What’s in your Breakfast? + Recipe: Chocolate Banana Overnight Oats

Welcome back to the what’s in your food series.  Today we are tackling breakfast which is my favorite meal of the day.  What do you eat for breakfast?  Do you even eat breakfast?  Are you too busy running out the door?  Do you grab whatever is quick and easy, maybe even making a stop at the closest fast food location for a quick bite?  Is it a simple go to bowl of cereal or packet of oatmeal?  I have a quick breakfast recipe for you!

First of all, if you are stopping in the drive through for breakfast McDonalds Fruit and Yogurt Parfait alone has approxametely 20 ingredients for just the yogurt and granola alone.  So as a general rule it is safe to think that the majority of fast food restaurants will not offer organic, un-processed, heathy choices.

I am guessing that most people go for cereal as a regular option.  I found some statistics from Statistics Brain that says that $7.7 billion dollars are spent annually on cereal with 2.7 billion boxes sold.  92% of American homes purchased at least one box of cereal this year.  816,000,000 pounds of sugar are used annually by the cereal industry.  Unfortunately, sugar is only one problem that can be found in our breakfast cereal.

Lets take a look at some breakfast cereal ingredient lists that are promoted as healthy choices…I will assume that we all realize that cereals like Frosted Flakes, Captian Crunch, and Fruit Loops are loaded with sugar and are highly processeds so we won’t go into detail about those.

Cereal	Ingredients
	Whole grain oat flour, sugar, soluble corn fiber, corn bran, contains 2% or less of cinnamon, salt, natural and artificial flavor, BHT for freshness, beta carotene for color.Vitamins and Minerals: Vitamin A palmitate, vitamin C (ascorbic acid), niacinamide, reduced iron, vitamin D, zinc oxide, vitamin E (alpha tocopherol acetate), vitamin B6 (pyridoxine hydrochloride), vitamin B2 (riboflavin), vitamin B1 (thiamin hydrochloride), folic acid, vitamin B12.
	Rice, whole grain wheat, sugar, wheat bran, freeze-dried strawberries, brown sugar syrup, soluble wheat fiber, contains 2% or less of salt, malt flavoring.Vitamins and Minerals: Vitamin C (ascorbic acid), reduced iron, vitamin E (alpha tocopherol acetate), niacinamide, vitamin B6 (pyridoxine hydrochloride), vitamin B1 (thiamin hydrochloride), vitamin B2 (riboflavin), vitamin A palmitate, folic acid, vitamin B12.
	Whole Grain Oats (includes the oat bran), Modified Corn Starch, Sugar, Salt, Tripotassium Phosphate, Wheat Starch, Vitamin E (mixed tocopherols) Added to Preserve Freshness.Vitamins and Minerals: Calcium Carbonate, Iron and Zinc (mineral nutrients), Vitamin C (sodium ascorbate), A B Vitamin (niacinamide), Vitamin B6 (pyridoxine hydrochloride), Vitamin A (palmitate), Vitamin B2 (riboflavin, Vitamin B1 (thiamin mononitrate), A B Vitamin (folic acid), Vitamin B12, Vitamin D3
	Whole Grain Rolled Oats, Sugar, Natural and Artificial Flavor, Salt, Calcium Carbonate, Guar Gum, Caramel Color, Niacinaminde, Reduced Iron, Vitamin A, Palmitate, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Riboflavin, Thiamin Mononitrate, Folic Acid, One of the B Vitamins
	Seven Whole Grains and Sesame Blend (Whole Hard Red Wheat, Brown Rice, Barley, Triticale, Oats, Rye, Buckwheat, Sesame Seeds) Soy Flakes, Brown Rice Syrup, Dried Cane Syrup, Chicory Root Fiber, Whole Grain Oats, Expeller Pressed Canola Oil, Honey, Salt, Cinnamon, Mixed Tocopherols for Freshness.

Look at all that sugar.  Companies will even call sugar different names to add more of it without us consumers being the wiser.  It also should raise an eyebrow when they have to add so many vitamins and minerals back into the product.  Processing often removes food of natural vitamins so they have to add them back, possibly in a chemical or synthetic form.  Kashi is even facing a class action lawsuit because they are calling products “all-natural” and say they contain “nothing artificial”, but they are “composed almost entirely of synthetic and unnaturally processed ingredients”, so says the lawsuit.

Here are some better alternatives for breakfast.  The Cornocopia Institute has a cereal score card.  Ratings are given to  companies based on organic status, organic commitment by owner, GMO Policy, and Agrichemical use.  It is a great resourse to pick better cereal options with links to the companies website for ordering and finding out where you find them for purchase.  Making your own is usually best but if you did buy cereal there can better options with more natural forms of sugar such as honey.  Here is an example:

Name: Nature’s Path Heritage Os	Ingredients
	Organic Whole Oat Flour, Organic Whole Wheat Meal, Organic Kamut Wheat Flour, Organic Evaporated Cane Juice, Organic Spelt Flour, Organic Barley Flour, Organic Barley Malt Extract, Organic Quinoa Flour, Organic Millet Flour, Sea Salt. Organic Honey.

By far the best way to know what is in your breakfast is to make it yourself.  As we now know even purchasing oatmeal packets can not gaurantee a healthy meal.  This recipe is great for a quick breakfast on the go.  You make it the night before, let it sit in the fridge, and just grab it in the morning on your way out the door.  This recipe is so versatile too.  Use whatever ingredients you enjoy.  I use oat groats which are a whole, minimally processed oat so they retain a lot of nutritional value.  I buy them in the bulk bins at whole foods and they are inexpensive.  Rolled oats are the more commonly found oat and are created when oat groats are steamed and then rolled into flakes.  Oat groats are the more whole food option.