How Important is Breakfast?

[weinoo]

I guess it depends on your point of view. 

 

The Most Important (and Literary?) Meal of the Day

 

Quote

 

Breakfast is the least analyzed meal. With quarantine, it’s taken on new meaning. We’re no longer grabbing a coffee and a corn muffin from the minimart, hustling to work as if Vince Lombardi were chewing us out. Some of us are taking more care with it.

There’s a small literature of the meal. I’ve owned breakfast cookbooks I’ve never opened. (Breakfast cookbooks are always slightly ridiculous.) But there is also, if you’re alert to it, a lot to be gleaned from novels, biographies and memoirs about starting your culinary day.

 

 

We certainly feel it's important here!

Edited May 7, 2020 by weinoo (log)

[kayb]

I'm not good at eating breakfast, as it's a habit I just never acquired. I much prefer to wait until mid-morning to eat, and that meant, when work was a "regular thing," usually resorting to high-carb or high-sugar type things. I've tried making egg cups, etc., to take to work, and they just don't do a lot for me.

 

I've worked at home for several years now, and I've gotten a bit better at breakfast. I still want somethign quick; the only time I'm want to put much bother into breakfast is on the weekend. Greek yogurt and granola and a little fruit usually do it for me. 

 

[Okanagancook]

Great Topic @weinooAs a retired Registered Dietitian I think I have heard everything when it comes to asking clients:  "so, what's your usual breakfast?"

 

I personally get nauseous if I don't eat something with my tea in the morning..usually first thing.  This may have something to do with us not snacking in the evening.  That would mean after dinner (usually around 7 pm) it's been almost 12 hours since I ate last.  My liver glucose  stores are reaching low points.  This means blood sugar levels could be hard to maintain which means the brain is not happy.  The brain is a big user of glucose which it draws out of the blood stream.  If the liver is struggling it will breakdown protein stores (muscle) to get glucose for blood glucose levels.  This is one of the high priority functions in the body...Keep the brain working and happy.   Here's a little recap:  https://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/breakfast-lose-weight#3

Those wishing more detail can look here 😎 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4050641/

 

With that background @kayb your Greek yogurt and granola is really a wonderful choice....protein and quickly absorbed carbs (but not too much) from the yogurt and mainly complex carbs from the granola.    That combo:  a little simple sugar/mainly complex and protein at breakfast is ideal in my mind.  There are loads of ideas out there:  These combinations are what we used to recommend...I've been retired since 2005 but I don't think the liver and brain have changed that much!  Take it or leave it.

 

Doesn't have to be a large amount of food

1.  cheese/ham/cold cuts/eggs (boiled for ease)/peanut butter or other nut butter/hummus or other bean blend/baked beans (a personal favourite)/or other bean side like refried beans/high protein cereal like Vector, etc...you get the idea.

2.  whole grain/higher fibre something with a small piece of fruit.

 

 

 

[chromedome]

Cool links, OC, I'll give 'em a read when I'm done for the day.

 

I also fall into the immediate-breakfast camp. That may be in part because I settle in to do "brain work" ASAP,  as the morning is my most-productive writing time. My almost-invariable breakfast, year-round, is steel-cut oats with a splash of milk and a topping of homemade applesauce; and a couple of toasted slices of my usual (100% whole wheat, home-baked) sandwich bread, one of which will have peanut butter on it. As you may gather, low-carbing holds no allure for me at all!

 

I don't find the high-protein egg breakfast appeals to me at all in the mornings. I feel greasy and bloated until mid-morning, and then I'm abruptly ravenous. My oatmeal 'n' toast combo, OTOH, keeps my belly happy until lunchtime. The only time I *don't* eat this in the morning is if I've forgotten to make a batch the evening before: I do a full cup of oats to a litre of water, and then reheat a portion each morning in the microwave.

[Okanagancook]

"Cool links, OC, I'll give 'em a read when I'm done for the day."

 

Good luck with the first link....the sunglasses are there for a reason!!!

 

Your breakfast sounds fabulous.  I hear you about the eggs.....I have to be in the mood but a boiled egg thinly sliced with a few chopped anchovies & parsley on top....

