Breakfast, A Thing Of The Past ?

I'm the polar opposite. If I want a steak, I eat a steak. If I want a salad, I eat a salad. I like both -- at different times. We are all different, even though we are biologically the same??? Do what works for you.

CD
For sure. I like a salad with my steak, so there you go. Anyway, my first meal of the day like I said starts at 4pm and generally I start with a large varied salad with a protein. Today it's some trout I smoked a few days ago, so that's my breakfast, so to speak, it is breaking my fast.
 
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The reason I do this is because of the metabolic advantages that come along with not eating.....lots of good things happen to insulin levels and lowers and maintains blood glucose levels, increases HGH (Human Growth Hormone) levels X5 which helps with fat burning and preservation of muscle. Cells are repaired by scavenging waste material from cells which helps in longevity and cancer cell reduction. Reduces oxidative stress and inflammation. Reduces blood pressure, blood triglycerides, increases levels of a brain hormone called brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF).........just getting started. :D

Yeah, I'm a nutritional nerd, sorry if it's boring and I don't want to highjack anyone's thread, but it might be interesting or get someone thinking, especially if they have any of the symptoms. Cheers.

My insulin levels tell me when I'm hungry.
 
I'm very much tied to a schedule for mealtimes.
We had a schedule of sorts when I was working. We did have a degree of flex time, but if we had, say, 9 am meetings, I'd want to get in at 7 or 7:30 to get preliminary work done prior to meetings. On those days I'd nab a hard egg or two, a little salt, and head on out. Or if I had quick-eating leftovers, I'd nuke those and run. If I had a bit more leeway, I might stop at Panera's on the way in and nab one of their breakfast sandwiches to eat the rest of the way.

On less busy days I never got there after 8 am. The highway liked to back up something fierce.

The cafeteria served a hot breakfast between 7 and 9:30 - I could sometimes get there at 7 and grab something. If we had no morning meetings, and my schedule permitted, sometimes I'd go for the Hobbit Second breakfast - eggs if I hadn't had them earlier, or oatmeal that I drizzled with a little milk, a dab of butter, and perhaps a half teaspoon of brown sugar. The oatmeal was the REAL stuff, not instant (which I cannot stand). Failing that, a little breakfast sausage.

In order to meet my crew for lunch, I aimed to get to the cafeteria about 11:45 (when I had that option). Other times we worked through lunch and (since we usually had a good idea what we'd be doing that day) I'd bring in my own lunch and try to eat at my desk while working, which was only something I could do in my last few years there. (Prior to that, I didn't have an office - my desk was in the lab proper, and it was verboten to Eat in a Lab, for very many good reasons... I was glad when I got an office, and it was also private enough that if I felt like bringing in fish and nuking it, no one was gonna complain. (I got grandfathered in a microwave from a previous supervisor who moved on to another company... although they did have other nuking machines elsewhere in the building. I left that equipment to the guy who took my office when I retired.)

Sometimes there were team lunch meetings, where people brought food from the cafeteria or home to eat, around noon. This was fine, although on days when I had to present data, I simply waited until after it was all over, to eat. We had a monthly pizza party at noon, too.
Work was out anywhere between 4 pm to 6 pm. Plus near the end, some 7 pm times didn't typically leave me much eating time in the middle of the day, and usually meant I was there by 7:30 in the morning, if not earlier. I was gonna need dinner! (Commute time to work - 25-35 minutes. Home - the later I got out, the longer it took, plan on over an hour...) I ended up on some longer days slow-cooking brisket, the only only only thing I have ever discovered that can stand that much slow cooking. Or, on the worst days, stopping at Whole Foods for a grass-fed/finished burger or a slice of pizza if the pizza had something interesting on it and did NOT have their vegan "cheeze". This also gave traffic a chance to die down on the highway... I knew that, even if I was usually quite happy with salad for lunch, I didn't want salad for dinners on lengthy days like those!

(I was usually in bed by 9 or 9:30 pm, no matter how work went.)

BTW, I enjoyed the career, and did manage to work around the food necessities. You figure out what to do, and you do it. And, unless there was an emergency, we always knew a day or three ahead of time whether the date in question was going to need adaptations or not. Most days were the usual, eat something, go to work, bring lunch in or purchase shortly before noon, go home and night and prepare a "quick and easy" dinner with foods I enjoy.

So... the point is, now meals are quite a bit easier to plan around, for me. I still do want a bite to eat ahead of time if I drive anywhere over a half-hour from here - unless it is a planned early brunch.
 
