My Everyday Breakfast
Forget “Part of a complete breakfast,” this is the WHOLE breakfast! Here is the WFPB (Whole Food Plant Based) breakfast that I eat every single day. These can be batch prepared so you can just have them waiting to go every single day.
A couple notes before we get into the recipe (I swear I’m not going to tell you my entire life story on a post about oatmeal!). Firstly, this makes a lot of food - like almost 1000 calories. This works for who I am: With my activity level, I need ~3200 calories per day. If you want to follow along with this recipe, but if your required daily calories are much lower than mine, just reduce the quantity of some of the ingredients. Finally after the recipe, I will have some extra notes explaining why some of the ingredients are included.
Alright onto the recipe. It’s split in two, the first set of ingredients is what you can batch prepare and the second set is what you should add the night before.
Batch Prepare
Combine together:
- 3/4 cup Oats
- 1/3 cup Pumpkin Seeds (no oil or salt on them)
- 1/8 cup Raisins
- 2 tbsp Roasted Milled Flaxseeds
- 1 tbsp Chia Seeds
- 1 tbsp Wheat Germ
- 1 tbsp Natural Processed Cocoa Powder
- 1/4 tsp Ground Ginger
- 1/4 tsp Ground Cinnamon
- 1/8 tsp Iodized Half Salt
- ~ 10 Dried Gogi Berries
Night Before
Mix in:
- 3/4 cup Soy Milk
- 1/2 cup Water
- Frozen Strawberries
- Frozen Blackberries
Explanations
Flaxseeds
These are an amazing source of omega 3 and include cancer fighting compounds called lignans. Read more about omega 3 and the amazing benefits of flaxseeds here.
Wheat Germ
In all kinds of different food, there is this compound called spermidine. It has an unfortunate name, since that is the first place it was observed, though funnily enough it’s a pretty bad source of it. A common trait among centenarians is high levels of spermidine in their blood. For maximum longevity, some researchers in Sweden proposed that women should aim to eat 25mg a day and men 30mg. Wheat germ is the most concentrated dietary source of it, having 2.5mg per tablespoon. It is also super cheap, making it a great easy addition to breakfast. If you have celiac disease, this one should definitely be left out.
Natural Processed Cocoa Powder
For starters, this adds chocolate flavour to your breakfast and who doesn’t want that? Health wise though, this does have benefits. For starters, it’s a great source of iron, you can learn more about getting iron on a plant based diet here. Beyond that, cocoa has been shown to improve artery function, as well as lower cholesterol and blood pressure, and help your immune system work better. Though this is technically a processed food it’s actually better consumed this way as you get the benefits of cocoa without all the saturated fat that would come were this in chocolate form. Make sure you’re buying natural processed cocoa powder though, the dutch processed, has all the good stuff removed. Grocery stores often sell both kinds in the baking isle, so keep an eye out.
Half Salt
The number 1 risk factor in the average person’s diet is the fact that they eat too much salt. In the USA people are recommended to not eat more than 2300mg a day, and in places like Canada and Japan they follow the WHO recommendation of no more than 2000mg a day. Most people blow right past this amount every day though, and it get’s worse, those are general guidelines. Experts on heart health like the American Heart Association and the European Society for Cardiology recommend no more than 1500mg and 1300mg respectively.
Personally, I think we should all be aiming to be at or below those heart experts values. Half salt can help with this as it’s just like table salt, except with only half the sodium and the other half is replaced with potassium, which incidentally is something that most people are lacking enough of in their diet. You won’t even notice a flavor difference, since your taste buds associate both with saltiness. While sodium raises blood pressure, potassium lowers it.
I add it to the oatmeal for flavour. The bit of salt wakes up the other flavours, and since it is iodized, it also provides part of my daily iodine intake.
Gogi Berries
These are packed with antioxidants but that is not the primary reason I include them here. For a while I struggled with light sensitivity, the sun caused my eyes pain and sometimes extended periods of time in bright light caused me headaches. Gogi berries, and other orange foods can help with this since your body actually takes the yellow pigments out of food and puts them into your eyes like a natural sunscreen to protect your from UV damage. Something like corn provides some of these pigments. There are also some things that are not visibly yellow that can also contain a bunch, like spinach and especially gogi berries. The egg industry likes to promote how egg yolks can help with this problem since they contain that yellow pigment, but gram for gram, gogi berries contain 60 times as much pigment as eggs.
Strawberries and Blackberries
You could really put whatever kind of fruit you want here, but these do actually contribute scientifically as well.. Blackberries are here because they provide the most antioxidants of any common fruits, so you get the best “bang for your buck” on antioxidants technically. I add strawberries because they are the only concentrated dietary source of something called fisetin, which is a compound that your body uses to clear out senescent cells. These are cells that have stopped being able to divide but that failed to signal your immune system to get rid of them. A buildup of these over time is linked with increased cancer and neurological issues. To really simplify things fisetin is something your body can use to find these senescent cells and get rid of them. Plus strawberries and blackberries are yummy.
