Breakfast cereals

Citation

(2011), "Breakfast cereals", Nutrition & Food Science, Vol. 41 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/nfs.2011.01741bab.001

Breakfast cereals

Article Type: Food facts From: Nutrition & Food Science, Volume 41, Issue 2

Breakfast cereals have been on the receiving end of misleading headlines in recent months, mostly in relation to their sugar content. “Cereals more sugary than jam doughnuts”; “Why a bacon roll could be better for you than healthy brekkie cereal” have constituted some of the more sensationalist headlines to recently appear in newspapers.

Health campaigners and government have fought long and hard to put across healthy-eating messages, in which cereal foods play a very important part. Indeed, the UK Food Standards Agency (FSA) has recommended that cereal grains make up a substantial proportion of dietary intake and include eating breakfast as one of their eight tips for eating well. A suggested breakfast option, included with the tips is a bowl of wholegrain cereal with some low-fat milk and sliced banana and a glass of fruit juice.

Breakfast is important because it helps to “kick start” the body for the day ahead and for peak physical and mental performance. Studies have shown that people who skip breakfast miss out on vital nutrients, which they are unlikely to make up for during the rest of the day. The impact for low-income families is particularly marked for breakfast cereal consumers. For adults and children cereal consumers, intakes of vitamins such as vitamin D, thiamin, riboflavin, niacin and folate were all significantly higher than in non-cereal consumers. This was also true for calcium and iron. In a study of 467 ten-year-old US schoolchildren, those who consumed breakfast were found to have a higher intake of vitamins A and E, B vitamins and iron. Those skipping breakfast (16 per cent of children in this particular study) were less likely to achieve even two-third of their RDA for vitamins and minerals.