Breakfast Like a Champion - Food for Thought!

Shanu Shashank
Aug 6, 2020
3 min read

Waking up each morning for an early workout session wouldn’t have been so easy if I were to continue believing the myth of having breakfast like a king. The last thing I would want is to spill all the food during those heavy compound movements. Starting your day with a perfect meal, constituting a plate rich in nutrients is followed by many of us, setting up the energy levels for the day. If I remember how I was conditioned at home for not missing my breakfast, I could say my entire childhood was a lie.

So, before we simplify this entire breakfast theory, let me put it this way- Breakfast is not the most important meal of the day, no it doesn’t promote, nor does it hinder the weight/ fat loss/gain process. As long as you are watchful of your overall nutrition and track the calories as per your goals, you will understand breakfast, lunch or dinner as just mere terminologies for several meals across the day, while the choice of having or not, and how you break down your meals is up to an individual. Stick to something which you can adhere to, for long.

Every myth comes with a story and may be with some self interest, too. When you dig history of Homo Sapiens, you get to know that there was never the concept of breakfast. Man would wake up early, walk miles for work, come back home only during mid noon and towards the end of the day to have a heavy supper.

But, how did the breakfast theory become so important?

So, here comes the Grape Nuts cereal, which was developed in the 1890’s, accidentally, while manufacturing a batter. Initially marketed as a food for the brain and nerves, that could help enhance health and fitness, grape nuts was just another cereal packed with some whole grains, fibers, proteins and minerals. The popularity grew so much that it was also consumed by the soldiers during World War II, since it comes under dry rations and could easily last for long.
Connecting breakfast cereals with health has been prevailing since ages and perhaps, they have been sold to us (yes, you read it right — you will come to know slowly), with celebrities and fitness models vouching for it and taglines like “ power protein”, there is no denial that we come across such advertisements even now.

Breakfast for weight loss and the studies?

When you do a simple web search, one would come across a number of articles with claims of how breakfast helps in promoting weight/ fat loss however, the problem with such claims is the sample size. While few of the studies taken into account have a different set of individuals among the categories — Breakfast Eaters and Breakfast Skippers, where chances of Breakfast Eaters being more active and into exercise routine could be high than the sample type taken for Breakfast Skippers and it’s a simple math of energy balance when it comes to weight loss or gain. So, it’s not breakfast that helped them lose weight, but the energy deficit created due to higher activity levels.
The chances of the individuals gaining weight when they skip breakfast usually happens due to consumption of huge amounts of calories, especially junk later in the day with lesser activities, as they might not be that health conscious, and out of hunger.
Socio-economic status and how much individuals are aware about fitness also play an important factor in being mindful about the eating habits leading to weight loss or gain.

But, why did people start believing in this theory?

Recalling the story of grape nuts, it was in 1898 that Kellogg’s brothers (John Harvey & Will Keith) invented and started the business of cornflakes. With the background of running a wellness center (called as biologic living), and with John Harvey being a religious doctor who believed masturbation as a crime and sin against nature, prescribed a bran diet including cornflakes as a cure, which was further mass marketed by his brother in the latter years.
This further went to another level when the magazine — Good Health mentioned How Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, which was edited by John Harvey again.
This claim started being capitalized by other cereal making companies, and then rest is history. So, now if you connect the above dots from “self interest” to “how they have been sold” to the “advertisements that lead us to buying cereals”, you should be able to understand this chronology of making a product look more than good just for the sake of selling it.

Final take:

Well, as mentioned earlier, it’s subjective from one person to another, whether you want to continue with your healthy and wealthy breakfast or just skip it, whatever be the choice, do it for the right reasons. Personally, I prefer to simply go by my target calories, hunger and a routine that helps me sustain the plan for long.