When it comes to cutting out processed food, please don’t let yourself get overwhelmed by trying to change everything all at once. Even baby steps in the right direction count for something! Some of the best advice I can give you is to start with just one meal of the day – like breakfast – and once breakfast is all cleaned up then you can move on to another meal like lunch or snacks. And as with any aspect of this lifestyle, the most important thing you can do is plan ahead. So today I’m going to share some ideas to help you do just that.
Speaking of planning ahead though, I first want to quickly tell you about our fabulous sponsor – Plan to Eat. Their service goes hand-in-hand with getting organized in the New Year and will also help you eat better, spend less time and money in the grocery store, and give you peace of mind knowing what’s for dinner. I don’t know about you, but I must always know what’s for dinner around here! :) Plan to Eat is an online meal planner that allows you to pick recipes from anywhere (the web or hard copies) and “drag and drop” them to create your own custom meal schedule for the week. Then your very own organized shopping list will automatically be created based on the recipes you’ve selected! You can see it all in action on this short video. They are currently offering a free 30-day trial – so go check it out!
Okay, back to real food breakfasts – here are six easy ideas…
- The Night Before: Overnight Oats
Making overnight oats is seriously SO easy. It takes no time at all and the possibilities are endless. Start with our favorite combo and go from there.
Recipe Link: Overnight Oats
– - Make Ahead and Defrost: Pancakes or Waffles or Muffins
Homemade goodies like pancakes aren’t just for the weekends anymore! Most baked goods freeze beautifully so next time you make them just double your recipe and save some for later. Be sure to pair it with some fresh fruit and you are good to go.
Recipe Links: Pancakes, Waffles, Muffins
– - Quick and Easy: Eggs or Warm Oatmeal
Can we all agree it takes less than 5 minutes to scramble an egg or make oatmeal (not from a premixed packet)? If you (or your kid) are a hot breakfast kind of person then this is the way to go.
Recipe Link: Quick Stovetop Oatmeal
– - Throw it Together: Simple Yogurt Crunch or Green Smoothie
These actually take a minute or two longer than eggs or oatmeal, but not much. For lighter fare go for this yogurt parfait of sorts or a big ol’ smoothie full of greens.
Recipe Links: Simple Yogurt Crunch, Green Smoothie
– - Plan Ahead: Homemade Granola
It’s officially a crisis if we’re out of granola in my house because it’s my favorite breakfast of all time. I’m like those people walking sideways (in the old V8 commercials) if I have to eat something else instead. So I’m sure to have a fresh batch ready to go each week before Monday hits.
Recipe Link: Granola
– - Running out the Door: Fruit & Nut Bar or Banana
We all have mornings like this and the worst thing you can do is go hungry. So if all else fails (i.e. numbers 1 through 5) at least have some fruit and nut bars (I like Larabar or Kit’s Organic brands) and fresh fruit like bananas or apples that you can easily grab and go. You can also make your own fruit and nut bars to have on hand for days like these!
Recipe Link: Homemade Larabars
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What’s your favorite quick and easy real food breakfast?
Real Food Tips: 10 (More) Recipes to Freeze for School Lunches
My fave: muffin from the freezer & banana for a quick breakfast. I bake the “better morning glory muffins” from all recipes with a few real-food tweaks.
I love your 6 ideas! I always tell people the same thing: start slowly. One meal a day. Go from there. Some personalities do well with an all-or-nothing approach, but most people are more likely to stick with it if it isn’t so overwhelming. Great post!
Like the pancakes and waffles, my son loves the whole wheat biscuits (with “clean” jam/fruit spread). I always freeze the leftovers and defrost single biscuits as needed in the morning. I usually pair it with a fresh fruit and sometimes a scrambled egg.
Thank goodness for fruit, eggs, and oatmeal. Somthing in like ought to be easy, eh? :) Great website!
I hard-boil eggs over the weekend so that I can have them for some of my work breakfasts during the week. Happily we have a fridge and toaster at work so I have one egg with buttered whole-grain toast and fresh fruit.
My son and I tried the overnight oats the other day and fell in love with them! Made them last night and we’ve just sat down to eat them. Todays offering included sultanas, pepita’s, sunflower seeds mix in the oats and then we topped with fresh blueberries. Yum! Now waiting for my daughter to surface to see her reaction to my son and my new favourite breakfast.
I am going to have to try the homemade granola!
I think going slowly is wonderful advice and any one of the first five suggestions is always in rotation at our house! In fact, my children’s science teacher has requested that they bring in empty cereal boxes for a project. I actually had to go to the store and buy one because we don’t keep cereal around, LOL!
These are such great ideas! It’s hard to break out of the cereal rut, but there are so many other great options. Yum!
Mind. Blown!!!! PlanToEat.com is the best recommendation In this world for all time! If this site works the way it promises too, I’m going to seem like a Superwoman chef whose household will never experience meal fatigue. It’s like Christmas morning all over again!
Porridge all the way!
It’s so easy….I make mine straight into my bowl – about 35g rolled oats in a bowl, add enough water to cover them, and a bit more (but not to drown them), and microwave for about 2 mins. Once it is cooked, stir it thoroughly then add a splash of milk to creamy it up. Delicious on its own or add chopped banana, honey, cinnamon etc to vary it. Also delicious with a sprinkling of sea salt (yes, really!)
