More than half of the residents in my country have "unsatisfactory" breakfast! Learn how to eat breakfast correctly in one article

On winter mornings, many people would rather give up breakfast and sleep ten more minutes in the warm bed.

On weekends or holidays, people simply sleep until noon, and "breakfast" becomes "brunch".

But at the same time, you may also see a lot of statements about "how harmful it is to skip breakfast", such as being prone to lack of energy for the whole day and being more likely to get stomach cancer...

Is this really the case?

01

Is skipping breakfast really that harmful?

There are many different versions about the dangers of skipping breakfast, but the ideas are the same.

Statement 1: Skipping breakfast will lead to weight gain, which means getting fat.

There is some basis for this statement.

The International Journal of Obesity once published an article that tracked 14,000 teenagers for three years. Except for one special case, all those who skipped breakfast became fat without exception!

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Another study compared women who skipped breakfast every day, ate breakfast only three to four days a week, and ate breakfast every day.

The results showed that the probability of becoming obese increased in order. For example, people who only had breakfast one or two days a week had a 75% higher risk of becoming obese than those who had breakfast all the time.

In other words, skipping breakfast occasionally may be okay, but if it becomes a habit, your weight may increase rapidly.

A year ago, you may have a well-proportioned body, but a year later, you may have a big belly.

After reading this, are those friends who want to lose weight by “giving up breakfast” heartbroken?

Don’t worry too much. Although skipping breakfast is correlated with obesity, it is not the root cause of obesity.

Studies have shown that many people skip breakfast not because they don’t have time, but because they simply don’t have good eating and sleeping habits.

I get up very late in the morning, so I just make up for it with lunch and dinner, which are high in sugar, oil and calories. After eating and drinking, I just browse my phone, play games and lie down all day.

These are all favorable conditions for fat accumulation.

It is a bit of a misunderstanding to attribute gaining weight to skipping breakfast.

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Statement 2: Not eating breakfast can easily lead to diabetes.

Studies have confirmed that people who skip breakfast do have a higher risk of diabetes, but this risk is also caused by the combination of "irregular diet".

Imagine if you skip breakfast one day, after finally getting through a hungry morning, will you eat more at lunch?

Being in a state of alternate hunger and fullness for a long time will cause your blood sugar to rise and fall rapidly, like a roller coaster. The burden on the pancreas will increase, and diabetes will naturally come knocking.

It is worth noting that breakfast is the most important of the three meals for maintaining stable blood sugar levels throughout the day.

Because the interval between breakfast and the previous meal is generally more than 8-10 hours, while the interval between lunch, dinner and the previous meal is only about 6-8 hours.

If you skip breakfast, your body will not get any sugar from the outside for more than ten hours. It can only mobilize the body to use some unconventional means to produce the blood sugar necessary for physiological activities. In the long run, this will have an adverse effect on the stability of blood sugar.

Therefore, in addition to strictly controlling your lunch and dinner intake and maintaining a normal schedule, you must not ignore the importance of breakfast to blood sugar.

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Myth 3: Skipping breakfast can lead to gallstones

First of all, we need to clarify one question: How are gallstones formed? In a nutshell, bile accumulates, cholesterol is saturated, and crystals are precipitated, which may lead to gallstones.

Rather than blaming the occurrence of gallstones on skipping breakfast, it is better to attribute it to long-term fasting.

The human liver secretes bile. Every time you eat, the gallbladder is stimulated and contracts, and bile is discharged into the intestines to digest food. If you fast for a long time, the bile cannot be discharged, which increases the risk of gallstones.

Therefore, not only those who skip breakfast, but also those who focus on the "fasting regimen" and skip dinner, or even go a day without eating, will face the same risk.

02

If you eat the wrong breakfast, it’s better not to eat it

Seeing this, many people may think that skipping breakfast may directly harm the body, but as long as you eat breakfast, you will be safe. This is a wrong idea.

Eating breakfast is also a science.

If you want to eat breakfast scientifically, you must first understand the definition of breakfast.

Some people think that breakfast is only after 6 o'clock and before 8 o'clock.

Some people also think that even if they sleep until the afternoon, the first meal they eat when they wake up is breakfast, which is the so-called "flexible breakfast".

