I gave up oatmeal breakfasts years ago. They weren’t working for me at all. I was gaining weight despite doing all the right things like loading my oats up with coconut oil, nuts and seeds to bring down the glycemic load. It was simply too much carbohydrates for my slower metabolic type. And so I switched to the best fat-fuelled breakfasts that I love.
Carbohydrates continue to be that macronutrient of debate. Some people can thrive on a diet that is rich in whole grains, lentils and beans, and others do not. As you UnDiet enthusiasts already know, there is no one diet for all.
After years on a predominantly vegan-style diet, one that would be described as healthy and balanced, I was gaining weight, hungry all the time, and my sleep was impaired. I developed cavities in my teeth, and my nervous system was slowly being blown to pieces until adrenal fatigue kicked in. I felt hungry all the time and after a car accident in 2011 when my body and mind just couldn’t recover, I knew some changes needed to be made.
That is when I swung the door open and welcomed in the dreaded macronutrient, the one that we’ve been taught to fear by mainstream media and yogurt makers alike: fat.
I was already eating loads of coconut oil, flax oil, olive oil, nuts and seeds, but my body needed more. Increasing the fat in my diet changed my health.
Increasing the fat in my diet changed my health.
I welcomed in ghee (clarified butter) by the bucketful (okay, maybe not bucketful but by the heaping spoonful for sure). I started cooking with it, adding it to my morning elixirs, tossing steamed vegetables in it and smearing it on my almond bread.
Very rapidly the extra weight I had been holding dropped without effort, my body pain from the car accident decreased, my eczema and psoriasis healed and my sleep improved. All of this happened very quickly.
What Fat Does In The Body
Helps form our cell membranes
Offers us a rich source of energy
Protects our nervous system
Helps us make hormones
Forms our brains
Supports effective functioning of the nervous system
Nourishes our skin from the inside out
Stabilizes blood sugar levels
Lubricates our joints
Tastes delicious!
Choosing Your Fats
The key for me was incorporating more saturated fat, and I chose to find options that were more sustainable to where I lived. Sure, I could have feasted on avocados and coconuts and their oils, but in Canada, we’re a far way from the tropical climates that house these culinary delights. So I turned to grass-fed, traditional saturated animal fats.
When it comes to saturated fats, or any fat for that matter, quality counts. We need to avoid conventionally raised animal derived foods that have not only been abused, but are full up with drugs and diseases. Check out your local farm or farmer’s market to ensure you are buying products that come from high-quality, sustainably raised, grass-fed animals.
Get To Know The Traditional Saturated Fats
Saturated fats (ghee, grass-fed butter, grass-fed meats, cold pressed coconut oil etc), work to protect the unsaturated fats (the fats found in nuts and seeds) from damage in the body – almost acting as antioxidants to protect the beneficial properties of those fats. In general, the North American population has been encouraged to decrease consumption of healthy saturated fats and medium-chain triglycerides, through predominantly unfounded research and propaganda from various lobbyists (I see you margarine and the Health Check programs). As the saturated fat is lowered in our food, most often denatured polyunstaturated fats and chemicals are increased to provide the flavour and mouthfeel feel humans love so much from fatty foods.
The quality does count and when I talk about saturated fats, I am not referring to french fry grease and caged feedlot animals. Quality counts far beyond quantity. A little saturated fat goes a long way. Especially when you’re using them in your best fat-fuelled breakfasts.
Fat-rich breakfasts are a staple in my life, a daily affair that keeps me full, satiated and energy stable until lunch. I eat less grains than ever before, more fat and feel better than ever.
This is my experience. Every body has its own unique needs and your job, as the wonderman or wonderwoman in charge of your body, is to tune in and pay attention to what is working, what isn’t working and be brave enough to make some changes when the changes are needed. It can be tricky when we’ve subscribed to one way of eating for an extended period of time.
We’ve been told so often that fat in the diet is bad for us and causes serious health problems like obesity, heart disease and cancer. Newer research is showing that the low-fat diet craze was based on a load of hooey.
