Keep Breakfast Simple

As moms (and dads) on the go it's easy to skip breakfast to save a few minutes.  This can actually wreak havoc on your diet for the rest of the day.  Skipping breakfast not only makes you feel sluggish and grouchy it can slow down your metabolism and make you ravenous at lunch time; therefore vulnerable to making unhealthy choices.

Here are my simple suggestions to make breakfast easy and delicious:

1. Keep it simple:  Don't try to re-invent the wheel each morning.  Stick to the same routine and keep it simple.  If you are not a big eater in the morning don't plan on a huge meal.  Healthy whole-grain cereal and low-fat milk are your best friend.

2. Keep it healthy: Simple does not mean grabbing a doughnut or huge muffin from the local coffee shop!  Eat your breakfast at home before you run out the door. It will save your wallet and your waistline!

3.  Keep your pantry and fridge loaded with staples: I always make sure I have whole-grain, high fiber cereals and instant oatmeal  in the pantry and a healthy supply of fruits and nuts in the fridge.

My suggestion for breakfast: Kashi or any other organic brand cereal or oatmeal, blueberries, a handful of walnuts, dash of cinnamon and low-fat soy milk.  I eat it almost everyday.  I don't have to think about it - it's routine - and gets me going for the rest of the day.

Easy Tricks to Stay on Your "Diet"

The word diet is truly a four letter word.  I do not use the word in the context of starving yourself through-out the day or denying yourself all of your favorite foods.  Diet should refer to a lifestyle of eating healthy foods on a regular basis.
One of the things I often hear is that when someone goes on a diet they skip breakfast.  This actually has the opposite effect on the body that you are hoping for.  By skipping a meal you can cause a dip in your blood-sugar which can leave you sluggish, irritable, and ravenous at lunchtime.  Sound like someone you know?
This is what I do to stay on track:
1. Eat a healthy breakfast: Skipping breakfast can also make your brain crave high-fat foods.  So don’t leave the door without eating something healthy – even if it’s quick - like whole grain cereal or oatmeal with berries and skim milk. 
2. Eat one or two healthy snacks through-out the day:  If you are watching your weight the idea of eating a snack may seem preposterous.   But eating healthy snacks between meals helps to keep your metabolism up and running and keeps your blood sugar from dipping too low.  A couple of good choices are low-fat yogurt with a handful or almonds or berries, a banana with 1 TBL natural peanut butter, or cut up fruits and veges.  If you have them already cut up in baggies they are easy to grab on the go.
3. Get plenty of Sleep:  We all have busy schedules but lack of rest can be detrimental to our “diet” plan.  Lack of sleep can decrease our smart decision making abilities including what food choices we make.  The optimum amount of sleep is 7-8 hours every night.  Just 2 nights in a row of less than 7 hours can impair your decision making ability, leaving you vulnerable to making poor food choices.
4. Don’t Deny yourself all the foods you love: Unless it’s a doughnut that is!  I love pizza, wine and chocolate.  I could not go through life happily if I was not allowed to eat those foods again.  So I choose to make my own healthy pizzas: light on the cheese, no meat, and heavy on the vegetables, go easy on the wine, and eat only good quality dark chocolate in very small amounts.  This way I can continue to enjoy my favorite foods, not feel deprived,  and keep my “diet” on track.

Healthy Snack Choices

I happen to believe that healthy snacking is an important part of eating a well balanced diet.  Eating healthy snacks between breakfast and lunch and then again between lunch and dinner helps to keep you from becoming too hungry and then either over eating or making poor food choices at meal time.

Starting off you day with a healthy breakfast is the beginning of a great food day.  Add a little protein to your breakfast to help keep you feeling full for a longer period of time.  Skip the sweets like donuts or pastries and opt for Kashi cereals or oatmeal topped with fresh fruit and a few almonds or walnuts and make sure you use skim or low fat milk.

For your morning snack choose low fat yogurt (make sure it does not contain high fructose corn syrup or any artificial sweeteners) and top it with fresh berries, a sprinkle of cinnamon, and a couple of chopped walnuts.

For your afternoon snack I recommend you follow Elvis’s lead and eat a sliced banana with a heaping tablespoon of all natural peanut butter.

Here are a few other healthy snack options:

• Fruit smoothies: Opt to make your own with fresh or frozen fruit, low fat yogurt, a little light vanilla soy milk, and a dash of cinnamon – store bought smoothies may contain high fat yogurts or ice cream.
• Berries: They are sweet, easy to pop into your mouth, and a much healthier choice than a candy bar. Raspberries, blueberries, strawberries and blackberries are all anti-inflammatory, rich in flavonoids (compounds to protect cells against damage) and offer immune-boosting antioxidant activity.
• Cut Up Vegetables: The fiber in veggies will help fill you up, and they provide a nice, satisfying crunch. Choose a wide range of colors (broccoli, cauliflower and carrots are good choices). I like to keep baby carrots and cut broccoli on hand to have an easy to reach for snack.
• Nuts: When eaten sparingly, nuts are a great snack. Walnuts are rich in omega-3 fatty acids.  Nuts can be high in calories and fat (even if it's the healthy monounsaturated kind) so watch your portion control.
• Dark chocolate: An ounce of dark chocolate now and then will satisfy a sweet tooth while providing antioxidant polyphenols (A kind of chemical that may protect against some common health problems and possibly certain effects of aging). Choose high quality dark chocolate with at least 70 percent pure cocoa, and enjoy the rich flavor.

