Rise and Shine: Breakfast

The most important meal of the day. Never ever skip breakfast. Sound familiar? Pretty much any fitness expert you talk to will stress how eating breakfast is a key factor in weight-loss, so I've decided to dedicate this post to our first meal of the day (that's you breakfast).

There are tons of reasons why eating breakfast is so important, (boosts your metabolism, gives you energy, keeps you on track for healthy eating all day) but you've probably heard them all before. So, here are two reasons that you may not have thought about:

1. If you are reading this blog, you, like me, probably are on a diet, which probably means...you like food! Why would you pass up a chance to eat food? It's not too good to be true people. There's no scam. You can and should eat this meal and it will help you lose weight. DON'T go off the deep end though. I'm not telling you to go out and eat some fatty greasy plate full of crap. (See below for some tasty, filling options.)

2. This one's a shocker, so prepare yourself. You should eat breakfast because... you're hungry! It's a pretty crazy concept, but, if you're hungry, you should eat. Cutting-edge, I know.

Here are some of my breakfast staples and their Weight Watchers points:

Egg whites with veggies and reduced-fat cheese (3 WW pts)
Whole wheat english muffin with reduced fat peanut butter (3 WW pts)
Fat-free vanilla yogurt with 1 cup of berries (2 WW pts)
1 cup "healthy" cereal -- my fav is Kashi Strawberry Fields (2 WW pts)

Recipe: Healthygirl French Toast (3 WW pts w/o syrup. 4 WW pts w syrup)

2 slices of light whole wheat bread
3 egg whites
cinnamon
splenda
fat free maple syrup (optional)

Combine egg whites, cinnamon and splenda in a bowl. Dip slices of bread into bowl. At the same time, heat up skillet or pan on stove and coat pan with Pam spray. Place slices of bread onto hot pan and brown. Enjoy your healthygirl french toast with syrup if desired. Eat. Feel satisfied and full. YUM!

Recipe: Healthygirl Egg Sandwich (4 WW pts)

1 whole wheat english muffin
2 egg whites
1 tbsp reduced fat cheddar cheese
1 tbsp whipped cream cheese
Franks Red Hot sauce

Toast english muffin. While toasting, cook egg whites one at a time in a hot pan. (Use Pam spray so that they egg whites don't stick). Put cheese on each egg white while cooking. Spread cream cheese on the english muffin. Sprinkle Franks Red Hot on top of the cream cheese. Put one egg white on each half of the english. Eat. Feel satisfied and full. YUM!

OK. I started writing this post while I was eating my breakfast this morning (kashi cereal). I've been writing so long, it's almost time for lunch! Maybe it would be a good time to actually do some work...being that I am at work and all. Ooops.