I think people who can go out for lunch are lucky. Where I worked they shunned it lot, and put the discouragement on. But the other tech and I had clout. Eventually we got sick of about every fast junk around there and insisted. The boss there saying "Don't go, you guys won't come back" and all this. We went.

So we went to the Ground Round and I had surf n turf, I forgot what he had, but we both had a few beers. then he says to me "I don't like how hee was saying we won't come back". Two minds with a single thought. I had to get change for the pay phone. (remember those ?)

Called the shop "Hey BIll, we ran out of money and need like $30 to get out of here". Clout ? "I can't leave because I am the only one here right now".

Well that was a medium white lie, we had money, we were working and always had money. So we went to the strip joint.

What do you think happened when we showed up the next morning ?

"Look, if you eat lunch at the shop we'll pay you through it". Not only did they do that, they went and got the lunch.

T
 
When I worked on overland pipeline construction (1969 to 1984). If I was out and about I would join one of the crews for breakfast (usually between around 09:00 to10:00). We started at 06:00. There are around 12 main crews involved in pipeline construction in UK and they operate some 2 - 3 km apart so each has their own mobile canteen and cook. Lunch was prepared between 15:00 and 16:00. If I was in the base the canteen was basically open all day but I got into the habit of eating at the sames times. Usually finishing time was 19:00 or thereabouts and I would then retire to the pub and except for finger snacks in the bar I wouldn't eat again. I can't remember the last time that I had three meals in one day.
 
I didn't eat breakfast for decades. Just went off to work and was fine. Then I went into the hospital in 2017 and they kinda got me hooked on it again. However of late I have been skipping it.

Sometimes I feel a little bit of hunger but it is very mild.

Later I also skipped lunch, mainly because at work it would make me tired. I cannot have that on the job, it is too demanding. Well all I had to do is my own work and help everyone at the shop and always be right. I got top buck but there was no room for error, well not much. The last cpouple jobs were good, I was involved. I improved the places and I liked it. But to do that I had to be 100%, that means no more toke breaks. (we did that at one place, if anyone called for us the secretary said we were out "rotating the tires", she was really cool)

But then I got my chances. I told the bosses what to do from day one, at first they look at me funny, like who da boss ? Then it is not forceful but "Believe me, do this". They did, it came out great and then I was respected, and more and more of these got me no official title but I didn't need one. And I wouldn't make more money, I was already at the top of the pay scale by any sane metric, and the perks, eesh. Ever here the word "Anything" ? Well that was about it. i got the problems without the title, fine with me. $$$

I just couldn't eat at work, so I ended up one meal per day.

For a while I relied too much on fast food and hurt my health. Got a bad back, really bad knees and just, well not what I would expect for like 35(?).

Then I found the time to cook and got off this junk food. My body healed itself. So cooking DOES mean something to me.

When I changed the way I eat, my knees were so bad I could not go down a flight of steps without excruciating pain. One night many moons into eating better I wake up in the middle of the night and my knees are like on fire. I mean the temperature was almost too hot to touch. It was not painful, but quite unusual. I went back to sleep and when I woke up my knees were completely healed. ZERO pain.

So I am a big fan of cooking.

But not breakfast.

Right now I float between one and two meals per day. Depends what I eat first, if it is alot it might be all, if not I forage later.

Lately, tthe only itme I eat when I first get up is if I had not eough last night, or sometimes if there is a pot of good soup or something on the stove I might forage that.

So, whaddya think, do we need three meals a day ?

T
As a teenager it was more like 5 meals a day, LOL. I had the metabolism of Michael Phelps at that age. I could eat a hearty breakfast, a solid lunch, and then devour a 16 ounce steak with a salad, large baked potato with tons of sour cream and butter, and still have room for dessert. These days I eat pretty light. When I was working breakfast was a granola bar or 2, skipped lunch, and a decent dinner (not a 16 ounce steak though, LOL). We now eat 4-6 ounce portions of steak and we eat way more seafood and chicken than we used to. Now that I am not working I might have a light breakfast of 1 egg over a half piece of toast with 2 slices of bacon. Today I splurged and made myself some stuffed French toast and I am still not hungry. We eat late anyway. Dinner tonight will be around 9, bacon cheeseburgers, so I probably won't be hungry in the a.m. and will go straight to lunch (likely a bowl of soup).
 
As a teenager it was more like 5 meals a day, LOL. I had the metabolism of Michael Phelps at that age. I could eat a hearty breakfast, a solid lunch, and then devour a 16 ounce steak with a salad, large baked potato with tons of sour cream and butter, and still have room for dessert.