But in reality, the definition of breakfast is much more flexible than this.

In fact, the regularity of three meals a day has a greater impact on your health than breakfast.

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Everyone has a circadian rhythm, or biological clock, in their body, and the human body and organs regulate their activities according to this clock.

If a person is used to going to bed at three in the morning and getting up at eleven, and insists on doing so every day, then it can be said that he has a regular schedule and does not count as staying up late.

Similarly, if you are used to eating your first meal after waking up at a fixed time, no matter what time it is, as long as you do not disrupt your body's established biological clock, you can be said to be eating "breakfast" regularly.

Once you have a regular routine, what you eat for breakfast is also important.

In order to save time and squeeze into the subway, some workers get up, eat a biscuit and drink a cup of coffee before going to work, thinking that this also counts as breakfast.

In fact, this perfunctory approach is completely useless - if the intake standard is not met, it is almost the same as not eating.

The intake standard does not entirely depend on the amount. Even if you eat until your belly is full, you may not meet the standard.

According to the "Dietary Guidelines for Chinese Residents (2022)", a nutritious breakfast should include three or more types of cereals and tubers, fruits and vegetables, meat and eggs, milk, beans and nuts. However, survey data shows that only 44.8% of the respondents have three or more types of breakfast food .

In order to save time, many people only eat a bun or drink a bowl of porridge for breakfast. Those who are a little more particular will add an egg, but in fact this cannot meet the nutritional intake.

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And there are many unscientific aspects in our eating habits:

For example, fried dough sticks and fried cakes, which are popular in the north, are high-sugar and high-fat foods;

The small pickles used as a side dish to improve the taste contain nitrites, and eating too much of them can have adverse effects on health.

According to the Dietary Guidelines for Chinese Residents (2022), a breakfast that meets nutritional standards should include:

Staple food: steamed buns and steamed bread.

Protein: milk, soy milk, eggs.

Dietary fiber: various vegetables and whole grains.

Vitamins: Fruits.

Image source: "Balanced Diet Pagoda for Chinese Residents (2022)"

In many people's minds, lunch and dinner are both regular meals, while breakfast only requires a pancake, rice noodle roll, or shouzhuabing to fill your stomach, and stir-frying vegetables and fruits are unnecessary. This mindset needs to be changed.

After all, there is a very important point to note in a reasonable and regular eating habit:

Every meal should be nutritionally balanced. Vegetables and fruits, which are easily overlooked, are actually a necessity for breakfast.

References:

[1]CS Berkey, HRH Rockett, MW Gillman, AE Field & GA Colditz.(2003). Longitudinal study of skipping breakfast and weight change in adolescents. International Journal of Obesity volume 27, pages 1258–1266.

[2]Kylie J Smith, Seana L Gall, Sarah A McNaughton, Leigh Blizzard, Terence Dwyer, Alison J Venn. (2010). Skipping breakfast: longitudinal associations with cardiometabolic risk factors in the Childhood Determinants of Adult Health Study. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Volume 92, Issue 6, December 2010, Pages 1316–1325.

[3]BBC. (2018). Is breakfast really the most important meal of the day?

[4]Astbury, NM, Taylor, MA, & Macdonald, IA (2011). Breakfast consumption affects appetite, energy intake, and the metabolic and endocrine responses to foods consumed later in the day in male habitual breakfast eaters. The Journal of nutrition, 141(7), 1381-1389.

[5]Bloch, HM, Thornton, JR, & Heaton, KW (1980). Effects of fasting on the composition of gallbladder bile. Gut, 21(12), 1087-1089.

[6] China Consumer News. (2022). More than 50% of Chinese residents have a single breakfast type and insufficient nutrition.

[7] Chinese Nutrition Society. (2022). Dietary Guidelines for Chinese Residents.

[8] Xing Chen, Gu Ye, & Song Lun. (2017). The role of circadian rhythm in metabolic regulation. Military Medicine (07), 618-622.

Author: Li Mi

Reviewer: Chen Ran Associate Researcher (Science Communication) Senior Engineer, COFCO Nutrition and Health Research Institute

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