Breakfast. It's either a daily ritual, where you prepare a meal for yourself and/or the ones you love or its something that if it happens, great, if not, you're in the snack drawer at work or downing 3 cups of coffee in the next 2 hours.

It's overlooked, and often less exciting than the dry piece of toast crumbling on your plate. It can also be pretty boring. Eggs. Bacon. Sausage.. omelets, maybe pancakes and waffles with sugar-laden syrup. Or cereal and maybe a piece of fruit.

I often wonder why we eat what we do eat for breakfast.

I can no longer eat eggs, they haven't agreed with my since being pregnant with Aria. Eggs were my go-to for so long, that when I realized I could not eat them, I dove head first into a bowl of oatmeal. Not good.

I needed to re-think breakfast.

Enter Paleo and the Whole30. These are life-changing in so many ways, but what they really did for me was made me rethink what I put on my plate and when. Paleo and Whole30 are pretty similar, both are fairly heavy on eggs for breakfast, for good reason of course. Eggs are full of protein, good fats, vitamins and minerals, eat them up if you can. If you can't eat them like me, or if you are looking for an alternative, then you have to find another way to get some protein early in the morning.

Simplest answer for you.. I turned dinner into breakfast. It is generally leftovers. I try to batch cook on Sundays and Wednesdays so I have plenty of options for protein, complex carbs and good fats.

It started where my batch cooking sessions would include ground pork sausage, (that's breakfast-y right?), that I could load into a sweet potato and top it with avocado. Delicious in every way, but after a week or two, I needed more variety.

This is where I started reaching for leftovers.

Here's my breakfast's for the past week: 

Monday:  Leftover Moroccan Chicken Thighs with half an Acorn Squash, stuffed with coconut manna (butter or coconut cream) and sprinkled with cinnamon.

Tuesday: Leftover Zucchini Noodles topped with Cincinnati Chili & Avocado (see pic on right)

Wednesday: Sweet Potato stuffed with Coconut Butter & Cinnamon with cooked ground Pork Sausage

Thursday: Leftover Pina Colada Jerk Chicken with Rice

Friday: Leftover diced Chicken with Balsamic Asparagus and a handful of olives

Don't be afraid to step away from those waffles. 

Starting your day with a solid protein, complex carbs and high quality fats ensures good energy levels, you'll be more alert, less sluggish and won't be dealing with as many cravings.

What's your go-to breakfast?