In this video I share everything I love about ghee and the other fat fuelled foods that get my day rocking.
2 tsp coconut oil (if you want a little more fat love!)
Honey or sweetener of choice, to taste
2 cups hot water
Instructions
Place all ingredients in your venting blender and blend until smooth.
Enjoy
Note: If you don’t have a venting blender, you can blend this with regular water and heat over the stove or blend with a small amount of regular water until mixed, transfer to your mug and add the hot water.
Prep Time:5 mins
Category:Drinks + Smoothies
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More Fat Fuelled Breakfast Ideas
Layered Chia and Almond Parfait
by Against All Grain
A delicious and easy make-ahead breakfast that incorporates the delicious fueling omega 3s from chia seeds, along with a creamy scoop of almond butter.
One of my own favourite recipes. We bake up a loaf of almond bread nearly every weekend. We use whole almonds and grind them in the food processor which makes this far less expensive than already ground almond meal. You can make this vegan by swapping the eggs and using chia paste.
As I am allergic to eggs, it’s always tough to find baking recipes that don’t use eggs as the main binding agent. That these english muffins are grain-free and egg-free makes me extra happy about this recipe.
This is one of my favourite recipes from my cookbook. I most often make this without the crust so it’s more like a tortilla. If you make the vegan version with tofu, it won’t be as fat-rich as if you use eggs, but you can always whip up a cashew mayo to slather on top!
Savory Mexican-style breakfasts are the best! Load up on avocado or guacamole for all of that fat-fuelled glory, plus you’ll get a load of protein from beans and eggs. For an egg-free version, substitute some scrambled tofu.
The combination of avocado, greens and coconut milk provides a simple, satiating breakfast. If you wanna be hard core, you can swap half (or all!) of the frozen fruit for a green apple.
For those of you who crave cereal in the morning, this grain-free granola will satisfy you because it’s packed with fat from nuts, seeds, coconut oil and coconut butter.
Coconut milk, cashews, toasted coconut, maca – it’s like having a warm hug in a glass. Instead of white chocolate, pop in a tablespoon or two of cacao butter (you know, the original white chocolate).
when I went to the link for the vegalicious quich, the intro says the crust is made of amaranth. however the ingredients say millet. would it make in difference in the prep method?
OMGosh! Your journey sounds like the nightmare I’ve been in for the past 3 years! It started with a slip on some ice and the ensuing fall resulted in me breaking my back in two places.
About a year and a half in, healed finally thanks mostly to an amazing, intuitive craneo-sacral practitioner, I sold my business, which had been baking! I still loved what I did but I felt like a hypocrite! I couldn’t eat or digest what I was creating. I was (am!) gluten intolerant and sugar is poison too…and here I was living and breathing it!
I cut out gluten and sugar, and because I’m sensitive to caffeine, eliminated that too, including chocolate :( But, sleep is more important than chocolate, so no worries…but worries over what TO eat, continue!
I have tried eating oats and they don’t work for me. I’ve made breakfast bars that just set me up for day long overeating and cravings, even when made with excellent ingredients and sweetened only lightly with honey. I like juicing but not every day, as it doesn’t always leave me satisfied.
I’m still trying to discover what to eat! My weight, if I lose any, comes right back on.
I have recently learned that depression is linked to low cholesterol. My cholesterol has always been naturally low, to where heart patients are asked to go! So…I know I can handle the fat but aside from eating spoonfuls (bucketfuls :) of ghee, I need to figure out what this gorgeous, glorious body wants for breakfast, lunch and dinner! Eager to hear more! <3
Butter and ghee prices are going through the roof. I have a friend who has decided to make her own butter. I know people who make their own ghee from butter. But, if you were going to start from scratch (creme) and make butter and then make ghee, what would your method be?
Love these ideas! I am curious how you realized that you were allergic to eggs, and if you are able to mention what you think are your eczema / psoriasis triggers…..
