Need some healthy breakfast ideas?
Breakfast is usually the hardest meal of the day for people to break the habit of eating bad foods.
Most people do want to start the day with a healthy breakfast but aren’t sure or don’t know what a healthy breakfast truly means.
With so much conflicting information, it’s very confusing to know what’s actually healthy.
You don’t need to be confused for much longer.
As both a doctor and a nutritionist, I’m going to share with you some delicious, filling and genuinely healthy breakfast ideas you’re going to love.
Remember: whatever you start your day with will regulate your blood sugar levels for the rest of the day.
Breakfast is the meal that will kick-start your metabolism.
So if you begin your day with processed cereals or other sugary foods, your whole day is going to be a sugar yo-yo. A recent study indicated that15% of adults participating in the study skipped breakfast, and as a result were likely to miss out on key nutrients that would support their health and wellbeing throughout the day.
You should always start your day with protein and make sure your meal is something warm.
Protein shakes are not the answer — find out why in my article about protein shake myths.
What A Healthy Breakfast Does Not Look Like
If you’re a porridge fan, the news isn’t great.
Porridge is not protein, and oats aren’t necessarily good for you. In addition, many people coat porridge with honey or sugar too.
For many people, oats are akin to eating wheat grains, because they can cause bloating and intestinal upset.
Even if oats don’t cause you any problems, you should still be starting your day with protein. It’s better for your body, your hormones and it’s more filling.
Cereals and toast are made from processed grains, which are essentially sugars, so it’s best we all avoid them.
Especially if you’re pregnant, excess consumption of sugars and grains can leave you dealing with gestational diabetes (which can ultimately affect your birth experience due to higher interventions), thrush and other health problems.
If you’re trying to conceive, inflammatory conditions like PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome) and endometriosis are more likely to flare up when you consume too many grains and sugars.
So on that note, here are 13 healthy breakfast ideas the whole family will love! Mix and match ingredients to your taste.
13 Healthy Breakfast Ideas
All of these ideas are without any breads or cereals.
#1: Poached eggs and smoked salmon (only eat cooked fish while pregnant)
#2: Spanish omelette, consisting of two or three eggs, Spanish onion, olives, chorizo, sun-dried tomatoes and parmesan cheese
#3: Grilled avocado (cut in halves), topped with ham off the bone, sliced tomato, cheese and finished with tomato salsa. This can be made vegetarian by removing the ham.
#4: Chicken chipolata sausage with sautéed spinach, onion and capsicum – you can now buy paleo sausages in some supermarkets
#5: Bacon, eggs, avocado and sautéed spinach
#6: Leftovers – double up your dinner efforts and have a yummy, hot, grain-free breakfast
#7: Almond meal porridge (almond meal, milk or water heated like oat porridge)
#8: Chicken mince (fried up with butter, extra virgin coconut or olive oil), with grated zucchini or other greens
#9: Plain boiled eggs (a pinch of salt is perfectly fine)
#10: Mini frittatas. Simply use your favourite quiche ingredients and put in muffins tins
#11: Savoury mince with some steamed kale
#12: Scrambled eggs
#13: Sardines – preferably fresh and pan-fried
*BONUS – TREAT ONLY!*
Almond meal pancakes topped with fresh berries (lower carb than other fruit) and natural yoghurt.
Combine almond meal, 1 egg and milk, mixed into a pancake batter.
They’re made like traditional pancakes, minus the flour.
These are for treats on the weekend, rather than a daily breakfast.
How To Cook Perfect Scrambled Eggs
Check out this video of Gordon Ramsey’s scrambled egg recipe… it’s amazing!
Ditch the bread, but the rest… DELICIOUS!
Cooking The Perfect Healthy Breakfast For You
Basically, a good old-fashioned cook up is perfect… minus the bread, bakes beans or other grains, as well as any sugary sauces or dressings.
Cook your healthy breakfast with a healthy oil or fat. Great choices are butter or virgin coconut oil, which have a huge range of health benefits that other oils simply can’t offer.
Coconut oil also has a high smoke point, unlike other oils. Olive oil is also fine to use but is best used cold as a dressing.
The most important thing to remember: a healthy breakfast should always consist of protein and be a warm meal.
This will help to get your metabolism going and assist with regulating blood sugar levels for the rest of the day.
Protein will also help you to feel more full, and for longer.
These are just a few examples of a healthy breakfast. There are many other healthy breakfast ideas you could be eating on a daily basis.
Just knowing the above simple rules can help get your creative juices flowing. Enjoy!
Articles posted on BellyBelly which are not written by Doctor Andrew Orr are the opinions of BellyBelly and not necessarily the opinion of Doctor Andrew Orr.