Breakfast Diet For Health, Energy & Weight Loss. Keeping Us Green Too.

Green Tea:

Unbelievable alternative to coffee. It has caffine like coffee, but it has much less: in an 8 oz cup, coffee provides 90 mg of caffine while green tea yields only 25 mg, almost 1/4 less than coffee. It provides the stimulus and energy you need to get going in the morning, but without the negative effects of the larger amount of caffine in coffee.

Most of all, it has anti-aging properties, increases energy, and controls appetite to aid your weight loss efforts. It strengthens your immune system, and a strong immune system promotes the natural healing process in your body to fight off the bacteria we all get in our associations, so we can avoid colds and the flu.

While I drink Hain's Celestial Seasonings Anitoxident Green Tea at $2.99 for 20 tea bags, you might check out these Web sites for good information about best brands to buy. There are a lot of green teas on the market now, and you want to get the best.

http://medicinenewsonline.com/green-tea-diet-products-reviewed/?gclid=COTK2-LJ5JcCFQ8Qagodlw8UEA/

Bulgar Wheat:

Bulgar is man's oldest recorded use of wheat. Germinated whole wheat kernels are cleaned, soaked, parboiled and dried, and then part of the bran is removed before grinding the kernels into small pieces. Thie result of this process is bulgar wheat, which, by the way, is the main ingredient in tabbouleh.

Since it is precooked it is easy and quick to prepare. I put 1 cup of bulgar wheat in 2 cups of boiling water and let it sit for 20 minutes and you have your morning cereal ready to eat. Sprinkle a little garlic salt on it to give it a great taste. One cup of the dried bulgar wheat will give you at least 7 breakfast meals. A 16oz bag of bulgar wheat costs less than $2.00. It has a light, nutty flavor.

Most importantly, it is a high protein, high fiber food that is great for the health of your body. A 1/4 cup of bulgar wheat provides 5 grams of protein, 105 mg of potassium (important for blood pressure), 4 grams of dietary fiber, 34 grams of carbohydrates, and no sugar, sodium or saturated & trans fat.

Suprisingly, bulgar and other whole grain wheats, supply more, and a greater variety of antioxidents than fruits and vegetables, including vitamin E for antioxidents, and the B vitamins. Good for your heart, cancer prevention and cholesterol levels.

Adding some blueberries to your bulgar wheat cereal, will provide an additional burst of antioxidants to your body. Some nutritional researchers rank blueberries as the number one super food.

If you want and need even more antioxidants, sprinkle some flax seed meal on your bulgar wheat cereal. Flax seed is also extremely high in antioxidants.

With a whole wheat cereal fortified with blueberries and flax seed meal, you will be ready to start your day with more energy, greater alertness, and a happy & positive attitude in your relationships. Your lifestyle will improve dramatically.

Furthermore, the fiber in bulgar wheat and flax seed is one of the best ways to achieve the critical daily elimination of waste and toxins, which is important for health and weight loss. Also, you will not have to turn your bathroom into a library.

A high-quality source of organic bulgar wheat is Arrowhead Mills: http://www.arrowheadmills.com/products/product.php?prod_id=220&cat_id=/

And a great source describing the health benefits of bulgar and other whole grain wheat is: http://www.healthcastle.com/whole-grains.shtml/

Sourdough Bread:

More than any other breads, including whole wheat, it has been found that sour dough bread provides more significant health benefits through its positive effects on carbohydrate metabolism, blood sugar and insulin levels.

Sourdough"s benefits appear to stem from the fermentation of the sourdough which changes the nature of the starches in the bread, along with the symbiotic culture of lactobacilli and yeasts, which provides a distinctively tangy, sour taste. Sourdough bread is raised with a starter or leaven of flour and water in which wild yeasts are encouraged to grow. The leaven is kept warm , which allows it to ferment over a few days, creating the bread's sour, tangy taste.

It is this process and blend of ingredients that makes sourdough bread an inmportant food item for health, energy and weight loss. We can eat bread and lose weight.

Not all sourdough bread is created equal. If you want "good for your heath", tangy, flavorable sourdough bread, don't bother with the commercial bakeries, and supermarket breads. They bake the bread to quickly, while it is longer fermentation periods that lead to healthy, tasty sourdough bread. After many attempts to locate good, healthy sourdough bread, I found a small bakery close to my home in Colorado that had it all. A franchise bakery with locations in other states, the Great Harvest Bread Company has the best. Check out their Web site: http://www.greatharvest.com/ Not only do they use an excellent starter for their sourdough bread, they use the starter in whole grain wheat dough, and with a longer fermenation period produce a healthier, tangy product. Great stuff. For more on sourdough bread, check out my Lens on whole wheat sourdough bread.

I found that for breakfast, Sourdough toast combined with, green tea and bulgar wheat cereal is a fantastic way to start the day, with great taste. And it helps supply energy to make it through the day.

These Web sites explain some additional health effects of sourdough bread:
http://www.squidoo.com/whole-wheat-sourdough-bread/
http://www.freedom4um.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=79282