I am trying to exercise more, but you could say I live a relatively inactive life.

First change

It is healthier to eat breakfast than not, right? I'm not overweight (by medical standards), but I do weigh about 15lb more than I did when my stomach was nice and flat last summer (145ish now instead of 130...5'6, 23 years old).

Is there a significant difference between Cheerios and oatmeal? I got a big box of both from BJ's, and discovered (10 minutes ago) that a bowl of cheerios w/ milk and a bowl of oatmeal with a chopped pear in it is too big to eat at the same time!

Why eat Both? The Oatmeal with the chopped pair is more than enough. Oatmeal is more filling for me also compared to Cherrios. Consider adding a scoop of Protein Powder to your otameal.

consider scrapping both

wat? Why scrap oatmeal? Oatmeal is freaking awesome from a breakfast and nutrition standpoint.

more awesome than eggs, bacon, fruit?

I used to eat fruit salad every morning, and couldn't understand why I had trouble shedding some extra pounds. After discovering this forum, I changed many aspects of my diet, and started eating oatmeal every day. (For one thing, a number of people suggested that I was consuming too much fruit.)

Of course, I've made so many changes to my diet and exercise routine that I don't know how much oatmeal helped or hurt. But one thing is obvious to me: oatmeal staves off hunger much more than anything other breakfast food I've tried.

Everything is individual, but I would be hardpressed to believe that the fruit salad in the morning was responsible for your weight loss stagnancy. If you're trying to shred it up you might want to cut out/limit the fruit, but the changes you saw were probably the result of other nutritional Eureka moments.

Regarding the hunger pangs comment, I definitely agree. Oatmeal is great at filling you up. It doesn't taste anywhere near as good as eggs though imo.

eggs are indeed tastier than oatmeal, but contend that carbs with a good amount of fiber in the morning will give you more energy than eggs and bacon with regards to exercise. You might consider eating oatmeal on morning workout days, and eating eggs/protein on rest days.

It must be april fools if you think fruit is worse for you than oatmeal in terms of body composition.

wow, didn't even read that post until now. I def agree with AZK here, don't limit your fruit. Besides, it's so freakin tasty.

I might try and dig up the thread where this point was made. It wasn't that fruit overall was bad; but that I personally may have been eating too much fruit.

I'm not making this up. It was advice I got here, and I'll try to find it. I'm probably not conveying it correctly.

This is the thread I was talking about

But on rereading it now many months later, I wouldn't waste anyone's time by recommending it. There's some good discussion there. But the point about eating too much fruit was really made in context of the lack of variety and protein in my diet.

I still eat a lot of fruit, in fact, but at different times. I snack on apples, bananas, pears, whatever throughout the day, but no longer have a large fruit salad for breakfast. I found that breakfast left me hungry pretty quickly. So, I am much happier now eating fruit as a snack at different times, rather than making it an entire meal.

What AZK said is pretty obv. Though I think some balance is necessary. Eating meat/eggs/fruit every morning would probably suck after a few weeks.

You've gotta get some carbs somewhere. Oatmeal is some of the best complex carbs you can eat.

Here's the difference I found:

Cheerios: Whole Grain Oats, Modified Corn Starch, Sugar, Oat Bran, Salt, Calcium Carbonate, Oat Fiber, Tripotassium Phosphate, Corn Starch, Wheat Starch, Vitamin E to preserve freshness, Plus some added vitamins and minerals.

Oatmeal: Organic Whole Grain Rolled Oats - - Plus whatever I may personally add. (Could be whey protein, flax meal, nuts, fruit, whatever) Anyway, I've never seen a reason to add corn starch or tripotassium phosphate.

Get some protein in your breakfast too.

I'm confused by this... oatmeal is not anywhere near eggs, bacon, fruit... did I read bacon? You're kidding me right?

Oatmeal is one of the BEST complex carbs out there and it's dirt cheap. If you can eat it regularly then ****, eat it regularly.

You can't compare oatmeal to fruit; have both


As for OP, there's nothing wrong with eating cheerios, though oatmeal typically is better (price wise and overall nutrition)

Me, I can't stomach oatmeal unless it's ground up in my PWO shake so I would pick cheerios over oatmeal (taste preference)

I was gonna comment on this. just look at how much freaking MSG is in cheerios. it's unfrakkinbelievable. cheerios have a ton of sugar and MSG more than sugar, so you are gettting so much MSG it's totally crazy.

also oatmeal has quite a lot of protein, more than u would think.

10 grams per cup I think. so if you have a big bowl youre getting like 20 grams protein.

wat?

Uh, I don't see any MSG in Cheerios...


What's a good source of protein to add to a < 10 minute breakfast? Eggs aren't good; can't get the dishes cleaned up and eat them without just scarfing it down, AND eat a bowl of oatmeal/cheerios w/ fruit. I tend to drink my protein shake after post-work 2 mile run.

Keep in mind I'm posting this for 'health', not necessarily a working out standpoint; my protein needs are probably significantly lower than many on this sub-forum.

seriously, wat? PLAIN CHEERIOS HAS NONE OF THOSE

Since I am so lazy in the morning I just have a scoop of whey for my morning protein. It gets the job done and it's great because it's fast absorbing.

All incomplete; and no one eats oatmeal for the protein, it's just a really good complex carb.

I thought the mixing thing was b.s.

like you supposed to eat rice with beans to get complete protein but I thought that was proven to be false.

Modified Corn Starch

isn't that one of the 20 or so names for MSG?