Meghan, thanks for all these delicious looking breakfast ideas. Have you found a way to bake the English Muffins in an oven, rather than a microwave? I will experiment with it, but thought I’d save time if you have already done this.
Love this for the morning!!
I made it with colostrum instead of collagen (cause that’s what I had!) which added a nice smoothness and used Four Sigmatic XOCO hot chocolate with Chaga in place of the cacao.
Delicious and I can almost hear my brain sighing with satisfaction :)
Thanks Meghan!!
[…] with food, and you want to go the extra step to choose even healthier options, here’s a link to an article that has some even more whole food saturated fat […]
I think that my consumption of sugar and carbs in the morning— and possibly during lunch— contribute to my feeling extremely drowsy at times and wanting to crash. I came across an interesting post that claims that consumption of refined sugars and carbs as the culprit of this energy-plummet. Have you found that to be true? And if so, do these kinds of breakfasts help to prevent those kinds of crashes given that they mostly consist of fats?
The breakfast elixer tastes great. I did not have the dandy blend or elixer but used cacao powder. Wondering this a stand alone breakfast or something you drink with other things? How often do you recommend drinking this? Daily?
Thanks!
I have been drinking this for 3-4 mornings per week. Feel great! I have added raw hemp hearts, blueberries, maca, cinnamon, ginger, vanilla, and dandylion tea. About 600 calories but not having my midmorning snack anymore. Thanks for sharing your other recipes. Have really been seeing a difference since cutting out all processed foods!
Isn’t it interesting how there’s no one size fits all diet? I spent years eating like you describe here, believing a diet higher in healthy fats was best. (I’m a certified health coach and had done my research.) But my weight just climbed and climbed no matter what I did. Recently I’ve been testing out a high complex carb, low fat plant-based diet on myself. One month in of eating as much as I want this way, and I dropped 6 pounds effortlessly. I need to lose another 40. My friend inspired me to do this after she lost 58 pounds last year. It goes against everything I thought I knew about carbs and fats, and now I’m concerned that maybe I’m not eating enough fat. But I need to lose the weight, so I think I will see how far I can get eating like I am now, then add more healthy fats back in when I reach my goal weight and see what I can tolerate. Balance is key. And I do believe we need fats for all the reasons you say. I do feel better cutting out oils and will probably keep it that way.
I eat a lot of fat in the form of butter and cheese. I used to severely limit my fat intake but kept gaining weight. I did not start getting healthy until I let fat into my diet. Also, reading labels, eliminating un-natural foods, etc., and most importantly, listening to Megan’s advise. One word of caution about lard: they put BHT in it to keep it from spoiling. Sounds poisonous to me.
Hi Meghan! Thanks for the Fat Fueled Breakfast blog. I have tried EVERY eating protocol to heal my body (and supposedly the fringe benefits of everything I try is to lose weight) to include zero fat for months and months to support what I was told was a sluggish liver. I didn’t feel much better and I didn’t lose one pound. I tried high (good) carb (no grains), didn’t lose one pound. Raw vegan til 4pm diet for a year – didn’t lose weight. Mostly eat leafy greens and sweet potato (at lunch) and fruit smoothie for breakfast (no protein powders) for 3 years, didn’t lose weight (and so hungry in the mornings). Medical Medium 28 protocol and liver rescue 9 day protocol (basically no fat again)…didn’t lose weight. I have been trying to figure out what will work in my body for 7 years, as I also heal naturally. (And I’ve had all of my blood tests, including thyroid, and of course, everything looks great every time.) ANYway, do you still eat this kind of breakfast and do you still feel satiated until lunch? For how many years did you/have you been eating this high fat vegan breakfast? What you said, “Fat-rich breakfasts are a staple in my life, a daily affair that keeps me full, satiated and energy stable until lunch.” This so resonated with me, because I’ve been searching for this, too! I’ve basically watched so carefully what I put into my body and have been very restrictive and basically hungry for years. So, are you still eating this way (didn’t see this blog’s date) and do you still feel satiated until lunch? I really need something like that! Thanks!
