Breakfast IS Important - Breakfast Tips For The Time Challenged

No one at my house ever misses a meal, especially not breakfast. I can't imagine anyone going off to school or work with an empty, growling stomach. How can you concentrate or get anything done? Then, the other problem is that you are much more likely to overeat when you do stop for food. Studies show that people who eat breakfast are much more likely to maintain a healthy weight.

So what does the cardiologist's family eat for breakfast? On school/work days, we have something that is quick such as cereal, oatmeal, scrambled or sunny side-up eggs. Barry drinks coffee while the rest of us have orange juice or milk. The kids like shredded wheat, and I like multigrain Cheerios. Sometimes the kids make cheese toast, or have a sausage biscuit. One product I've tried are Jimmy Dean's D-Light breakfast sandwiches found in the freezer section. They have much less fat than a sausage biscuit and are made with egg whites and canadian bacon on an English muffin. They microwave in about two minutes. The kids eat toaster pastries once a week and fruit is always available.

The weekends usually mean a bigger, nicer breakfast. I make pancakes, muffins (Fiber One), coffe cake or biscuits. Now that Grace is an accomplished biscuit maker, she often takes over breakfast. We don't eat bacon or sausage often but we do eat it, maybe once a week. Eggs are perfectly fine to eat. I think they got a bad rap a few years ago but eat the egg whites if you'd rather. At 70 calories for one large egg, only 4 1/2 grams of fat plus protein, vitamin A, calcium and iron, they are perfectly nutritious.

A couple of years ago, there were several complaints about the quantity of food served in our local school's lunches. One woman wrote in a letter to the editor of the local paper that her son was often left hungry after eating lunch at school. However, she confessed in the letter that she and her son slept as late as possible and skipped breakfast or grabbed a granola (candy) bar. I was greatly offended that this woman blamed the school for not feeding her son, yet she made no effort to feed him before school herself! It really doesn't take much time to eat cereal and a bananna or to have boiled eggs on hand ready to eat in the morning.

Please don't start your morning with a soda or something sugary like donuts every day. The sugar load just leaves you hungry sooner and tired. Speaking of sodas, I hope my son can help me load a video soon that everyone needs to watch. It makes the point of not drinking excess sodas and sugary drinks very well so check back.

I hope that one of your New Year's resolutions will be to make breakfast a part of your regular routine if it isn't already. I think you'll realize the benefits right away.