Sees me right through till lunch every day.
I absolutely love this post! I love overnight oats for breakfast! I have been looking for a “clean” waffle/pancake recipe that freezes well for a pre-workout early in the morning! Thanks for the great tips!
Eggs are such an easy, inexpensive, and nutritious breakfast! I stick with them for at least 5 of 7 breakfasts in a week! Scrambled or Fried are by far the easiest but I love making frittatas with veggies too! Another alternative is taking some organic sausage or bacon and mixing it with some premixed (frozen) veggies for another quick breakfast (or lunch!).
Hi Lisa. I recently discovered your blog and love how different it is. Great job!
To answer the question, I thought I would add my 5 cents.:) I do not like to make breakfast, so I always pre-cook. My favourites are overnight oats, egg muffins (many with quinoa), chia pudding, overnight oats, muffins, waffles, parfaits, overnight quinoa. So many options are out there
Hi Lisa! I’ve been following your blog for a while and eat lots of real food. Would you consider coconut palm sugar a refined sugar? I still use it sometimes in baking because honey can be expensive.
Hi Caitlyn. For purposes of the pledge we just use honey and maple syrup. Outside of the pledge, coconut sugar is a good option used in moderation.
Yep! These look just like what we eat for breakfast in our house every morning! We also drink a lot of pink, purple, or chocolate peanut butter smoothies, too (which also happen to have spinach in them). So, so good!
Really great post and Thanks for this information.
Great tips for the new year. My goal is to actually plan LESS, I am not the least bit spontaneous and find myself getting stressed when plans change.
By the way, if anyone is looking for a free meal planner, I recommend checking out spoonacular: https://spoonacular.com/meal-planner
In my home, breakfast is the hardest. We are busy with farm chores and need to get started on school work, so breakfast needs to be easy, fast, and real. Great ideas. thanks!
Lisa, I tried making the corn tortillas recipe in your book and the tortillas did not turn out well. I used the brand One Degree from Whole Foods. I followed your instructions to the T. I grew up using Maseca, but now I know it is not a good product since it’s nonorganic and probably full of GMOs.
My question is; what is the brand of masa you buy to make the corn tortillas? Also, where do you buy that brand?
So sorry that happened! I always use Bob Red’s Mill Masa Harina with no issues: http://amzn.to/1BcpXiX Their products are non-GMO.
Great ideas. Having cut sugar out of my diet I am now working on reducing the amount of grains I eat. Breakfast has been the hardest meal to adapt. My go to options have been green smoothies, eggs cooked in a variety of ways and yoghurt with pumpkin seeds, almond flakes and coconut flakes. Sometimes with a drizzle of pumpkin oil (try it! it doesn’t taste as strange as it sounds.). Sometimes I top the yoghurt with a milled linseed mix including sesame and dried berries (Harvest Morn from Aldi for any UK readers).
I have tried making grain free pancakes but so far had nothing but time consuming disasters so if anyone has a recipe that works please let me know :)
Hi just wanted to let you know detoxinista.com has an almond butter pancake that is really good. My two sons and I ate them up.
Thanks for the ideas- I love making waffles on a Saturday and freezing them for another weekend or a weekday snack. My favorite quick and easy breakfast that’s not on here is a green smoothie. My husband and I drink one every work day and feel so much more energetic now! Our fave combo is greens (kale, spinach, swiss chard), carrots, celery, and frozen berries.
My fave quick real food breakfast is a hard boiled egg and a piece of fruit. I get some filling protien and something a little sweet. :)
We love Dutch Baby Pancakes, and the protein that they pack. Basically eggs, milk and whole wheat flour blended together and baked in a healthy fat (butter is our usual, though coconut oil lends a different flavor profile.) We either top with maple syrup or go savory and dice up ham or bacon and cheese for the top. Yum!
Quick breads made with real ingredients and baked in muffin form are also a sure winner with my children. Banana bread is what we bake most often, but pumpkin is really good too. These are wonderful to freeze ahead as well.
You shared some great ideas, thank you!
Our favorite breakfast right now is ruby red grapefruit and hearty Wasa cracker with goat cheese spread on it. I can eat it every day and not get bored.
Eggs? Really Nothing but abused animals. Meat and diary are the second leading cause to green house gas!
I just wanted to say I tried the Plan to Eat website last month and ended up getting the subscription during their black Friday deal. I’ve seriously been looking for a site like this and SO grateful you posted about them. This is hands down the best site I’ve stumbled upon in a long time…besides yours, of course. ;)
I have found breakfast to be the easiest meal to convert to whole foods because i never was a big fan of cereal. My kids are creatures of habit and expect oatmeal on Mondays because that is oatmeal day. The day they are having a hard time giving up is bagel day. I have tried making other things in its place that they love. They apparently love them on mommy’s choice Friday or baked goods Saturday, but not on bagel Tuesday. Any suggestions for a recipe I could bake and freeze in advance that would be similar to lenders bagels?
My kids are creatures of habits also, so I totally can understand!
Lisa has made bagels using her whole wheat raisin bread recipe: https://www.100daysofrealfood.com/2011/05/25/recipe-whole-wheat-cinnamon-raisin-bread-for-bread-machine/. If you google how to make bagels and use the instructions from that it will walk you through the steps. You will need to shape them, let them rise, boil them, and then bake them. Hope that helps some.