On Breakfasting in the New Year (Or, Here's a Porridge Recipe...)

I holidayed hard, guys.

With a vengeance.

It's not an uncommon story. Equal parts revelry and lack of time lead to sustaining oneself on hors d'oeuvres, candy canes, and whiskey for a month (note: I don't think I actually had any candy canes)(for sure the rest, though). I was more vegetarian than vegan, and I have no regrets. It was a fun month. A fun month that ended with me being not entirely sure when I'd last had a vegetable and reasonably certain that I was suffering from a mild amount of self-inflicted malnutrition.

Needless to say, when the tinsel settled, it was time to detox.

Now, "detox," is a very strong word. When some people use it, they mean they're going to embark on some kind of magic juice cleanse or fast. Good luck to them. When I use it, all I really mean is that I start paying attention to what I'm doing again. It only took about two days for my blood to stop hurting, so I have faith in my system.

For me, a decent breakfast is key to making good choices for the rest of the day. However, I'm not going to get up any earlier to make it, so breakfasts that are quick and easy - or that I can prepare in advance on the day I set aside to do my cooking for the week - are also my friend.

I kicked off 2015 with a nifty little dish I found on Pinterest last summer that happens to meet both requirements, a raw buckwheat chia porridge that is super easy and satisfying. It's also vegan and gluten free, so extra snaps if either of those things apply to you or you're having friends over for breakfast that you don't want to poison. Recipe after the jump.

On Breakfast (Or, Trying Not to Fail at My Own Life Plans)

So here's a thing that is true: breakfast is good for you.

I know. Stop the presses.

Now, whether or not breakfast is, "the most important meal of the day," as our parents and most after school programming would suggest, apparently remains to be seen. There are studies and articles and what have you floating around out there making the case for lunch and/or dinner. My non-scientific opinion is that all three meals are kind of equally important, as skipping any of them tends to throw life out of whack and/or send me spinning into a blind rage.

And yet...

It's just so easy to miss breakfast. Even now, when I'm fully aware of the consequences, it's one of the first parts of my morning routine to get cut when I'm bargaining for extra minutes of sleep. I don't know what it is - the proximity of the meal to what's often the most rushed part of the day, the popular idea that breakfast is really just first dessert (why did we even let Pop-Tarts become a thing?)(because they're disturbingly delicious slabs of sugar and chemicals, damn them)(triple parenthetical), the government (I needed a third thing) - but, despite my best intentions, I am a serial cereal skipper (I know, I'm so sorry - not sorry enough to delete it, but still).

Well, no longer. I am making this bold declaration to the universe, the cyberverse, and the 4ish people I can mostly guarantee will at least sort of skim this post: I will make breakfast a legitimate priority. And I don't mean I'm going to have a cup of tea and merrily skip off to start my day, satisfied that I have achieved my goal. Simply throwing something into the morning meal time slot will not necessarily allow you to reap the benefits of being a breakfast eater. Am I saying ditch your coffee and never look at a donut again? No. Donuts are amazing. And I mean, I'm not at all fond of coffee, but I don't begrudge you the right to enjoy it.

What I am saying is that, occasional indulgences aside, it's just as important to consider the nutritional value of the first meal of the day as it is the second and third. Because again, in a world full of pastries and pancakes and something called toaster strudel (again, why did we even...?), it's so easy to forget that you're meant to start most days with purpose, and that maybe pouring a bag of refined sugar onto your soul isn't necessarily going to be conducive to optimal brain function.

Now, does this mean we all need to resign ourselves to eating nutritionally enriched cardboard and living lives of sadness? No. Promise. What I'm reminding myself, as much as anyone else, is that crafting a dish that is both functional and phenomenal in the morning is neither impossible nor complicated. Exhibit A after the jump.