Breakfast on the Run

I have a love/hate relationship with breakfast. I love many of the foods and flavors that often find their way into this meal. I hate the fact that it takes place during one of the most hectic times in my day. I’d love to savor something delicious with a hot cup of coffee in a sunlit kitchen, but my life doesn’t always line up that way. I’m not alone. Many people, especially women, skip breakfast altogether citing the fact that they are too busy to eat. Others grab a granola bar or a yogurt on their way out the door and eat it in the car or at their desk. The next time you’re out driving during breakfast hour (and really, who ISN’T out driving during breakfast hour between commuting and carpooling and gym runs) check out how many of your fellow motorists are eating or drinking in their car. It’s become a lifestyle.

While there are tremendous benefits to organizing your morning in a way that enables you to sit down in a chair and eat breakfast without any other distractions, the truth is that the practice is out of reach for many people. And the MOST important thing about breakfast is just to EAT it. After 8 or 10 or 12 hours without food, your body is begging you to break the fast you’ve been enduring and give it some nourishment. I usually coach my clients to have an “emergency breakfast” option always on hand to take with them on mornings when breakfast just didn’t happen. Something like a Kashi bar, a cheese stick, and an apple. Portable, relatively nonperishable, not too messy.

But there are days when even that solution falls by the wayside. And on those days, the only way breakfast is going to happen is by relying on restaurant food. While restaurant fare can often be laden with unwanted fat an calories, that doesn’t have to be the case.

Lucky for us, Health magazine recently worked with a number of nutrition experts to study the breakfast options at various chain restaurants. They compiled a list of the healthiest fast-food breakfasts. The options that made the list had to be:

<400 calories

low in saturated fat

good mix of protein, complex carbs and healthy fats

>3 g fiber

<700 mg sodium

 

Here are Health Magazine’s the Top 10, with a little commentary from me:

1. Cosi’s Spinach Florentine Breakfast Wrap

2. Starbucks: Protein Artisan Snack Plate (CMS: I’m also a fan of their oatmeal or Turkey Bacon & Egg White on English Muffin)

3. Jamba Juice Berry Topper Ideal Meal (CMS: Oh how I wish we had Jamba Juice in Cincinnati!)

4. Au Bon Pain Oatmeal

5. Denny’s Scrambled Egg Whites, Chicken Sausage & Fruit

6. McDonald’s Oatmeal (ex brown sugar) (CMS: I’m not opposed to a classic Egg McMuffin as an option here either)

7. IHOP’s Simple & Fit Veggie Omelet (CMS: Order this with a side of fruit)

8. Subway’s Western Egg White & Cheese Muffin Melt (CMS At 160 calories, this needs more substance. Consider ordering two…or better yet, adding a piece of fruit or two to make a complete meal)

9. Dunkin Donuts Egg White Turkey Sausage Wake Up Wrap (CMS: At only 150 calories, same comments as above)

10. Panera’s Breakfast Power Sandwich (CMS: Order without the ham to keep the sodium level down; it’s the only one on the list with >700 mg sodium)

So, the next time you find yourself out and about without having eaten breakfast, you can confidently fix that situation without totally derailing your healthful eating goals. And perhaps if you’re lucky, a little sunlight will find its way to the spot where you’ve chosen to break your fast. Bon appetit!

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Naked Pizza

There are three reasons why what I’m about to tell you in this post is shocking.

1) Cincinnati is almost NEVER ahead of a trend. Seriously. Things become cool here YEARS after they’ve been fully adopted in hipper cities like NY and LA and Chicago.

2) Cincinnatians are extremely loyal to their favorite pizza. Long-standing local brands like LaRosa’s and Dewey’s dominate the city and most natives are very particular about their preferences. (It’s almost as bad as the chili wars we have around here but that’s another post altogether.)

3) Pizza is not often featured in a post by a health blogger (unless you count vegan pizza, but we all remember how that turned out.)

Well Cincinnati, there’s a new game in town. It’s trendy. It’s pizza. And – drumroll – it’s healthy!

Naked Pizza opened its first store in Ohio last Friday, just in time for the meatless Fridays of Lent. Cincinnati has a BIG Catholic population and thus meatless Fridays are a big deal around here. (In fact, the McDonalds Filet-O-Fish sandwich was invented by a Cincinnati-based franchisee in 1962 in a showdown with founder Ray Croc. Read that story here.)

So, consider Naked Pizza as an option for meatless Fridays or your weekly family pizza night, and a healthy option at that.

What’s so healthy about it?

From their own press release, “Naked Pizza’s recipe is based on the use of all-natural ingredients with no added sugar, high fructose corn syrup, trans-fat, hormones or preservatives. Its crust is made from an Ancestral Blend® of ten grains, prebiotic fiber from the agave plant and special heat resistant probiotics or “healthful” bacteria. The diversity of nutrients and fiber along with the added probiotics support digestive health. According to co-founder Jeff Leach, it’s a recipe based on a 200,000-year-old nutritional blueprint, and a taste that’s all pizza – saucy, cheesy, still round, still comes in a square box, and delivered fast to your door.”

All that delivers a cheese pizza with 161 calories and 7 grams of fat per slice (in a 14″ pie). They have the range of meat and vegetable toppings you’d expect, but theirs are all hormone and antibiotic free. Check out their website at nakedpizza.biz for more information, pizza varieties and full nutritional information.

We got Naked on Friday for lunch (giggle) and thought it was excellent. I tried the Greenhouse pizza with a skinny crust – delicious.

The Cincinnati location is located at 3646 Edwards Rd in Hyde Park. They offer takeout or deliver within a 9 mile radius.

NY, LA, and Chicago? We’re way out ahead of you on this one.


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Begin making tiny movements – a bit of yoga inspiration

At the end of each yoga class, our instructor settles us into “savasana” (alternately spelled shavasana), a pose in which we lie flat on our backs, perfectly still, for a few minutes of meditative silence. With nothing but a fan whirring overhead or (if we’re lucky) birds chirping outside, it’s the quietest moment of my day. It’s a period of complete rest, no matter how short-lived. When it’s time to end savasana, the instructor asks us to “begin making tiny movements with our fingers and toes” before we raise ourselves to a seated position and end the class with a single “om”.

That phrase “begin making tiny movements” has stuck with me for several weeks now. It seems to be a choicefully selected phrase, notable for its specificity. Not big movements. Not “okay, sit up now.” But “Begin making tiny movements…” For a room full of women who’ve just been completely at rest, tiny movements are about all we want to muster.

Then, this week, I read this little nugget on the Peace & Projects blog written by  Melissa Gorzelanczyk, and I thought “Aha!”

I’ll include it here so you can read it for yourself.

“Focus on tiny movements. That’s all it takes to change your life. If you want to quit smoking, you can stop putting a cigarette in your mouth and lighting the end. Once you master the way you move, you can do anything. You can decide to write instead of go out to lunch. You can put away the beer and go to bed early. You can feel your feet on the ground for a run. Movements, no matter how small, shape your entire life. How you go through the motions is up to you.”

So true. Change is simply a series of tiny movements strung together. It’s making “the next right choice” and every moment is a new chance to get it right.  I’ve blogged before about momentum and how it can be a helpful force if you are on the right track. But if you find yourself on the wrong track, one that doesn’t serve your goals, then perhaps the best thing you can do is to still yourself.  Completely.  Stop everything.  Find your own Savasana. And when you’re ready, begin making tiny movements… strung together, they’ll change your life.

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