USWNT’s Kristie Mewis Shares the Easy High-Protein Snacks She Loves

Team USA’s professional women’s soccer player Kristie Mewis will be on the field at the 2024 Paris Summer Olympic games, hoping to once again clinch a medal with the team. She continues to constantly train prepping for the summer matches, and with that comes prioritizing her nutrition and health goals.

Through her partnership with Activia Probiotic Dailies, we chatted with Mewis about her favorite meals to eat before and after practice. Plus, she shared her morning routine, favorite snacks—including high-protein picks—and why she doesn’t listen to music while she trains.

EatingWell: What does your typical morning routine look like?

Mewis: I wake up and I immediately have to have coffee—I am a coffee connoisseur. I can’t speak to anybody, I can’t do anything until I have a sip of coffee. I’ll make a full breakfast. I’m a big breakfast person, so sitting down and having coffee and just giving myself a minute is really important to me in the morning. That’s something that I look forward to. My commute to training is actually an hour, sometimes over an hour, so having an Activia Probiotic Daily with me in the car with a banana really helps me stay good until my next meal.

EatingWell: Why partner with Activia?

Mewis: Activia Probiotic Dailies drinks have been such an amazing addition to my diet and to my everyday snacking. It’s so good on the go. Our lives are just incredibly busy and the easier that we can make it, the better. It’s making me feel good, and it’s making me feel better every single day.

EatingWell: Do you have any favorite pre- or post-workout meals to keep you satisfied and energized?

Mewis: In the mornings I’ll have eggs and toast or oatmeal, something that keeps me really full but not too full where you don’t feel good. I feel like those have been my go-to breakfasts basically forever just because I feel like they make me feel the best when I’m training and performing. For lunch… I kind of hate lunch, honestly. I struggle so much with lunch food. But I’ll make chicken [and] sweet potato, or I’ll make a sandwich with some chips on the side. Just really simple stuff that makes you still feel good—I resort back to a lot of the stuff that I had in my childhood. I’ll even make a tuna fish sandwich. I love tuna and my mom used to make it for me all the time. And I’ll have peanut butter and jelly sometimes.

EatingWell: Any favorite snacks you always have on hand?

Mewis: For a snack, I’ll have an apple with peanut butter, cottage cheese and crackers or a bag of chips. Sometimes I’ll sit down and watch a whole [Netflix] series and crush a bag of chips by myself. It depends on how I’m feeling and what I feel like my body and my heart needs. Sometimes you just need a whole bar of chocolate, some days you need an apple. I think you have to find a balance with everything, and I think that that’s super important as an athlete but also just as a human.

EatingWell: Do you listen to music while you train?

Mewis: Sometimes I struggle with music because I like upbeat dance music, so it almost hypes me up too much before I go out and train or before a game. I need a little bit of calmness before, so I’ve honestly been listening to a lot of podcasts. I like hearing people speak, relating to them, hearing about their stories, just listening to different things being talked about.

EatingWell: Nighttime routine?

Mewis: I get home from the long day, do some recovery things that make me feel better the next day. Sometimes I feel like it’s annoying to do that, but it always does make you feel so much better. Take a long shower, anything to really just settle down mentally and physically and just make myself feel good. And the weather is getting nicer here so I’ll go on a nice walk and make a nice dinner at home.

Editor’s Note: This interview has been edited for clarity and length.