: Good breakfast to regain concentration and energy after a morning workout? I work as a programmer. Recently I've been going to the gym downstairs and doing half an hour of pretty intensive rowing before work every day. The

Honestly, unless my breakfast has some form of protein in ample supply, the breakfast is useless to me. You will do better with a sausage, egg, and cheese sandwich on an English muffin than a bowl of cereal. The cereal is quick energy, and is easily burned up. Protein just sticks with you, and takes longer to process.

Another important point, is that you probably just don't have enough food at breakfast. A "healthy bowl of cereal" will likely try to keep the Calories low--even with milk. If you are a guy, and you just exercised, anything less than a 500 Calorie breakfast is probably not enough.

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I am a programmer too, and since your more into cereal than meat in the morning, what worked for me is one of these two meals:

250 g of cottage cheese + 1cup blue berries + 1 banana + 1 tbsp organic honey
1 cup of oats + 5-6 egg whites + bluebrries + honey+cinamon ( you have to bake the mixture for like 20 minutes)

concerning the first one , the good thing about it is that :

cottage cheese has 15 g of protein in 175g of cheese , ie in 250 its 30 g, and u need protein to recover muscles and to fill u up for a longer time.
Berries are very energetic fruits (their sugar and fiber)
banana has a lot of potassium which u need after workout
honey is a simple carb (fast absorption) which spikes your insulin and energy fast.
The most important also is that cottage cheese has a good amount of salt (around 500mg in 175g of cheese) thus after you have sweat a lot in the gym and lost a lot of sodium (makes u feel light headed and less concentrated) this will recover ur sodium level

concerning the second:

it has a lot protein too
Oats are the best kind of complex carbs, they get stored as energy in the liver , fill you up for hours, regulate your blood sugar thus make u focus better
blueberries as mentioned above
honey is for a fast energy spike (and of course good taste)

i go for the first option most of the time coz its faster and that the high sodium amount really helps. But its good to try both on seperate days.

PS: I also recommend that like 30 minutes before you go to the gym, have a small cube of dark chocolate. It is a good mind and energy stimulant in the morning and will help you workout better and be sharper for a while.

UPDATE(answering your questions)

Probably won't go for the second one as 6 egg-whites seems expensive and I hate waste (the yolks).

I don't know about where u live, but in Canada eggs are kind of cheap. You Can still use the yolk, a cooking technique is to put the yolk in a tupperware and freeze it. You can still use the yolk if your doing cakes or sweets or wtv.. all you have to do is to take it out of the freezer and put it in the fridge the night before use. Also, i don't know if you have this option where you live, but here we have egg whites bottles, so u can buy one of these.

One question though - doesn't this stuff contain a lot of calories and fat?

Here is the nutrition facts:

Calories Fat Protein
250 g of cottage cheese 200 2g 30g
1cup blue berries 80 0g 1g
1 banana (small) 90 0g 1g
1 tbsp organic honey 60 0g 0g
TOTAL: 430 2g 32g

Which means it is a very good calorie level (specially in the morning and post workout) , very low in fat and very high in protein

Calories Fat Protein
1 cup of oats 360 6g 12g
5 egg whites 80 0g 20g
1 cup blueberries 80 0g 1g
1 tbsp organic honey 60 0g 0g
TOTAL: 580 6g 32g

Which also means it is a very good calorie level (specially in the morning and post workout) , very low in fat and very high in protein.

Note:

you need calories in the morning and specially post workout to recover and regain concentration. In case these amounts of calories above are way to much for you age/height/weight then just remove the banana or the honey from it and it'll be fine.
Fat, contrary to the common myth, does NOT make you fat. You have to understand that if your body requires X calories per day, and you eat more than X, one of two things might happen:
a) if you have crazy awesome genetics, the excess calories will be thrown out of the body
b) if you are like me and the majority, the excess will turn to sugar inside the body and be stored as fat.

But if you are in the good range of calories, Fat does not make you fat at all. It gives you a lot of energy (1g of fat yield 9kcal) and help regulate your hormones for growth and recovery. However, 99% of the fat you eat should be the good fat, ie the mono/poly unsaturated fat. while Saturated fat, you do need a bit , but if you eat too much your arteries get clogged with time.

I'm not definitely more into cereal in the morning. in fact I'd prefer
something more savoury. Do you have any tips for some meals like that
(that aren't too fat and cal heavy)?

As shown above, they are not calorie heavy and fat is not bad for you.Also these mentioned recipes are savory (try it)
I do have tips for other meals, i have one on my mind right now:

2eggs + 1 cup cottage cheese + green onions + spicy herbs + a bit of baby spinach

Calories Fat Protein
2 eggs (large) 140 5g 12g
1 cup cottage cheese(125g) 100 1g 15g
green onions (28g) 7 0g 1g
1 cup of spinach 7 0g 1g
TOTAL: 254 6g 29g

(you can add bacon/turkey bacon to it if you want more taste). Chop the onions and mix the ingredients (do Not chop the spinach else the juice of the leaf will evaporate and ruin the taste).
Now this has a good amount of protein and low calories and taste good. But, also notice the spinach, which in fact is the best food on earth probably, because it has a lot of uric acid which gets transformed into amino acids (protein) in the body, thus in fact you'll be having more protein than 29g. This is an energetic meal.

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I workout in the morning as well and what I've found best for myself is to eat 2 times. About 30 minutes before my workout I eat about 1 serving on yogurt. This helps me get through my workout and keeps my stomach from going crazy. Then, after I shower, I have 2 pieces of whole wheat toast with peanut butter and a banana. I feel that the carbs from the toast help get me through the day and the peanut butter and banana are just extra fillers until I get a chance to eat again.

Hope this helps.

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I am not a nutritionist but I have read lots about breakfast being a very important part of the diet, as it's supposed to be the refueling of your body after sleep, which is when your body goes into a self-maintenance phase.

The reason that you feel completely beat after the rowing is probably that you're pushing yourself to a hard exercise when your body is low on fuel. Try moving the exercise routine to lunch time, half an hour of rowing and maybe a quick lunch with a sandwich. I have been doing lunch workouts for about two years now, and am very happy with it. If nothing it's a good way to break the routine of sitting in front of the PC, and the shower afterwards is a great way to wake up midday. :)

PS: I also work as a programmer/data analyst.

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I have a fairly intense, aerobically-challenging, functional workout most mornings.

What ended up working best for me was waking up about 90 minutes beforehand, having a protein shake with a portion of pre-workout powder, and going back to sleep as best I could.

Without the calories, the workout was simply too much to deal with. If I had it, say, 30 minutes before the workout, it made me a little upset to my stomach and caused digestive issues.

After the workout I'd either have a more-substantial protein/fruit/etc. smoothie, or actual food. Either should contain a mix of fast-acting protein and carbs, and depending on your eating schedule, slower-digesting protein and carbs. I tend to eat fairly often, so the exact ratios of fast/slow aren't super-critical, but after intense workouts, the fast protein/carb ratio should be somewhere around 1/2-1/4, depending on who you ask.

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