Does Your Breakfast Make You Amazing?

I saw this commercial and Quaker Oats does such a great job at pushing the most important meal of the day, BREAKFAST!  Check it out: Does Your Breakfast Make You Amazing?

Time and time again, I work with clients that do not eat a healthy breakfast or one at all!  This is the one meal you cannot skip!!  Regardless of whether you are hungry or not, you need to eat a healthy, powerful breakfast within the first hour of waking. 

You need to get your Metabolism going ASAP!  Think of it this way, your body has been working all night rebuilding the work you've done from the day before on top of maintaining daily functions.  If you got a good nights sleep, you could have gone 8 hours without eating/drinking a thing!  Our body is a smart little thing and conserves it's energy as if in starvation mode.  So when you wake up, one of the first things you should do is get something in your belly!

So what should we eat? There are so many options here but there needs to be some healthy Carbohydrates in here!  This is the energy for our day!  Do not cut carbs here!!!  Try to get some type of Protein as well, eggs or natural nut butters are some of my favorites here.  It's also nice to incorporate some Fiber here; whether from grains/fruits/vegetables. 

Here are a few of my favorites!

Greek Yogurt with Fresh Fruit and Granola: I don't cut that fat in the Greek Yogurt, I go for the 2% so I can get some good fats right in the morning as well.  I usually grab an organic granola to go with this as well as seasonal organic berries. Also an easy mid-morning snack to bring to work!






Breakfast Burrito:  You can make this pretty healthy and with whatever ingredients you have in the kitchen.  I usually incorporate some sauteed seasoned potatoes here, some scrambled eggs, cheese, salsa/pico.  If you have an avocado, slice it up and add it at the end!  All wrapped in a whole-wheat burrito!

Oatmeal: The old-fashioned oats, not the sugared ones in a package, preferably.  You can add so many things here: nut butters, fruit, nuts, almond milk, etc.  A great winter breakfast!

Ezekiel Bread Toast with Natural Peanut Butter and Sliced Apples/Bananas: This is a great breakfast if you're not too hungry or going to workout and want something light.  Ezekiel bread is one of my favorites, it's a flourless bread made from sprouted grains.  You can find them in the freezer section!

Protein Pancakes: This is a great weekend breakfast that I found the recipe in the cookbook, "Body For Life."
 -1 c. oatmeal
 -1 c. cottage cheese
 -6 egg whites
 -1 tsp. cinnamon
 -1 tsp. vanilla
 -1 pkg. natural sweetener
Mix all ingredients in a blender and you've got an amazing pancake batter!  Add some fruit or peanut butter on top and you've got a yummy treat!

What are some of your favorites?  Post your favorite recipes below, I'd love to try them!!! 

Make Your Breakfast Amazing!

Last Week of the Sugarfree Nightmare I'm living In!

So, I must come clean...I have allowed sugar to enter my life once again!  But this 30-day Candy ban has definitely been eye-opening as to what presence sugar has in my everyday life. 
I didn't decide to do this because I wanted to lose weight or go on a diet.  I just knew that Candy is one thing that has a grip on me in regards to my diet.  I can eat pretty clean most of the time but no matter what would not give up chocolate.  So I took Hersheys, Mars, and Cadbury on all at once!

What's interesting is how aware I became of my habits.  I found that it had become habitual for me to eat a little or a lot of something sweet after dinner.  If I was tired halfway through the workday, I would grab some sugar or caffeine.  I also found that after a long day or week, I had earned it!  This is pretty ridiculous if you think about it, but I felt like I had worked hard and I deserved to eat some candy/brownies/cookies/etc. as a reward.  It is good to reward yourself after meeting your goals or after a great week of workouts or eating healthy.  But these rewards need to not be detrimental to your goals!

The point of this exercise is to take one thing in your diet that is not considered positive, eliminate it and then become aware of the situations that you eat this item.  I don't intend to eliminate sugars completely from my diet, because...let's face it, I love sweets!  But the idea is to eat them sparingly.  If a portion of your diet is not in sync with the rest, eliminate it for a few weeks and then (within reason) you can slowly add it back in. 

Enjoy eating healthy!

The Smelly Brussels Sprout

As a kid, I avoided this vegetable! I remember being the only one left at the dinner table with just a serving of this awful veggie standing in the way of me and my dessert.  For whatever reason, I avoided the Brussels Sprout for the next twenty years.  I remember it being smelly and bitter tasting.  There was nothing pleasant about it and personally I did not know why the Belgiums would introduce this mini-cabbage sidekick to the rest of the world.  They should stick to producing Beer! 

A few years back, a client of mine who loved to cook passed along a pasta recipe to me with Brussels Sprouts as one of the main ingredients.  Was he serious?  Brussels Sprouts in your pasta!?!?  I was a skeptic at first, but he encouraged me to try it.  I'm always looking for new healthy recipes to try so I decided to give this little cabbage another chance.  Pleasantly surprised it's now one of my favorite recipes.  I have grown to love this cute little veggie!
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Off the top of my head, here's the recipe:

• 1 pkg. of spaghetti (I prefer vermicelli)
• 6-8 large Brussels Sprouts (preferably organic)
• 2 tbs. butter
• 2 tbs. olive oil
• 1/4 c. Pine Nuts
• fresh grated Parmesan cheese

Boil the pasta until cooked, al dente.  Reserve 1/2 c. of the pasta water and drain the pasta.  Slice the Brussels Sprouts into thin strips.  In a large skillet, heat the butter and olive oil until frothy.  Add the Pine Nuts and toast until lightly browned.  Add the Brussels Sprouts and cook until leaves are slightly wilted.  Stir in the pasta and reserved water and continue to cook for 3-5 minutes.  Serve with Parmesan cheese sprinkled on top. YUMMY!!
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The key to Brussels Sprouts is DO NOT overcook them!  They not only lose their nutritional value but this is when they begin to emit that awful sulfur smell!  It is much easier to cook these guys when cut in half or in thin strips.  This allows them to cook quicker and more evenly.

So why am I pushing these little guys??
They're healthy of course!  According to "The World's Healthiest Foods" (http://www.whfoods.org/), these mini cruciferous vegetables should be eaten on a regular basis and are one of the most powerful in fighting cancer in the cruciferous family.  The total glucosinolate content is what we're looking at here and is higher in Brussels Sprouts than found in mustard greens, turnip greens, cabbage, kale, cauliflower, and broccoli.  Brussels Sprouts also help in the body's detox system by providing sulfur-containing nutrients, vitamin C, beta-carotene, manganese, and vitamin E.  The glucosinolate content (specifically glucobrassin) in Brussels Sprouts also helps regulate the body's inflammatory/anti-inflammatory system. Both glucobrassin and vitamin K are present and are important anti-inflammatory nutrients.  Brussels Sprouts are also an important source of omega-3 fatty acids.  100 calories' worth contains 430 milligrams of omega-3s.  There are 4 g. of Fiber in every cup of Brussels Sprouts.  Not only does the fiber help support our digestive health but glucoraphanin is also present which helps in protecting the health of our stomach lining by preventing bacterial overgrowth. 

All in all, I can't find one thing wrong with these guys!  And now that I've figured out how to prepare them properly, I am a huge promoter of this Superhero Veggie!  Remember do not overcook, you will lose a lot of there benefits by overcooking (specifically boiling) and they will have that awful sulfur smell!