It's likely that your mom has told you the same thing that my mom has told me... that breakfast is the most important meal of the day.
But it works both ways. It can be the most important meal for helping you stay lean, focus better, and remember things better. Or it can be the most important meal to shut off fat burning, put on weight, and have a foggy, unproductive brain.
Why?
It depends on what you eat for breakfast. The food you eat in the morning helps set up your neurotransmitters (brain chemicals) for the day. So its important to get the right "morning" foods into your body.
At Genesis Gym, during out initial client consultations, we always ask what a person eats. Over the years, we have collected data from thousands of clients, and here are the most common answers to "what do you eat for breakfast?"
Bread
Milk
Cereal
Hawker food (bee hoon, noodles, pau etc)
Various toppings like peanut butter, kaya, jam etc
The problems with these choices are discussed below.
During the night, you are in a fasted state and your body tends to want to burn fat, this is great news for most people, and this fat burning effect can continue through the morning.
But it STOPS once you put some carbohydrates into your body. So that means bread, cereal, noodles, and the other choices listed above -- all of which are high in carbohydrates, will prematurely shut off fat burning making it harder to stay lean and healthy.
In addition, our brains enjoy fat as a fuel source for active thinking, focus and memory, so low fat foods are a bad choice. The above choices tend to also be low fat foods which will make us less energetic and productive.
This is one reason why many people "get to work" at about 9am but only start working at 1030 or 11am! Their brains are just not ready for thinking yet because of all the elevated blood sugar from a poor breakfast food choice.
Finally, many of the food choices are highly processed and have many ingredients that humans have an intolerance for. When you are intolerant of something, it can lead to lower energy, brain-fog, increased bloating, increased fat storage and a damaged digestive tract.
The most common "culprits" are wheat and milk.
Since breakfast is so important, it makes sense to put a few minutes of time, and a few ounces of effort into doing it right. So what should a brain and body friendly breakfast have?
1. A healthy source of fat
I'm not talking about deep fried dumplings, or potato chips. I mean natural sources of fat that will keep you brain well "fed" and allow your body to stay in a fat burning mode. Things like coconut oil, coconut cream, grape seed and olive oil, omega-3s from fish oil, and butter are good choices.
2. A healthy source of protein
You use up a lot of protein during the night as a detoxification agent. Your liver uses up a lot of protein as "tow-trucks" to connect to toxins and allow them to leave your body. So you start each day in a protein "debt". Getting some protein in the morning is the best way to get out of debt.
This means that a healthy breakfast would include some of the following ingredients. Choose one or more from each list, and rotate the foods (not the same thing every day).
Protein choices: Eat till satisfied
Any lead red meat
Any seafood
Any poultry
Eggs (buy the more expensive, free range kind, they tend to give less digestion problems)
Greek yoghurt (not the sweetened processed stuff)
Fat choices: 3-4 thumb size servings
Egg yolks
Coconut cream
Butter
Cream
Olive oil, grapeseed oil
Omega-3 fats from fish or supplements
Any Natural Nuts one handful/30g/about 25 nuts
Yes, you will need to prepare food the night before if you don't have time to cook in the morning. Yes it's different from what most people eat, and yes it will take some time to get used to the new habits. But for a little effort, you will have a breakfast the allows you to stay leaner, think better, and feel better all at once.
I even suggest that our clients ask for a raise as they improve their nutrition habits. After all, that's what increased productivity is for.
Coach Jonathan Wong has a Doctorate of Science in Holistic Medicine, and is the author of "The Happy Body - Getting to the root of YOUR fitness, health and productivity". He is also the Founder and CEO of Genesis Gym Singapore, which aims to provide the best personal training and fitness services in Singapore.
