During the week I have a corporate job with a very well established company with lots of resources. Recently I went to a company training event where they provided a “continental breakfast.” There were two tables in the breakfast area. They weren’t marked as such but I could tell they were making an attempt to give people the choice of comfort food vs. healthy food. On the “healthy” table there was a large platter of fruit, including cut up melon and various kinds of berries. OK so that’s a good start. Next to the fruit platter sat a large container of creamy (i.e. not the greek type) yogurt to spoon over your fruit. I did not taste the yogurt, but my guess is that it was vanilla flavored and had sugar. As long as you were not lactose intolerant or diabetic, it was probably fine.
I had some fruit, skipping the lactose-laden, blood sugar-spiking yogurt/dessert topping.
On the other table was an even larger platter with a gorgeous array of pastries and muffins. Ah the allure of comfort food… white processed flour and white processed sugar… warm it up and add a pat of butter. I am salivating just thinking about the steamy aroma and messy yumminess of salty melted butter commingling with sweet runny blueberries. Sigh. Alas, anything but healthy.
Next to the Platter of Heavenly Sin, there was a slightly smaller platter with a pile of bagels and a variety of flavored cream cheeses. I figured there must be at least one or two whole grain bagels in the pile as I noticed a few oat flakes speckled the plate and table nearby. For sure, cream cheese has some protein in it but any nutritional advantage is swallowed up by the abundance of saturated dairy fat molecules that surround it. And who knows what else was in the cream cheese in order to make it taste like strawberries or honeyed walnuts or whatever. Besides the runny vanilla yogurt, the flavored cream cheese was the only bit of protein I saw at the whole breakfast. I would have been thrilled with some hard boiled eggs or plain greek yogurt…
Finally, there were a few different kinds of juice, and of course, coffee. All in all, a nice solid breakfast of pure carbs, mostly processed. Thank goodness for the coffee to keep us all awake during our mid-morning sugar crash.