Summertime Breakfast

What did you have for breakfast this morning? Years ago when I was overweight - ranging from 25 to 50 pounds overweight, I never had time for breakfast. I couldn’t stomach the mere thought of breakfast. But by mid morning I could usually be found at the office snack shop wolfing down a Danish with coffee. 

Now that I’m thin and have been thin for 30 years, I eat breakfast every morning. Pat and I quickly whip up some scrambled or eggs fried in a bit of butter and add fruit - this morning we shared an apple and an orange. He jump-starts his day with coffee, I eat an ounce or so of dark chocolate. From start to finish our morning ritual takes about 15 minutes. Unless we get to talking and that’s fun, too.  

Our summer breakfasts usually contain a summer-type fruit - watermelon, cherries, peaches, but not today. We need to do a grocery store run soon. 

From all the research pouring from the news leads every day, we all know that eating breakfast stokes one’s metabolism, that folks who eat breakfast weight less, and that women who eat eggs for breakfast weight less. To sum up the research, eating breakfast keeps weight gain at bay and aids weight loss. 

I have personal prejudices, I admit. I think that a soy or protein shake could possibly be good for a snack, but hardly for a breakfast. A person’s stomach just isn’t well designed by nature to efficiently get much value from soy protein. Perhaps if you put tofu - a fermented soy product in your shake, you’d get more value. I favor eggs or another source of animal protein because when you eat it for breakfast, it can banish the 4 pm hungry blues. (Yes, I’m the one at the continental breakfasts in hotels both in the US and abroad who pulls out a 3-oz. tuna packet to eat with the fresh fruit. I need the energy.) 

Danishes are yummy, but I think they helped make me fat. Ditto the pastries, cereals, and starchy grain-based products. If they stave off your hunger for 4 hours, they’re working for you. If I starches for breakfast, I crave sweets and starches all day long. By dinner, I yearn to hold the real food and instead eat a couple desserts. 

There’s a couple HOT news items on health that will get more and more significant in the next year, so keep an eye out for more. Probiotics (which now include important life-giving viruses and fungi) may dictate your moods, health, condition of your teeth, and aging. Researchers now plan to corral the power of probiotics, etal, to rid the body of bacterial infections in place of antibiotics. Even your skin uses bacteria to create a protective shield that could help prevent wrinkles and infections. 

The zinc in sunscreen isn’t so great after all. When exposed to ultraviolet light, it becomes chemically active and produces compounds that harm your skin. Best idea: wear a hat. For now, wear sunscreen. I anticipate next summer’s crop of sunscreens will find a way around this problem.

I’ve had a problem with my right foot off and on for couple years: plantar fasciitis one year, dislocated metatarsals the next. Last winter it was an inflamed tendon. Finally, I realized that I love to sit on my right foot. I do it at dinner, at meetings, whenever I think I can get away with it. Well, even if no one saw me, I didn’t get away with it. I’m consciously and mindfully NOT doing this anymore and so far I haven’t had any more foot “itis”es or such.  Fingers crossed I have solved this puzzle. 

And about the herniated disc in my neck - which was so yucky last summer. I have placed my computer screen on a 16-inch wooden crate/ box so that the bottom of my screen is at eye height. I no longer bend my neck forward for long hours to write. Watercolor painting was also a problem. The time-old tradition is to sit down and bend over the paper. I can’t do this anymore, so I’m standing up at an easel. It’s confused my various teachers: I set up my easel in the back of class and try to stay under the radar. Only one teacher simply didn’t want me in class anymore. My art isn’t as precise, but I’m still having fun. 

And I really hope you’re having fun, too, this summer. Summer activities here in Utah only last 3 short months - street fairs, art festivals, outdoor concerts, breakfast on the deck, dinners on the patio, balloon festivals, parades, and rodeos. I’ve gotten so relaxed and laid back this summer, that as I was paging through the July Better Homes & Gardens, I read the following note: “Buying in bulk can save up to 50 percent, says, Lucy Beale,” My first thought was, “oh, my gosh, that girl has a name like mine. I wonder who she is.” To continue, “coauthor of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Eating Well on a Budget. But using up 5 pounds of anything before it goes bad or you get bored is tough. Go in on the haul with friends.” 

Turns out that girl is me. Have a wonderful summer. 

Love, 

Lucy Beale Partridge

Author, books at www.lucybeale.com

801-501-8240