It may sound unlikely to most health-conscious Australians, but chomping down on a high-fat breakfast of fried bacon, sausages, eggs, mushrooms and all the rest could actually be the healthiest way to start your day.
According to US scientists, the traditional full-English breakfast is better for your heart, weight and blood pressure than carbohydrate-heavy cereals, bread and pastries, the UK’s Daily Mail reported.
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The thinking behind the new study, at Birmingham’s University of Alabama, is that fatty food gets your metabolism going for the rest of the day which then helps burn off later meals and snacks.
Cereal, on the other hand, gets the body ready to digest carbohydrates only.
However, this doesn’t give you licence to eat fatty foods all day. The system only works if you eat the fried food first thing and then follow it by a regular lunch and light evening meal.
“The first meal you have appears to program your metabolism for the rest of the day,” said Dr Martin Young who conducted the research.
“This study suggests that if you ate a carbohydrate-rich breakfast it would promote carbohydrate utilisation throughout the rest of the day, whereas if you have a fat-rich breakfast, you can transfer your energy utilisation between carbohydrate and fat.”
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The research, which looked at how mice reacted to different eating regimes, suggested the timings of meals are of greater importance than was previously thought.
“Studies have looked at the type and quantity of food intake, but nobody has undertaken the question of whether the timing of what you eat and when you eat it influences body weight,” added co-researcher Professor Molly Bray.
“Our study seems to show that if you really want to be able to efficiently respond to mixed meals across a day, a meal in higher fat content in the morning is a good thing.”
Your say: Do you think this research is true or that a low-fat diet is more beneficial?
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