Friday, March 30, 2007

Breakfast Five Ways

I accomplished my goal of five different breakfasts; one for each workday this week. Here is the breakdown.

  • Monday - Kashi Cinnamon Harvest cereal, blueberries and non fat milk. A light breakfast because I had a lunch meeting that day. Being cereal, it was quick and easy.
  • Tuesday - Whole wheat english muffin with peanut butter and bananas with a glass of non fat milk. Very filling. I didn't eat until after my noon run.
  • Wednesday - Steel cut Oatmeal with blueberries and maple syrup. The longest to cook, but sure was tasty. I usually have this on Saturday mornings. I ended up reading the newspaper as I cooked the oatmeal.
  • Thursday - Breakfast sandwich with a toasted whole wheat English muffin, Canadian bacon, a fried egg and salsa. Easier than I thought and filling.
  • Friday - Two croissants and jelly. Very Italian style breakfast. Very tasty, but I am sure not that healthy, but once a week can't hurt right?
My favorites were probably the oatmeal and the breakfast sandwich. I was going to make pancakes on Friday, but I ran out of eggs. I probably need to find a couple more quick breakfasts so I can rotate more variety. I am looking for more savory options. Any suggestions?

Friday, March 23, 2007

Recipe Update

I am going to move my recipes to my new website My Cookbook. That way I won't clog the blog with long recipes, and all the recipes will be found in a single location. It will also get me more space to let me comment on food in general. I will first be adding the recipes that are already on the blog. As I add new recipes, I will let you know here first.

Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a pauper

A while back I lamented about my too sweet American breakfast and I was going to search for a less sweet alternative. Ultimately, I switched my bowl of Kashi Go Lean Crunch to a bowl of Kashi Cinnamon Harvest cereal with non fat milk and some blueberries for my fruit. The new cereal is less sweet, full of fiber and whole grains, so I was content. But something happened over the last several weeks when I started to increase my weekly running miles. During my lunch time workout, I was starving, even though I ate my new whole grain cereal and having a mid morning snack (a banana). I realized I probably needed more protein in my morning meal.

The other thing that hit me was we generally desire meal variety at lunch and dinner, but for breakfast many of us are creatures of habit and eat the same thing most mornings. We even get upset when the box of cereal that we each morning is empty forcing us to find something else or just skip breakfast. To get more morning protein, I needed to break my breakfast habits, so that means variety.

I remembered an old German proverb;

"Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a pauper."

This eating pattern makes a lot of sense. The problem is who has the time to cook for a king in the morning. I need to have a variety of healthy protein filled breakfasts that can be made in minutes. Leftover homemade pizza, seems like a natural, as do some sort of breakfast egg sandwich and something with peanut butter, along with my standard cereal and my favorite oatmeal. I will try 5 different breakfasts next week and report if my breakfasts are fit for a king.