[chromedome]

27 minutes ago, Okanagancook said:

"Cool links, OC, I'll give 'em a read when I'm done for the day."

 

Good luck with the first link....the sunglasses are there for a reason!!!

 

Your breakfast sounds fabulous.  I hear you about the eggs.....I have to be in the mood but a boiled egg thinly sliced with a few chopped anchovies & parsley on top....

No worries, this is exactly the kind of thing I geek out on in my (vanishingly rare) free time. I was the kid who read his Britannica from cover to cover (admittedly, my eyes glazed over from time to time). When I see an interesting article at one of the many science/tech/nutrition sites I visit regularly, I'll usually click through to the underlying studies.

Just for the record, I'm not at all averse to a nice plate of bacon and eggs, or an omelette (and for that matter, eggs Bennie in various forms is one of my GF's favorites, and therefore crops up frequently in our home). I just don't usually eat them at breakfast time.

[ElsieD]

I rarely eat breakfast although mid-morning I'll sometimes have a muffin.  For lunch, I often eat breakfast type foods such as oatmeal and a handful of grapes or a banana.   I also like greek yogurt mixed with chopped fresh fruit such as pineapple with bran buds mixed in with it.  Looks like a mess, but I like it.  Breakfast also sometimes shows up for lunch in the form of poached or fried eggs on toast.  Pretty boring stuff.

[blue_dolphin]

6 hours ago, weinoo said:

I guess it depends on your point of view. 

 

The Most Important (and Literary?) Meal of the Day

 

What a great little collection of literary references - thanks for sharing!  

 

Not sure what it is about the pet stories, but I must say that I'd also love to have seen, “Herman Melville at breakfast feeding a sardine to his cat.” 😺 or witness Harry Crews, "puncture a biscuit and fill it with syrup, and then keep refilling it until it wouldn’t absorb anymore. He’d put two pieces of fried pork on top and share the whole thing with his dog."🐶

[MokaPot]

Normal breakfast is steel-cut oats w/dried fruit (boring). If I don't eat a breakfast, I end up craving glazed donuts & stuff like that.

 

For a leisurely restaurant breakfast, prefer savory to sweet, e.g., omelet or Eggs Benedict.

[JoNorvelleWalker]

Often as not I do not eat until dinner.  Which around here can be after midnight.  Though yesterday I had an oatmeal breakfast around 5:00 pm, and the day before an omelet at 6:00 pm.  (And an exceptional omelet it was.)

 

 

[Okanagancook]

3 hours ago, ElsieD said:

I rarely eat breakfast although mid-morning I'll sometimes have a muffin.  For lunch, I often eat breakfast type foods such as oatmeal and a handful of grapes or a banana.   I also like greek yogurt mixed with chopped fresh fruit such as pineapple with bran buds mixed in with it.  Looks like a mess, but I like it.  Breakfast also sometimes shows up for lunch in the form of poached or fried eggs on toast.  Pretty boring stuff.

Your timing is off a bit 🙃

[Okanagancook]

30 minutes ago, JoNorvelleWalker said:

Often as not I do not eat until dinner.  Which around here can be after midnight.  Though yesterday I had an oatmeal breakfast around 5:00 pm, and the day before an omelet at 6:00 pm.  (And an exceptional omelet it was.)

 

 

No comment😇

[ElsieD]

39 minutes ago, Okanagancook said:

Your timing is off a bit 🙃

 

I know.  I'm also now thinking my post isn't relevant to the topic.

[Okanagancook]

Well, from your response it isn’t important to you.

My experience is people are either breakfast eaters or they not.  😍

Edited May 8, 2020 by Okanagancook (log)

[gfweb]

When I'm working, I have black coffee all morning.

 

Maybe some peanut butter crackers or chips at lunch, or maybe a diet coke. Or both.

 

But right now ... I eat 3 squares a day and I'm fat.

[liuzhou]

Rather disappointed the article only mentions a short reference to James Joyce's Finnegans Wake rather then the chapter of Ulysses where Leopold Bloom not only makes his  wife breakfast in bed, but also feeds the cat then goes shopping for his own, returns and cooks and  eats it. It is  by far the best description of a breakfast I know.

