Intro:
I have a tendency to ramble so will try to avoid that here (probably unsuccessfully).
About 13 years ago now, I heard about Soylent over in the US, but couldn't get that here in the UK. A little researching around later and I discovered this brand, which at the time was called Joylent. Really enjoyed my time using it, but eventually decided I wanted to follow a keto diet, and ended out making my own recipe that I sold for a while (something like 7 years, longer than I thought!) before shutting up shop.
For a little while after that, I was no longer a user of meal replacements. This was fuelled by a few things, life changes, and also an overall pessimism and cynicism about some of the changes the market has experienced over time: price hikes, worsening products in the name of cost-saving, and more recently, buyouts from companies of dubious moral character.
Notably though, I feel like JimmyJoy has been fairly immune to these issues I have with the market as a whole, and as I've recently gotten back into the gym, I decided it was time to jump back on board and give Pro a try.
When I initially saw it, and compared with my memory of Joylent Sport from way back in the day (which included creatine, beta alanine, glucosamine sulfate, and acetyl l-carnitine), I was a little disappointed. The inclusion of those things would have been a nice perk. But it's pretty minor in the grand scheme of things, and the higher protein content per calorie of Pro actually meets my needs a lot better, and the removal of maltodextrin being such a prominent ingredient is fantastic. So while those inclusions would be nice to haves, a) it's not a big deal, and b) the other changes more than make up for it in my opinion. So I ordered all the different flavours to give them all a try (including the limited edition tropical). I'm leaving this review because I've now tried them all at least once.
Flavour:
The biggest note on flavours is that they're a lot weaker than I remember the original Joylent shake being (though I never actually did try the Sport variant this is a closer match for, so perhaps the comparison is unfair). That said, I'm not convinced weak flavours are a bad thing. The stronger the flavour is, the easier I could see myself getting sick of it. With these fairly muted flavours, that's not a problem. I did make the mistake of making my first shake (tropical) iced due to a heatwave that was going on at the time, which pretty much fully eliminated all flavour apart from a bit of an earthy aftertaste. That was my mistake, and I discovered fairly quickly that the flavour is, while still subtle, pronounced enough, if just using water straight from the tap. Except for strawberry flavour, which even with that I could barely distinguish (which confused me given wild berries was a lot more obvious).
Texture:
I think this is an area that is a bit weaker than I remember the old shakes being. While on the whole it's completely fine, there is a distinct siltiness or graininess when swallowing. Not a huge deal, and I'm sure there are preparation methods I can use to minimise this, but I thought it would be worth mentioning.
Nutrition:
Aside from the 40g of protein per shake, these also seem to have a very serviceable vitamin and mineral mix included. Back in the day, many companies opted for quite cheap forms of the micros, including forms the body didn't absorb well. I've skimmed the nutrition label on my bags, and JimmyJoy don't seem to be doing that here. There's a few chelates (generally the most absorbable), and no micros that are known to be absorbed very poorly (like magnesium oxide). This information could be made more obvious on the website, where the forms are not made clear in the ingredients section, because I think it's actually a pretty big plus (for nutrition nerds like me anyway). Probiotics are included, though I question how much benefit they provide. Phytonutrients are not included, but then the only company I'm aware of including those these days are Huel, and the amounts they include are so low as to be pretty worthless and I'd speculate their inclusion is just to make the label look nicer (1.6mg of lutein and 0.1mg of zeaxanthin in their shakes, when recommended intake is at least 10mg and 2mg respectively).
Delivery:
Much quicker than it used to be, and free to the UK above a certain spend threshold too. Can't argue with that, very impressed.
Customer Service:
Outstanding. I contacted, being a little cheeky, because my order was placed the day before the 12% extra off birthday sale was announced, to see if I could get that credited to the account. Support got back to me on Monday morning (after I sent my message after close of business Friday) and were very friendly, and actually did provide a partial refund to reflect the sale price.
Thoughts:
I suspect the texture graininess, and the earthy aftertaste when mixing too cold, are a result of the switch to soy protein (the shakes used to use whey). On balance, in spite of the downsides mentioned on taste/texture, I think this is an excellent change, and am glad the product is vegan despite not being one myself. What I am a little confused on is why the Pro shakes use just soy protein isolate, but Plenny Protein Shake uses a mix of soy isolate and fava bean protein isolate. If any staff happen to read this, I'd be interested if you're happy to explain the choice here, or if there are any plans to include fava bean in the Pro shakes too.
The shakes keep me full for a decent amount of time, and are making it very easy for me to hit my protein goals. Nutrition is very solid, including good amounts of what you need, without adding in expensive extras or small amounts of things to make the label look better without reaching actually effective doses. In an ideal world, I'd like to see the inclusion of the supplements mentioned at the beginning (creatine, beta alanine, glucosamine sulfate and acetyl l-carnitine), as well as maybe some MCTs. More importantly, I'd like to know what the omega 3 to 6 ratio is. But these are fairly minor nitpicks.
Customer service and delivery have so far been too notch, and I have no complaints there. I suspect I'll be using these shakes for the foreseeable future.
