And I thought oh god that's a lot of crap, don't eat soy for breakfast! What is wrong with you people! So I knew I had to get working on this post. So the past two times I made my special breakfast I took pics. Then today at the end of the Hungry Girl email it said that September is Better Breakfast Month, so it was like a sign that I needed to get moving on this. PS - sign up for Hungry Girl's emails! Most of her recipes are too processed for me, but she has some good tips, and most importantly, she is my source of daily stupid food holidays (I love that!)
I know you have probably been wondering what I eat for breakfast. You're thinking "Jen is so tired and grumpy and unhappy to be alive in the morning, I wonder what she's eating, I should avoid that at all costs!" Well I can assure you that my bad morning temperament has nothing to do with my diet, however because I am half dead and very pressed for time in the morning I need something that takes no effort. I also like to have a very protein heavy/little to no carb breakfast. I also feel best when I follow Tim Ferriss' 30/30 rule - consume 30 grams of protein within 30 minutes of waking up. If you are unaware of this, do yourself a favor and get The 4-Hour Body. Even if you are completely satisfied with your body as it is, the body hacks and experiments are fascinating! The Slow Carb diet works AMAZINGLY if you follow it EXACTLY, which is hard for me long term, but I will do it for a week or two after holidays or vacations and I get rid of the excess pudge really quickly.
Anyway, back to breakfast... egg muffins!! I bake egg substitute from a carton into individual cupcakes, seasoned with 11 secret herbs and spices. Breakfast perfected! So if you use one entire carton of egg substitute to make 12 muffins, each muffin will have 8.33g of protein and only 42 calories. So I have 3 or 4 for breakfast, depending on how hungry I am or if I'm having something else with it like fruit or something. Starting your day off with a huge protein dose really does affect appetite and actual consumption the rest of the day, for me at least.
So let's get crackin! But don't use real eggs. Use egg substitute or egg whites, the amount of real eggs you would need, the fat, the calories, the cholesterol, yuck. No bueno.
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| Green onion, Frank's Xtra Hot, egg substitute, garlic salt, freshly ground pepper |
Preheat your oven to 350F. Like everything is baked at 350, but you could do higher, 375, 400, 450 if you're daring, whatever, but I heard somewhere that eggs like low and slow, so I give them what they want.
Give each muffin cup a light spritz of EVOO from your silver olive oil sprayer thing. Pour eggs into muffin cups. (You can also do this all together in a large pan and then slice up after cooled. This makes it easier to add some veggies like spinach or broccoli if you are so inclined, but then it is a little less portable.) Add your seasonings and stir. I add two dashes of Frank's (I seriously do put that shit on everything..), a sprinkle of garlic salt, and a couple cranks of pepper to each cup, then stir it a little with a knife (I should get a tiny whisk). I guess you could put it all together in a large bowl and stir it up then dish it out, but that dirties a bowl, the carton has a spout for easy pouring, and I don't know the amount for 12 dashes of garlic salt. So now you know. Then cut up a little green onion on top (green part only, the white part would be too intense), some parmesan cheese is also a nice addition. Then bake until it stops jiggling and a knife or toothpick comes out clean. This takes me about 30 minutes at 350. If you plan on freezing these, I would underbake a little to compensate for the future microwaving. And these freeze wonderfully. I do two weeks worth at a time, then thaw what I need. But I will be honest, I prefer these cold (as I do most things), and I won't eat them straight from the fridge if they were thawed. If they were frozen I always microwave them for food safety and textural concerns. And even if they are not frozen, I will microwave them if it's been a couple days because I am afraid of getting some horrible GI ailment because I was too lazy to wait 2 minutes to eat my muffins.
So, simple enough. Here are some more pictures:
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| Ready for the oven! Use silicone muffin cups! It will make your life so much easier. Don't use paper liners either, it won't work. And look, I have flower and butterfly shaped breakfast! |
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| I like the red, round pan better. Round and clean. Shaped eggs are kinda weird haha |
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| Told ya. This was like one and a half cartons, so there was some leftover, hence the big weird blobby looking pyrex dish muffin. THAT is probably going to be a bitch to clean. Sigh |
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| Let cool, pop out of pans. Put in some appropriate storage container or bag and put in the fridge. Then cold enjoy as is, or microwave ~2 min for 4 muffins in a weakish microwave. If you want to freeze them, put on a plate, freeze, then pry off the plate and put them in a freezer zipper bag or something. If you don't lay them out to freeze you get one big old eggy block of cold.
Bonus round? Oatmeal is not a bad breakfast choice - it has fiber, but also a lot of carbs, some protein, but not nearly as much as eggs. So eat it for lunch! Prepare it with unsweetened almond milk (or coconut, or almond/coconut, maybe rice, but rice is kinda nutritionally pointless for me. Don't use cow or soy, unless you like eating disgusting things...) instead of water (or just use water, whatever), add cinnamon, vanilla/almond/lemon/whatever extract, pinch of sea salt, some ground flax seeds, sweetener of choice, frozen/fresh/dried fruit, nuts, chocolate chips, whatever you want, this is your bowl! My FAVORITE combination is what I like to call "Donut Oatmeal". I use almond or coconut milk, some flax, cinnamon, vanilla and almond extract, brown sugar, and frozen raspberries! Sooooo good! Or "Lemon Cake Oatmeal" - no cinnamon, vanilla and lemon extract, stevia, rainbow nonpareil sprinkles! If you want extra, extra bonus points, HEAT UP YOUR WAFFLE IRON (I always use the highest setting because I love crispy waffles), make up your favorite oatmeal, but use appropriate liquid so it is goopy, not soupy, like globs you could mold, kinda rubbery, the flax really helps. This sounds horrible, but hear me out. You put a glob on the waffle iron and let it cook until steam stops coming out, and then you have a delicious waffle that is portable and does not require syrup. I think you could even mix up all your oatmeal ingredients in a bowl the night before, and let it come together in the fridge, then you wouldn't need to microwave it, just plop it on the hot iron. BUT the key here is that it MUST be goopy, if you have normal consistency it will not cook right and stick to your waffle iron and it will be a bitch to clean and the waffle will just fall apart and not be neat and portable. This is when you are using whole (as opposed to ground) oatmeal. Like you can make excellent waffles with ground oatmeal, egg whites, and cottage cheese (google South Beach waffles), but if you don't grind the oatmeal, it won't waffle! It might pancake, but it will not waffle. I'm not nearly at the waffle expert level to diagnose the cause of this, so just trust me. Or don't! Experiment, it's fun and you might learn something. That's how I learned that goopy oatmeal waffles! Anyway....
Ta-da! This does not look great. But frozen raspberries that have been microwaved and squished then cooked again and mixed with brown sugar gives a weird beefy color. Oh well. I decided I'm not gonna be one of those people that takes perfect pictures with perfect looking food that took them 7 batches to make and 300 photos to find the right lighting and the right angle. No. I have a life. I am doing this because I like cooking and experimenting and also writing, and if I can help/inspire/educate others, all the better :)
So there you have it. Jen's (almost) daily breakfast and sometimes lunch. Happy eatings!
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