Why bacon and eggs may be good for you

The traditional English fry up is often under fire as an unhealthy start to the day because of its its high fried fat content.

But a new study suggests that it may be healthier that thought. What you eat in first thing in the morning may determine how your body metabolises food later on in the day.

Researchers have discovered that eating fat-rich food in the morning, helps prevent metabolic syndrome - a condition characterized by abdominal obesity, high triglycerides, insulin resistance and other cardiovascular disease-risk factors.

Eating fatty foods for breakfast appears to be an effeicient way to turn on fat metabolism, as well as turning on the ability to respond to different types of food later in the day.

Conversely, eating carbohydrates first thing, turns on carbohydrate metabolism which seems to persist even when eating different kinds of food later in the day.

However, the study, published online March 30 in the International Journal of Obesity, was carried out on mice rather than men.

It also found that mice given foods which were higher in fat after waking had normal metabolic profiles. In contrast, mice that ate a more carbohydrate-rich diet in the morning and consumed a high-fat meal at the end of the day saw increased weight gain, fat accumulation, glucose intolerance and other markers of metabolic syndrome.

One of the researchers, Martin Young, commented "The first meal you have appears to program your metabolism for the rest of the day.

"This study suggests that if you ate a carbohydrate-rich breakfast it would promote carbohydrate utilization throughout the rest of the day, whereas, if you have a fat-rich breakfast, you have metabolic plasticity to transfer your energy utilization between carbohydrate and fat."

If these results were also true for people, the implications for our eating habits could result in a return to popularity of the big breakfast fry-up - although the researchers point out that they still have to test the effect of this dietary approach on heart conditions.

At the very least, the researchers note that humans rarely eat a uniform diet throughout the day and need the ability to respond to alterations in diet quality.

"Humans eat a mixed diet, and our study, which we have repeated four times in animals, seems to show that if you really want to be able to efficiently respond to mixed meals across a day then a meal in higher fat content in the morning is a good thing," the researchers conclude.

"Another important component of our study is that, at the end of the day, the mice ate a low-caloric density meal, and we think that combination is key to the health benefits we've seen."

This article was published on Thu 1 April 2010