Lately a thermos of gazpacho. Usually a handful of cashews or other nuts, or a piece of cheese, or overnight oatmeal or a hard boiled egg if I’ve planned well.
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But I’m not much of a breakfast person and usually I just have coffee.
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I have a boring breakfast and lunch during the work week, so I can splurge during dinner 
I usually have an early dinner at 5PM, and for a late night snack I munch on grapes instead of chips.
For breakfast I’ll have a small amount of Fiber One cereal with 5 dried figs and Vanilla soy or almond milk. That gives me my fiber intake for the entire day 
For lunch I make a combination of quinoa and riced cauliflower, and add chopped peppers, or scallions, or other vegetables, with lots of garlic salt and pepper for flavor. I make a big batch on the weekend to last me all week.
This is why you only see me post on the What’s for dinner thread, and not the breakfast or lunch threads
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My obesity is due partly to medical problems that, since I retired, severely limit my physical activity. I am now able to follow my natural circadian rhythms. I stay up until at least 2 a.m. and sleep, sporadically, for 9 hours. When I get up, I have decaf coffee, usually with a 210-calorie nut bar, but sometimes a banana or a cookie. Not that I am hungry at that time, but I have meds that work best when taken with food. It is then 5-6 hours until I think about a meal. Even if I eat nothing, I am not hungry for 5-6 hours, but DO get a headache and sometimes feel shaky. A banana is quite filling, as is a nut bar. This schedule hasn’t decreased my avoir dupois, but has kept me from gaining. I find that a hard-cooked egg is good for satiety and it’s easy to have those on hand. Eating a sliced apple along with a piece of cheese and some crackers, as a meal, takes so much time that one feels quite full when finished. It’s prime proof that it takes 20 minutes after eating for hunger to subside.
The horrors of American politics in recent years having made me avoid broadcast TV as much as possible, I often stream via Acorn and Britbox. Toast seems ubiquitous in these programs. What’s the attraction? Crunch? Simplicity of preparation? Affordability? If either of the first two, nuts should work, and will forestall hunger longer than bread does. Additionally, a piece of fruit, or 6-8 almonds, eaten an hour before dinner will decrease your mealtime appetite and portion size.
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Where do I begin? Roasty Maillard reaction compounds, butter vehicle, egg yolk vehicle, salt and sugar delivery. Love toast, even if it doesn’t love me back. I’ve switched to whole wheat or German whole rye/pumpernickel to be a bit healthier…
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Well, yeah…but what caught my attention on those TV shows was people eating it straight from the toaster, not spread with or dipped in anything.
A few years ago when I found out my cholesterol was up I started eating steel cut oats for breakfast as it is supposed to be good for lowering cholesterol - just cook in water and a little honey, cinnamon and a bunch of frozen blueberries (or whatever fruit on hand is about to be to ripe to eat - mango, strawberry, etc.). Plus it takes car of your daily fiber intake.
Your breakfast of toast or muesli sounds innocuous on its own. But maybe other calorie bombs lurk in the wings.
Myself, I am recalling a breakfast I lit upon in college in the 1980s and still resurrect at times: a big glob of plain yogurt in a bowl, a mess of grapes, and a handful of uncooked oatmeal flakes (Quaker oats here). I’ve always supposed that the uncooked oats must have expanded inside me, because I wasn’t hungry (that as a teenager) for an hour or two past lunchtime.
Of course, one can change up the grapes with fresh fruits or other berries, accent in various ways with some honey, agave syrup, some nutmeg or cinnamon, etc.
Good luck!
Many thanks all, it’s given me some helpful ideas.
And, by co-incidence, today’s breakfast was very much in line with BadasBing’s idea. A few spoonfuls of plain, low fat, yoghurt with an apple grated into it.
Really good ideas throughout this thread which tackled a meal that is problematic for many of us.
And for emphasizing perhaps the most important element of weight control and health. PORTION SIZE! I don’t know whether modern American portion sizes came from or dictated restaurant portions, like the “normal” three egg omelet. But our portion sizes are definitely out of whack.
