I'm a skinny guy too. IMO small frequent meals are the way to go. It's hard for me to eat a lot, so trying to gorge myself with few meals stuffing as many calories into each of them ended up defeating me. I can have a massive meal at lunch time, and literally not want to eat for the entire rest of the day. I'm guess I'm not alone on this, even though I may be an extreme case.
Think about it this way, you can have your shake with 2 scoops of whey, peanut butter, oats, bread, chicken legs, what have you, and if you are taking it during the day, you're going to be pretty full for a long time, take it at night and you're not going to sleep very well and wake up feeling bloated and like crap.
Instead of that, try a simple one scoop whey shake with water with a banana. It's fast, easy, and most importantly, not that filling. Us ectomorphs have to make our calories count since there is limited stomach real estate
Since a whey shake with just water isn't that filling, you should be fine having them between each meal as a snack. That will yield you far more good calories throughout the day than one of those mega bodybuilding shakes, not to mention it shouldn't disrupt your appetite too much causing you to want to miss or skimp on your meals.
I have a hard time eating during the day, so I try to stack as many small meals and snacks throughout the day as I can to stack up calories, then when I get home from work I eat a decent sized dinner. For breakfast It's usually a whey shake with a banana or oatmeal or a few hard boiled eggs, lunch is a chicken breast with half a can of beans, and I tend to gorge myself with dinner.
Raw almonds mixed with raisins in an 8oz container makes a good snack too. Oh, yes, and also I'd be hesitant having too much olive oil too early in the day. That's just a personal thing though, but it would just be too filling for me to do and keep me from eating. I save the oils, flax seed, etc for night time.
Also consider strength training if possible. Not only will it increase your appetite, but it will stimulate muscle growth, and muscle weighs more than fat.
I'm sure you've heard this 1000 times, yeah breakfast IS very important. I always knew it, but didn't find out just how important until recently. Never been a breakfast person all my life until a few weeks ago, and strangely, on days I eat breakfast I'm hungrier and able to eat more for lunch and dinner. Calories from an extra meal plus an added bonus! Even if it's just a whey shake and a banana, eat SOMETHING for breakfast if you aren't already.
I'm incredibly underweight, but it's because I never really enjoyed eating as much as most people, don't know why. I'm serious about gaining weight now, so I don't look at eating the same anymore. Rather than something to do for enjoyment or when I'm hungry, I'm strategic about it...each meal being applied to a purpose. It's helped me, at least.
In the last few years I have gone from 90 lbs to 120 lbs (being 5'6). I still have a long way to go, but I've made pretty good progress, albeit sporadic due to lapses and going back and forth trying to quit smoking. But I'll get to my goal eventually.
Best of luck, man.
edit: You can get whey pretty cheaply if you buy bulk online. Back in March, I bought online a 20 lb bag of whey concentrate/isolate blend on par qualitywise with ON 100% for 100 bucks after applying discount codes I had found on other web forums using google
Private message me if you want the name of the site I from whence I purchased it, as I am unfamiliar as to whether this forums has rules against mentioning supplement companies.
Edited by javyn, 20 August 2009 - 02:47 AM.
