No, breakfast is not the most important meal of the day, but it does have a lot to do with our health. And actually, this makes a lot of sense if we think that we have the same breakfast almost every day. Unlike dinner or lunch, breakfast is the meal of the day in which we vary the least. For this reason, experts have been criticizing foods such as juices, cookies or jams, which have been the typical breakfast for families in Spain for decades, for years.
For the gastroenterologist Trisha Pasrichawho is also a professor of Medicine at Harvard University, the perfect breakfast must meet three aspects: have a low glycemic index, eliminate hunger for many hours and do not increase the risk of diseases, such as cancer. The expert believes that it is essential that we make room in breakfast for fiber and healthy protein and, therefore, that we eliminate refined flours and processed meats.
In fact, Pasricha has spoken with the american newspaper The Washington Post and has provided six simple changes that we can make to our breakfast to make it healthier. All of them are foods that we also eat for breakfast in Spain, but they have very clear healthy substitutes. The first of the foods that this expert has pointed out is white bread, a food that we not only use for breakfast, but to accompany all meals of the day.
Frequent breakfasts
We Spaniards are used to the taste of white bread, but the problem is that to make it they have removed one of its healthiest parts from the wheat grain. Refined wheat is wheat from which the bran has been removed, a layer made up mainly of fiber and minerals. Without this layer, bread is rapidly transformed into increasingly simple sugars during digestionthat is, it has a high glycemic index. The alternative is, therefore, to switch to whole wheat bread, which does retain that bran.
“Whole grains are heart-healthy and help reduce the risk of colorectal cancer,” explains Pasricha. Therefore, the next group of breakfast foods that this expert has criticized is sugary cereals. If we like these cereals, The doctor suggests we change them for whole oat flakes. Yes, it is true that they do not have as much flavor as the others, but oats can be mixed with fruit and natural yogurt to obtain a sweet flavor in a healthy way.
Juices are one of the most beloved breakfast items, but experts have identified them as an unhealthy food despite coming from fruit. The expert recommends taking the whole fruit or making smoothies in which the fiber of the fruit is preserved. “While fruit juice seems like a healthy extension of the fruit, when the skin and pulp are removed, you actually lose a large part of your profits and you receive a glucose spike that stresses your pancreas,” explains Pasricha.
Healthy substitute
“Think of it this way: You probably wouldn’t eat three apples at once, but you can easily drink the equivalent amount of sugar in one serving of apple juice,” the expert adds. If you are one of those who eat cheese or yogurt for breakfast, the expert recommends that you take the fresh ones in the first case and the natural ones in the second. Besides, “Plain Greek yogurt can help you avoid hunger with half the carbohydrates and twice the protein of regular yogurt.
Pasricha lives in the United States, a country where eating processed meats like bacon or sausages for breakfast is often a cultural thing. However, We Spaniards also eat other processed meats first thing in the day. Basically, turkey cold cuts and Serrano or Iberian ham. Although, like the rest of the breakfasts, there is no harm in having them from time to time, if we want to include animal protein in our breakfast, Pasricha recommends that we have eggs for breakfast.
Unlike these meats, eating an egg a day has been linked to a lower risk of cardiovascular disease in the healthy population and contains a high amount of protein. Processed meats, remembers the expert, They have also been associated with an increased risk of colorectal cancer. Finally, Pasricha assures that drinking coffee for breakfast can reduce mortality, increase satiety and stimulate intestinal transit. But we should get used to its unsweetened flavor.