We were in Amsterdam last week. Breakfast in the hotel was mainly a buffet of ham, cheese, bread, etc. But they also did a omelettes and pancakes to order. I had an omelette one day and the server asked if I wanted 1,2,3 or 4 eggs. Can’t recall ever being given that much of an option before.
Signs of the times. We notice on every visit that Europeans are catching “the American disease”. Even in France, unless it’s a tasting menu, serving sizes are creeping up. I often look at my plate and tell the waiter “enough for 4 people”. They usually laugh and say, “No, only two!”
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Partner’s typical brekkie. There’s turmeric powder and broken flaxseeds underneath. Pure chocolate alongside coffee.
The figs are here! Red wedges are delicious plums from Spain. Stunning beetroot coloured flesh. Skin is purple with “freckles”.
Mine is the same but with overnight oatmeal, mixed frozen fruits and mix dried fruits. Seasonal fresh fruits are important as the rest remains the same.
In Japan I loved the big savoury breakfast, albeit too early, at 7:30. And in Vietnam a steaming bowl beef noodle soup.
Check this out, fried fish and raw egg. I was about to crack it, thinking it was hard-boiled. The partner said “it’s raw”. So how to eat it? Japanese guests staying at the same guest house cracked it open and mixed well in the rice. I did the same. It made the rice soupy.
Yonaguni island, Okinawa.
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A major switch for me has been including a vegetable vs. fruit in the morning. Some breakfast meals I’ll use spinach, asparagus, beets, bok choy with a scrambled egg, other mornings fresh melon or berries with a soft boiled egg or greek yogurt. coffee is a given.
Most recently, I don’t eat a major bread carb until lunch if at all that day and even then half the portions. Bread doesnt fill me up in the same way it once did. The lighter I’ve gotten the more in tune with bloat I’ve recognized and avoided.
For me, maintaining a healthy weight is about portions and movement more than food choice but I cut where I can without feeling deprived. When someone else is doing the cooking or we head to a resto, I keep portions in check or take half home.
i wouldnt recommend skipping breakfast if you wind up shaky, non energized or so hungry by lunch you consume too many calories.
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I should include that there are many situations where what I’m preparing food wise I’m not actually eating much of or at all myself. It is a skill I had to work hard on knowing I need to follow my own healthy choices even if they are diff than my spouse, family or friends. Without drawing a lot of overt attention, I enjoy meals based what works for me each day. But as someone who enjoys baking and cooking at home and entertaining at home, I still do all the same requested meals for folks I care about.
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John, my distant friend, I choose to continue to think of you as a tall and rail thin Briton, perhaps with a Sheltie at your ankles, wandering over the moors before having a full English at some four hundred year old pub.
My most common breakfast is leftovers from the previous dinner before my wife clears them out.
From scratch:
Berries in season with yogurt over and granola (muesli is fine) over that.
One-eyed egg, often called ‘toad in a hole;’ an egg fried in a hole in the center of bread.
Matzo brei; I add onions and salsa over the classic recipe.
Crepes with berries or given time sauteed spinach and mushrooms with an onion bechamel.
Fried/steamed egg in a ring on English muffin and a bit of bacon (think Egg McMuffin).
Poached egg and toast with tomato and pickled onion.
Toasted bagel with sausage patty; we have a soy substitute from Morningstar I like as it is less greasy.
Hard-cooked egg quartered with tomato and anything else scraped from the fridge (pickle, olives, cheese, Giardiniera).
Oatmeal.
Farina (Cream of Wheat in the US).
Now about “right to roam” and that small dog…perhaps a walking stick. And a hat - must have a hat. Maybe a Fitbit? grin
This is such a helpful comment, @Rooster. Thanks for sharing. It’s something I struggle with too.
I try to bake - or make things I don’t want to consume by myself - when I’m going somewhere that I can take the goodies.
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I have been employing the same rules since January and have lost 20 pounds…so essentially I am now down to a 12 pack.
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Lol, good on you 12 pack man, good on you.
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That’s really kind. And really inaccurate - as a couple of contributors here, who have met me, would testify (although I suspect both are too polite to do so).
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