The student news site of El Camino College

El Camino College The Union

The student news site of El Camino College

El Camino College The Union

The student news site of El Camino College

El Camino College The Union

No: Breakfast is not the most important meal

While breakfast is said to be the most important meal of the day by ads, it is not a necessity to achieve good health because there are alternative ways to consume ample amounts of nutrition by eating healthy lunch.

Tony the Tiger claims that his Frosted Flakes cereal is a great part of a nutritional breakfast. The key point in his famous line is, “a part.”

Most people who eat breakfast just eat a bowl of cereal. But most cereals contain so much sugar and nothing much else that all they get is a jittery high and a bloated stomach.

For example, Cinnamon Toast Crunch has 127 calories and 24 grams of carbohydrates while a can of Coca-Cola has 140 calories and 39 grams of carbohydrates.

With almost as much sugar and carbohydrates as a can of Coca-Cola, this cereal deserves a title of a daytime snack rather than a nutritious day starter.

A bowl of cereal can be a tasty addition to a nutritious breakfast such as eggs, toast, sausage and a glass of orange juice, but cereal alone does not serve the body well.

With all the artificial flavorings and sugar, it is healthier to skip breakfast and eat a nutritious lunch instead if one has a choice of eating a bowl of popular cereal.

According to www.checkyourhealth.org, an ideal lunch should include 2 to 3 servings of fruits and vegetables, one serving of dairy and one to two servings of a grain group.

A sandwich with whole wheat bread, lean ham, slice of cheese and fresh-cut tomatoes will be a sufficient meal to substitute for the missed breakfast.

With that said, however, if one skips breakfast and consumes a Whopper, large fries and Mountain Dew for lunch, that is in no way a good replacement of the morning meal or doing the body any good; the missed breakfast can be made up only by a healthy lunch.

Eating breakfast is an excellent way to start the day.

However, without the proper amount of nutrients in it, breakfast is nothing more than a bowl of extra calories.

By eating a healthy lunch, one can have peace of mind knowing that the skipped breakfast is properly substituted by something more nutritious than the sugar-loaded Cookie Crisps.

In the end, the key to good health is not whether one eats breakfast, but what he or she eats throughout the day.

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