Steak, I have taken to filet mignon some, though I do like cheap cuts, keeps the choppers working.

Either way, until I can get out to the grill and do this, I have been pan frying these. (all winter)

My big discovery was to not use oil or anything, let it stick to the pa, the more the better. Now you know how non non stick your non sticks pan may be. Boil one spaghetti and it needs to be scraped sometimes. But NO, when you WANT it to stick it won't ! (<John Belushi voice there)

I can make it stick by not taking it up to temp first so that is the current method. When I rip the steak out, whatever is left is there you pour some white wine over it, say bit more than enough( twice really). Deglaze the pan of course, that was the idear, and then pour that over the meat on the plate. Makes a excellent sauce, especially if you lost blood there. But for me the steak does because it is very rare.

Of course this is at the bottom of the plte and go ahead and use it on the meat, BUT there i almost always some left. Well you usualy have part of a baked potato there falling down, if you been eaiting it properly. If you don't at the skin you ain't, umm somethig. Aanyhow, go ahead and drag tthose spu pieces in that juice, QQQQ ! And, I usualy have a separate bowl of spinach or broc that can go it. Someties broc n cheese. Throw it on there and let it all get to each other and that juice to get to it all.

If the situation is you have to broil, somewhere you have to be able to come up wiht some cheap meat, even ground meat. Make whatever of that in the pan and use it for the sauce.

T
 
Steak, I have taken to filet mignon some, though I do like cheap cuts, keeps the choppers working.

Either way, until I can get out to the grill and do this, I have been pan frying these. (all winter)

My big discovery was to not use oil or anything, let it stick to the pa, the more the better. Now you know how non non stick your non sticks pan may be. Boil one spaghetti and it needs to be scraped sometimes. But NO, when you WANT it to stick it won't ! (<John Belushi voice there)

I can make it stick by not taking it up to temp first so that is the current method. When I rip the steak out, whatever is left is there you pour some white wine over it, say bit more than enough( twice really). Deglaze the pan of course, that was the idear, and then pour that over the meat on the plate. Makes a excellent sauce, especially if you lost blood there. But for me the steak does because it is very rare.

Of course this is at the bottom of the plte and go ahead and use it on the meat, BUT there i almost always some left. Well you usualy have part of a baked potato there falling down, if you been eaiting it properly. If you don't at the skin you ain't, umm somethig. Aanyhow, go ahead and drag tthose spu pieces in that juice, QQQQ ! And, I usualy have a separate bowl of spinach or broc that can go it. Someties broc n cheese. Throw it on there and let it all get to each other and that juice to get to it all.

If the situation is you have to broil, somewhere you have to be able to come up wiht some cheap meat, even ground meat. Make whatever of that in the pan and use it for the sauce.

T
Yeah, I am pretty snobby about steak and other meats. I don't do cheap meat, except for the occasional sirloin tips in the crockpot for stew. My dad bought porterhouses and T-bones. I remember a few times going to someone's house and they were grilling sirloin steaks. I was spoiled by my dad's cooking so it was meh. As I grew older, I leaned more towards ribeyes and filet mignon and I pretty much still prefer those to anything else. Even if I make a hamburger I tend to use ground beef tenderloin and I pile on bacon to my burger to add more flavor.

When I was a teenager there was nothing left on my plate but the bone from the T-bone or porterhouse, and I gnawed the bone and ate the entire giant potato, skin and all. I was taught not to waste food and when I was really little I had to sit until the food on my plate was gone. As a teenager it was never a problem. These days if we occasionally get T-bones or porterhouse steaks, I will take the bones and put it in the crockpot to make a beef stock or as a starter for a pot of Bolognese sauce.

I pretty much don't grill and in the winter I am not making hubby go stand in the snow and try to cook a steak when the wind is blowing the snow sideways. Not only is it uncomfortable for him, but the grill isn't cooking evenly. I have gotten really good at pan searing in my cast iron skillet and finishing in the oven. I have no problems with sticking and I want a good sear but don't want my food to stick. I use a tad bit of butter in the area where my steak is going to go, and when it smokes, I throw on the steak. If I deglaze after cooking beef, I generally use red wine. Never thought to use white, I tend to use that for seafood. To each their own, I reckon.

I don't like my meat really rare these days, though I did as a teen. Nowadays I eat my steaks medium rare. I like burgers medium well or well done.
 
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