Mom (or Dad) on the Go Breakfast

We're always in a hurry but that is no reason not to take a few minutes and eat a healthy breakfast.   I try to eat my breakfast soon after the kids leave for school so that I don't let myself get too hungry and then start to think about unhealthy food choices.  To keep it simple I eat the same breakfast almost everyday.  It's simple, quick and full of good stuff:

Kashi Instant Oatmeal - Maple Brown Sugar
I add a sprinkle of cinnamon, a few whole walnuts, blueberries (about 2 dozen) and a few craisins for sweetness.

To drink I have a cup of green tea - I like Stash Green Chai Tea.


It's a simple, super healthy breakfast!

Steel Cut Oats

I remember a few years ago when Dr. Oz was still just a guest on the Oprah Show that he recommended eating Steel Cut Oats for breakfast.  So I ran out and bought some for myself but after I realized that I was going to have to cook them - and they take at least 20 minutes - and then add the flavoring myself - I thought it was too much work.  So I opted for the prepackaged oatmeal (from Kashi) which is still a great healthy choice and very convenient.

Recently I decided to try my hand at preparing  Steel Cuts Oats again and boy am I glad I took the time.  They are filling and delicious and with less processing they maintain their flavor and texture.  Steel Cut Oats are good for you because they are rich in whole grains, are high in B-vitamins, calcium, protein and fiber while low in salt and unsaturated fat. 

To flavor them I add a little bit of brown sugar, cinnamon, a few walnuts and blueberries.

Healthy Breakfast Idea

I have a new favorite breakfast that I wanted to share. It's super healthy, easy, and OH so yummy!

1 6oz Stoneyfield Organic Fat Free Chocolate Underground Yogurt
1/4 Heaping Cup of Cascadian Farm Organic Oats & Honey Granola Cereal
1/4 heaping Cup of fresh blueberries
1/4 tsp cinnamon

Empty yogurt into a bowl. Top with remaining ingredients. Enjoy!

Unhealthy Breakfast Choices

Doughnuts: High in sugar, trans-fats, calories and refined flour, doughnuts are not only bad for your waistline, but ultimately disastrous for your energy levels as well. The high sugar content is likely to end in a midday energy crash. If you crave a doughnut, try a piece of whole-grain bread with some jam and peanut butter instead.

Fast-Food “Breakfast Sandwiches:” The combination of low-quality, fried meats, processed cheese, and refined breads adds up to a high-calorie, high-sodium, fat-laden food. A better option is to make a sandwich at home - include whole-grain bread, low-fat cheese and fresh veggies, for an added dose of fiber.

Sugared Cereal: While different brands vary widely in the amount of added sugars (do your homework and read the labels), sugared cereals should not be a part of your morning routine - or your diet, period. If you crave sweetness, try adding a teaspoon of sugar to unsweetened whole-grain cereals, or try a bowl of steel-cut oats with some blackstrap molasses, which provides an added dose of calcium.

**From drweil.com 6/10/2009**

Welcome to my Blog!

I started this blog not because I am an expert in nutrition, diet or exercise but because I am a pushing forty, happily married, cancer surviving, mother of two who just wants to raise a healthy family without having to have a personal chef, trainer or a degree in nutrition. Why should I have to read the label of every single food item I buy for my family? What happened to food just being food?

Two years ago when I found I had cancer, my family and I, who already exercised and ate pretty healthy, really started doing a lot of research on what we were eating. We began to read the labels of everything we bought. The first few weeks of doing this meant for long hours at the grocery store. I found myself exclaiming out loud in the aisles, “I’ve been feeding this to my kids?” It produced a number of wary looks from fellow shoppers. Once I began to get a handle of what products I thought were okay and what to avoid it began to get much easier but what I found shocking is the number of preservatives, hidden trans fat, and over processed foods that are in our diets. Why should there be ten ingredients in butter? Shouldn’t butter just be cream and salt?
So I decided I would start off 2009 with a blog that had great food tips, easy healthy recipes, and information that I could share with others on getting back to a more natural way of eating. I wanted to help others so they would not have to do all the leg work I have done over the last couple of years to put healthy food on my families table.

1 Corinthians 6:19,20 (New Living Translation)
Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body.

The first thing I want to talk about is breakfast. For me, it’s boring. I do not get excited about breakfast at home. It is utilitarian. Although I would prefer a nice big toasted everything bagel with a bunch of cinnamon swirl cream cheese. That’s not what I eat. Six out of seven days a week I eat either cereal or oatmeal with fruit. I know it sounds pretty bland but you can really make it a great start to a super healthy day. Here are a few suggestions:

Kashi Heart to Heart Brown Maple Oatmeal
Kashi Go Lean Crunch Cereal
Kashi Heart to Heart Cereal










Whatever I choose I always add about a teaspoon of cinnamon to my cereal, ground flax seed (I’ll tell you why next), and fruit – usually blueberries or sliced bananas. To make the cold cereal even better I use light vanilla soy milk. I know it may sound strange but it is so good. I like it so much that I never use regular milk anymore. If you don’t like the extra vanilla flavoring than just get regular light soy milk. My favorite brand is Light Silk Soymilk. It’s all natural.

The reason I usually choose Kashi brand cereals or oatmeal is that I know I can trust that their products are going to be all natural. I don’t have to read the list of ingredients before buying their products – I have found from my research and reading the labels of many different brands of cereal that they consistently use all natural ingredients. Here’s their website if you want to look at the products they sell.

http://kashi.com/

I also want to add that I do not work for anybody or get anything for mentioning products. I am just simply sharing my opinion about products I love. As I mentioned, I have spent a lot of time reading labels and just want to share the information I have found so that I can help others get back to more natural way of eating.