saulrosenbaum.com / The Big Healthy Breakfast

I’ve lambasted the American breakfast tradition before In general ‘We’ eat too much, and what we eat isn’t particularly good for us, that’s not to say that a slice of bacon or an egg yolk is bad for us, it’s about moderation, and portion control - two words that until very recently meant absolutely nothing to me.

I spent a little time reading labels and doing some trial and error cooking I came up with a delicious fulfilling breakfast that’s essentially guilt-free (I also should mention this is not my daily breakfast.. again, say it with me…moderation)

A Big White Omelet

• 85g of egg whites (carton egg whites work fine, if your cracking your own that’s the whites of about 3 large eggs )
• 28g of fat-free cheese shredded (Kraft makes both a cheddar and a mozzarella pre-shredded either of which are good, Cabot’s reduced fat cheese is far better, but you’ll have to shred it yourself)
• 30g of yellow or white onion chopped (I buy mine chopped)
• 10 cherry tomatoes halved

Okay - so you have everything measured and ready? you don’t want to be slicing tomatoes or shredding cheese because this cooks pretty fast and burnt eggs suck.

1. Take a medium-sized non-stick frying pan and a small non-stick frying pan and lightly hit them both with some non-stick spray (I use Smart-Balance Omega, it doesn’t bring any fat or calories to the party) and put them on medium heat.
2. In the small pan toss your onions in the small pan, and pour your whites in the medium pan.
3. Keep your onions moving and as they start to sweat add the tomatoes.
4. As the eggs start to cook turn their heat down to medium low, this will allow your onions and tomatoes some time to get to know each other.
5. Once you can smell and hear the onions cooking it’s time to get the eggs happy, turn the heat back to medium and watch your eggs, you’re waiting for that point when your eggs look shiny, but are no longer fluid, when they reach that point, add the cheese - keep the cheese away from the edges it will just make folding it difficult
6. By now your veggies should be fully aquatinted, add them on top of the cheese
7. Now here’s the beauty of this, take it off the heat, let it sit for 2-3 minutes, go make coffee or read the paper, 3 things are happening, the cheese is melting from the heat of the vegetables, the moisture and flavor of the tomatoes is mixing with the cheese and eggs, and the eggs themselves are finishing cooking from the residual heat in the pan.
8. Take a silicon spatula and fold your omelet flap over, and carefully pour onto a plate (It took me a few ugly omelets to learn how to do that right).
9. Eat it!

That’s a big omelet huh, we couldn’t possibly eat all that… sure we could, here’s the facts

• 85 grams of egg whites = 44 calories
• 28 grams of fat-free cheese = 45 calories
• 30 grams of onion = 13 calories
• 10 cherry tomatoes = 50 calories

Okay I’ll save you the math, that’s 152 calories, so we need something else -
2 slices of light whole wheat bread, and a (small) touch of peanut butter, bring our breakfast to a guiltless 305 calories, a small apple (at 60(ish) calories) makes a well-rounded 365 calorie meal, that will make you the envy of the breakfast table. Oh I almost forgot, if you’re a carb counter, excluding the bread and fruit - the omelet has about 15 grams of carbs.

Enjoy.

Tagged: breakfast, calorie conscious, eating well, eggs, recipe