subject: So what shall we have for breakfast? [print this page] So what shall we have for breakfast? So what shall we have for breakfast?
High-fibre carb-rich breakfasts make you feel fuller for longer, reducing your urge to snack, and keep you more alert during the morning.
There has been a lot of research done on breakfast. We are encouraged to eat it so that we are alert in the morning. The University of Sydney recommends a high-fibre carb-rich breakfast - which really means porage ( for us here in Scotland) or muesli, rather than more processed cereals. They find that it has great benefits when you are trying to control your eating and weight. Hypnotherapy can help you embed the decision to make this positive change.
The study involved eating a breakfast of around 490 calories. The high-fibre, carb-rich breakfast was the least delicious but was the most filling. Their results showed that after this breakfast, people ate less during the morning and at lunch. Hunger returned at a slower rate than after the low-fibre, carbohydrate-rich meal (the more processed kind of cereal). On the other hand, people who ate fat-rich breakfasts (bacon, black pudding, sausage, fried egg - a full Scottish breakfast) felt less satisfied and found they ate more later on in the morning. So after eating a calorie-dense breakfast, people felt hungry sooner.
By the end of the day, the average total calories eaten were significantly greater after the fat-rich breakfast than after the high-fibre, carbohydrate-rich meal.
So what can we learn from this if we are trying to manage our weight. There are 2 pointers. We should avoid fried breakfasts (eating them only as an occasional treat) because they tend to make you eat more overall, even after the breakfast. Well, I suppose most of us knew that already. The other thing is to eat porage and muesli because they are more filling and satisfying, with those nice full sensations lasting longer through the morning, so that we don't feel like eating till much later on. (I suppose the other point I would want to make is that eating regularly is one of the ways that we avoid the risk of hunger and panic eating.)
What else did they discover? They tested for alertness. On average, the high-fibre carb-rich meal was associated with the highest post-breakfast alertness ratings and with the greatest cumulative amount of alertness during the period between breakfast and lunch. Interestingly, alertness and a sense of fullness seemed to go together. Perhaps when you are feeling alert, you are more likely to get so absorbed in whatever it is that you are doing, that you can forget about weight and eating anxieties.