 

Quote

Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls. He liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards, a stuffed roast heart, liverslices fried with crustcrumbs, fried hencods’ roes. Most of all he liked grilled mutton kidneys which gave to his palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine.

 

Kidneys were in his mind as he moved about the kitchen softly, righting her breakfast things on the humpy tray. Gelid light and air were in the kitchen but out of doors gentle summer morning everywhere. Made him feel a bit peckish.

 

The coals were reddening.

 

Another slice of bread and butter: three, four: right. She didn’t like her plate full. Right. He turned from the tray, lifted the kettle off the hob and set it sideways on the fire. It sat there, dull and squat, its spout stuck out. Cup of tea soon. Good. Mouth dry. The cat walked stiffly round a leg of the table with tail on high.

 

 

The full passage is here.

 

[Okanagancook]

@gfweb

deep down, you’re a breakfast eater😃

your weight gain is not because of breakfast..but total daily intake increase perhaps coupled with a reduction in energy expenditure?

cut down what you are eating At each meal by 1/3 and take Henry for a run..trying to helpful even though you weren’t asking!

[weinoo]

I am, and always have been, a breakfast person; practically my favorite meal of the day, always (99.99% of the time) at home.

 

During the course of a week, eggs show up, oatmeal shows up, cheese, yogurt and butter show up, fruit shows up, leftovers show up, bread/toast shows up, nuts show up, etc. etc. It's all there in the breakfast thread; it's (almost) always healthy in the way OC mentions, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

 

Also - there's great coffee, which always happens before any food appears.

[weinoo]

Any and all weight gain I might suffer is attributable to a lack of my normal walking around the city 2 - 3 miles per day.

[Okanagancook]

Ouch, that’s a lot of city walking...makes my feet ache.
 When we lived downtown in Montreal we used to walk a lot too...but that was 46 years ago...no arthritis in the old feet then.

 

you didn’t mention bagels?

 

Edited May 8, 2020 by Okanagancook (log)

[gfweb]

46 minutes ago, Okanagancook said:

@gfweb

deep down, you’re a breakfast eater😃

your weight gain is not because of breakfast..but total daily intake increase perhaps coupled with a reduction in energy expenditure?

cut down what you are eating At each meal by 1/3 and take Henry for a run..trying to helpful even though you weren’t asking!

Yup, I love breakfast.

But I can't bear the delay for prep and eating when there's work to do.

And knowing I have to get to work makes a calm breakfast impossible exc on the weekend.  unless I'm playing golf or fishing.

But when the weather sucks and I'm not working, I'm all over breakfast. 😉

[heidih]

I am a leap out of bed and go person. No coffee needed. I first eat depending on when I last ate the night before. I do not eat heavy meals at one sitting but last night lentils and and  eggplant stew thing so this morn no appetite until maybe 2pm. I get working right away and no "brain fueling issue"'. I think when I finally 86'd the eating disorder years ago I became an eat when hungry person= eliminate obsessing.  I tried variations of oatmeal with a tad of protein but I must be carb sensitive so for me =ravenous hunger. We are all unique

[weinoo]

9 hours ago, Okanagancook said:

Ouch, that’s a lot of city walking...makes my feet ache.
 When we lived downtown in Montreal we used to walk a lot too...but that was 46 years ago...no arthritis in the old feet then.

 

you didn’t mention bagels?

I love bagels, but they must be good bagels; I don't suffer bad bagels gladly.

Edited May 8, 2020 by weinoo (log)

[scamhi]

I stopped eating breakfast. it is NOT important except to the folks selling breakfast foods.

I start my eating 16-18 hours after we finish dinner the previous night.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/17/well/eat/the-benefits-of-intermittent-fasting.html

[chromedome]

1 hour ago, scamhi said:

I stopped eating breakfast. it is NOT important except to the folks selling breakfast foods.

 

We'll agree to disagree. It *is* important if you're a breakfast person, and it's not if you aren't a breakfast person. As HeidiH said upthread, "we are all unique" and there is vanishingly little about food that is truly "one size fits all."