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One of my own favourite recipes. We bake up a loaf of almond bread nearly every weekend. We use whole almonds and grind them in the food processor which makes this far less expensive than already ground almond meal. You can make this vegan by swapping the eggs and using chia paste.
This is one of my favourite recipes from my cookbook. I most often make this without the crust so it’s more like a tortilla. If you make the vegan version with tofu, it won’t be as fat-rich as if you use eggs, but you can always whip up a cashew mayo to slather on top!
by Against All Grain
A delicious and easy make-ahead breakfast that incorporates the delicious fueling omega 3s from chia seeds, along with a creamy scoop of almond butter.
One of my own favourite recipes. We bake up a loaf of almond bread nearly every weekend. We use whole almonds and grind them in the food processor which makes this far less expensive than already ground almond meal. You can make this vegan by swapping the eggs and using chia paste.
This is one of my favourite recipes from my cookbook. I most often make this without the crust so it’s more like a tortilla. If you make the vegan version with tofu, it won’t be as fat-rich as if you use eggs, but you can always whip up a cashew mayo to slather on top!
Love this! Thanks so much for sharing Meghan!
when I went to the link for the vegalicious quich, the intro says the crust is made of amaranth. however the ingredients say millet. would it make in difference in the prep method?
Thanks so much for including my granola! Love your blog by the way xoxo
OMGosh! Your journey sounds like the nightmare I’ve been in for the past 3 years! It started with a slip on some ice and the ensuing fall resulted in me breaking my back in two places.
About a year and a half in, healed finally thanks mostly to an amazing, intuitive craneo-sacral practitioner, I sold my business, which had been baking! I still loved what I did but I felt like a hypocrite! I couldn’t eat or digest what I was creating. I was (am!) gluten intolerant and sugar is poison too…and here I was living and breathing it!
I cut out gluten and sugar, and because I’m sensitive to caffeine, eliminated that too, including chocolate :( But, sleep is more important than chocolate, so no worries…but worries over what TO eat, continue!
I have tried eating oats and they don’t work for me. I’ve made breakfast bars that just set me up for day long overeating and cravings, even when made with excellent ingredients and sweetened only lightly with honey. I like juicing but not every day, as it doesn’t always leave me satisfied.
I’m still trying to discover what to eat! My weight, if I lose any, comes right back on.
I have recently learned that depression is linked to low cholesterol. My cholesterol has always been naturally low, to where heart patients are asked to go! So…I know I can handle the fat but aside from eating spoonfuls (bucketfuls :) of ghee, I need to figure out what this gorgeous, glorious body wants for breakfast, lunch and dinner! Eager to hear more! <3
Butter and ghee prices are going through the roof. I have a friend who has decided to make her own butter. I know people who make their own ghee from butter. But, if you were going to start from scratch (creme) and make butter and then make ghee, what would your method be?
Great article and some great recipes to try. Where do you get ghee in Ottawa or Toronto that is from a grass fed source?
Love these ideas! I am curious how you realized that you were allergic to eggs, and if you are able to mention what you think are your eczema / psoriasis triggers…..
Thank you thank you thank you ☺️My barely moving metabolism needs the fat. Eating fat makes me nicer to be around, my children thank the fat?
Hi! Just wondering about people who don’t have gallbladders..processing a lot more fat just won’t work. Any thoughts would be appreciated.
Awesome post! Thanks for all the info and your honesty regarding your journey. Great breakfast ideas too!
Meghan, thanks for all these delicious looking breakfast ideas. Have you found a way to bake the English Muffins in an oven, rather than a microwave? I will experiment with it, but thought I’d save time if you have already done this.
Love this for the morning!!
I made it with colostrum instead of collagen (cause that’s what I had!) which added a nice smoothness and used Four Sigmatic XOCO hot chocolate with Chaga in place of the cacao.
