Better Breakfasts

What To Eat For Breakfast!

Lard or carbs? Full fried or not fried? At first it looks kind of obvious, fat provides nine calories per gramme, whereas carbohydrate or protein provide four calories per gramme. So you need loads of fat right? Er, wrong. The problem with fat is that it takes ages to digest and, in the process, slows your ability to digest anything else you take in efficiently.

When sports experts talk about 'fat burning', they mean the fat that's already stored in the body - on average enough to run at five-minute mile pace for almost 24 hours. But fat that's in the process of being digested is a waste of space, so rule one - stay away from the full-fried breakfast. That doesn't mean no fat, but don't go for the full sausages, bacon, black pudding et al experience unless you want to spend the rest of the day digesting it. One peripheral point, fried eggs actually contain less fat than scrambled.

Slow Burn Carbos With Toast Please The best basis for a day out is a load of carbohydrate, preferably slow burn, complex ones, so load up with a bucket full of cereal or mesli and whole grain toast with jam. Porridge is a really excellent way of getting slow burn carbs in, though not to everyone's taste, particularly at altitude, where appetite tends to be suppressed. Something like jam on toast combines slow burn carbos from the bread with faster burn, easy access stuff from the jam, aka sugar. Finish off with a banana if you're in the mood.

It's not thaty simple, of course, when is it ever? Different high carbohydrate foods have different glycemic indexes, which means that they get banged into the muscles faster or slower. Baked potatoes are high, quick absorption, so good for immediate post-exercise snacks, particularly with a protein filling, bananas are medium, apples are low, so take longer to be absorbed.

On The Mountain The same rules apply, but you might find it easier to start with an energy bar

Drinkees Tea or coffee? Ideally neither, although if you need you caffeine, you need it. But be aware that both are diuretics, so you're likely to aggravate overnight dehydration even more - not ideal. Better option is some sort of herbal or fruit tea - lemon and ginger i s nice - and lots of straight water. Fruit juice is too concentrated to be absorbed quickly so mix it at least 50/50 with water.

So there you go. Me, I'm a dog so I'll stick to Boneo and Pedd' Chum ta very much, but for you lot, cereal, toast, jam and loads of water maybe some mushrooms and eggs are the way to go.

Woof!

The Butcher's Dog