Where Else Will You See Such Horses and Men
Where else will you see such horses and men is a quote credited to Sir Walter Raleigh in reference to the attributes of eating oatmeal. Oatmeal has long been a staple in Scotland and while its uses are many, like my amazing Oatmeal Cookies (oops! How did that sneak into a blog post about dieting? {grin}), its main popularity still is as a breakfast porridge.
I eat my Vanilla Cinnamon Oatmeal with Walnuts – a lot! I like my oatmeal; I think it tastes great and, of course, it’s nutritious. So, I eat it at least 5 days a week. I have done this for years now. It’s time-consuming to make (6 minutes in the microwave, then some mixing), so occasionally, if I’m rushed, I eat my other favorite breakfast, Weetabix with Yogurt and Berries.
My point in sharing this: if you don’t like oatmeal, don’t eat it! My diet isn’t about eating food I don’t like. It’s about eating what I love, but finding those foods within more of a “clean eating” structure – something that’s surprisingly hard to do in today’s processed food environment.
On top of that, I strive for Minding My P’s and Q’s (Portions and Quality) – eating less and better quality. So, if oatmeal doesn’t do it for you, choose something else. But, we need to include a source of protein in our morning meal or we won’t make it to lunch without snacking.
Protein, you ask? How does protein fit into oatmeal? Well, by adding whey protein powder, ground flaxseed, chia seeds, chopped walnuts and soy milk plus the protein already found in oatmeal, my oatmeal has a whopping 22 grams of protein!
NOTE: Cheerios (which I love, by the way, and eat occasionally) has only 3 grams of protein in a 1 cup serving. Adding 1/2 cup of soy milk adds another 3.5 grams, so 6.5 grams of protein total. A half cup of regular milk adds 2 grams or 5 grams of protein total. So, a breakfast of cold cereal with milk won’t sustain you through the morning until lunch. Unless you eat my Weetabix with Yogurt and Berries (16 grams of protein because I eat it with a brand of yogurt that has 12 grams of protein!).
Adding fruit to your breakfast won’t solve the protein problem. A typical serving of fresh fruit has 1 to 2 grams of protein. So, in order to sustain hunger until lunchtime, another source of protein needs to be added to breakfast.
Some examples: a whey protein shake made with water will add about another 18 grams of protein. Check out my recipes for Coffee Banana Protein Smoothie and Strawberry Protein Smoothie. An egg adds 6 grams of protein, so eat 2!
Or, an even better choice (if you don’t like oatmeal) would be a breakfast burrito made with 1 corn tortillas (2 grams of protein), 1/2 cup of black beans (6 grams of protein), 1 scrambled egg (6 grams of protein), 1 slice of cheddar cheese (7 grams of protein), a couple tablespoons of your favorite salsa (0 grams of protein). This totals 21 grams of protein – a very adequate breakfast choice!
However, one small breakfast burrito may not make you feel full, so you may be tempted to eat two! Before you go down that path, know the stats (I know, I know – I said I wasn’t going to count calories, but they are an important part of this exercise!). Here they are (the stats):
Carole’s Vanilla Cinnamon Oatmeal with Walnuts:
- 350 calories
- 22 grams of protein
- 92.5 grams of sodium
- 13 grams of fat
- 8.4 grams of fiber
- 5 grams of sugar (where’s that coming from, you ask? Milk; yes milk has sugar in it!)
Breakfast Burrito described above:
- 354 calories
- 21 grams of protein
- 666 grams of sodium (wow! almost a third of the daily recommended amount of sodium)
- 15.5 grams of fat
- 10 grams of fiber
- 1 gram of sugar
Now, times the Breakfast Burrito by two:
- 708 calories
- 42 grams of protein
- 1,332 grams of sodium (yikes!)
- 31 grams of fat
- 10 grams of fiber
- 2 grams of sugar
A better choice than eating two burritos is to add fruit to your meal. Eat a banana (110 calories, 1 gram of protein, 0 grams of sodium, 0 grams of fat, 4 grams of fiber, 21 grams of sugar) or a cup of strawberries (77 calories, 1 gram of protein, 4 grams of sodium, 0 grams of fat, 5 grams of fiber, 10 grams of sugar). Or, eat both; they’ll only add another 187 calories to your 354 calorie burrito for a total of 541 calories – a still very respectable breakfast!
With my banana, my morning stats stack up like this:
Carole’s Total Breakfast Stats:
- 460 calories
- 23 grams of protein
- 92.5 grams of sodium
- 13 grams of fat
- 12.4 grams of fiber
- 26 grams of sugar
So, I vote for my oatmeal (and horses and men {grin})!
Today’s weight: 233; a total of 30 pounds lost since starting this diet 6 months ago. I lost only one pound in the month of December, but hey, I still lost! Woohoo! And, I cheated big time! Here’s what I did between my last weight update (Curve Ball) and today’s weight update:
- Had Thanksgiving Dinner at my mother’s residential care facility and ate everything in sight!
- Made a turkey after Thanksgiving and had turkey leftovers for two weeks (see Sour Apple Cranberry Sauce; Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme Roasted Turkey, Stuffing and Turkey Gravy).
- Made Christmas Caramel Apples and with Charlie’s help, ate every single one of them!
- Went to Los Angeles to visit my niece, Erin, in between flights from New Zealand and Chicago and ate (or is that pigged out?) at Mario Batali’s Pizzeria Mozza on Highland Avenue in Los Angeles.
- Spent the weekend with my girlfriend, Christin, in Orange County and went to the Orange County Swap Meet and ate my way through the swap meet!
- Went out to lunch with girlfriends on the 16th and ate breakfast for lunch (bacon, eggs, French toast!).
- Had our family’s Christmas celebration at my house on December 21st and ate so much that I was still full the next day!
- Ate a big breakfast the next morning with family (bacon, eggs, English muffins and fruit).
- Went out to lunch with girlfriends on the 23rd and ate mashed potatoes swimming in gravy, sourdough bread and butter, monkfish (it tastes like lobster) swimming in butter and several bites of a brownie sundae (the 6 of us shared the brownie sundae!).
- Ate Christmas Day dinner at my mother’s residential care facility and pigged out yet again!
How in the world did I manage to lose one pound with all of this cheating? Well, my guess would be two-fold: (1) my stomach has shrunk since starting this diet 6 months ago, so piggy out to me isn’t what it used to be (for example: even though I said I “pigged out”, I left food on my plate in my pigging out sessions) and (2) I did a lot of walking around stores shopping for Christmas gifts!
Plus, I didn’t worry about it. As I shared in November’s post, Curve Ball, sometimes life throws you a Curve Ball and you just have to accept it, live in the moment, get past it and move on.
Tip of the Month: eat a decent portion of protein with every meal. Protein stabilizes your glucose levels, leaving you to feel less hungry throughout the day. An excellent article to help you decide what is right for you, can be accessed at this Livestrong link: How Much Protein is Right for You?
Hope your holiday celebrations were special!
Oh, BTW, the beautiful horse in this photo is at a neighboring farm near our home. He was galloping towards me and I shot this photo with my telephoto lens. He came up to the fence for a nuzzle – he probably thought my camera was a snack!
Tootles,
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(other posts about The Incredible Shrinking Woman)
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