Delicious and I can almost hear my brain sighing with satisfaction :)
Thanks Meghan!!
[…] with food, and you want to go the extra step to choose even healthier options, here’s a link to an article that has some even more whole food saturated fat […]
Hi Meghan,
Are you able to share some brands of ghee from gas fed cows that is available in Canada? I wasn’t able to read the label during your video.
Thanks,
Erin
Meghan,
I think that my consumption of sugar and carbs in the morning— and possibly during lunch— contribute to my feeling extremely drowsy at times and wanting to crash. I came across an interesting post that claims that consumption of refined sugars and carbs as the culprit of this energy-plummet. Have you found that to be true? And if so, do these kinds of breakfasts help to prevent those kinds of crashes given that they mostly consist of fats?
Thanks,
Arrio
The breakfast elixer tastes great. I did not have the dandy blend or elixer but used cacao powder. Wondering this a stand alone breakfast or something you drink with other things? How often do you recommend drinking this? Daily?
Thanks!
I have been drinking this for 3-4 mornings per week. Feel great! I have added raw hemp hearts, blueberries, maca, cinnamon, ginger, vanilla, and dandylion tea. About 600 calories but not having my midmorning snack anymore. Thanks for sharing your other recipes. Have really been seeing a difference since cutting out all processed foods!
Isn’t it interesting how there’s no one size fits all diet? I spent years eating like you describe here, believing a diet higher in healthy fats was best. (I’m a certified health coach and had done my research.) But my weight just climbed and climbed no matter what I did. Recently I’ve been testing out a high complex carb, low fat plant-based diet on myself. One month in of eating as much as I want this way, and I dropped 6 pounds effortlessly. I need to lose another 40. My friend inspired me to do this after she lost 58 pounds last year. It goes against everything I thought I knew about carbs and fats, and now I’m concerned that maybe I’m not eating enough fat. But I need to lose the weight, so I think I will see how far I can get eating like I am now, then add more healthy fats back in when I reach my goal weight and see what I can tolerate. Balance is key. And I do believe we need fats for all the reasons you say. I do feel better cutting out oils and will probably keep it that way.
I eat a lot of fat in the form of butter and cheese. I used to severely limit my fat intake but kept gaining weight. I did not start getting healthy until I let fat into my diet. Also, reading labels, eliminating un-natural foods, etc., and most importantly, listening to Megan’s advise. One word of caution about lard: they put BHT in it to keep it from spoiling. Sounds poisonous to me.
Hi Meghan! Thanks for the Fat Fueled Breakfast blog. I have tried EVERY eating protocol to heal my body (and supposedly the fringe benefits of everything I try is to lose weight) to include zero fat for months and months to support what I was told was a sluggish liver. I didn’t feel much better and I didn’t lose one pound. I tried high (good) carb (no grains), didn’t lose one pound. Raw vegan til 4pm diet for a year – didn’t lose weight. Mostly eat leafy greens and sweet potato (at lunch) and fruit smoothie for breakfast (no protein powders) for 3 years, didn’t lose weight (and so hungry in the mornings). Medical Medium 28 protocol and liver rescue 9 day protocol (basically no fat again)…didn’t lose weight. I have been trying to figure out what will work in my body for 7 years, as I also heal naturally. (And I’ve had all of my blood tests, including thyroid, and of course, everything looks great every time.) ANYway, do you still eat this kind of breakfast and do you still feel satiated until lunch? For how many years did you/have you been eating this high fat vegan breakfast? What you said, “Fat-rich breakfasts are a staple in my life, a daily affair that keeps me full, satiated and energy stable until lunch.” This so resonated with me, because I’ve been searching for this, too! I’ve basically watched so carefully what I put into my body and have been very restrictive and basically hungry for years. So, are you still eating this way (didn’t see this blog’s date) and do you still feel satiated until lunch? I really need something like that! Thanks!
Thanks for the information!!