When you’re on a diet to lose weight, I bet one of the first meals you attempt to do away with is breakfast. After all, it’s usually the easiest meal of the day to skip. You’re busy in the morning getting ready for work or other activities, and you may not feel particularly hungry anyway, so you head out the door and start your day without a bite to eat.

What happens when you skip breakfast?

While you may think that you are helping your body lose more weight by avoiding breakfast, in fact, you’re doing the exact opposite. As you were sleeping, your body’s metabolism slowed down to a crawl. This means you burned zero calories during the night. After waking up, it takes your metabolism a while to get going again.

And guess what?

Eating a healthy breakfast is the best way to give your body a boost so that it can burn fat more efficiently. You’ll also benefit by feeling more refreshed and energetic. If you’re relying on that morning cup of coffee to provide you with a substitute boost, it will work for a while, but I bet you’re tempted to eat that donut in the break room. Or, visit the vending machine for a quick sugar-filled snack before lunch.

And when you do go out for lunch, you will probably eat a lot more than your diet program allows, simply because you’re famished. This can all be avoided by eating some food in the morning. Now, the amount and type of food you can eat for breakfast varies with each diet.

Some people are following the big breakfast diet plan, where you are allowed to eat whatever foods you feel like, as long as you stick to a certain calorie level. For many people, this type of “any thing goes” method can easily lead to overeating.

If you like to cook, there is an array of diet breakfast recipes that you can prepare in around 10 minutes. But, if you are like many people, who are pressed for time in the mornings, you just want to make something quick and easy.

Here are some healthy diet breakfast foods that you can grab quick: fruit slices, hot or cold cereal with sliced fruit, toaster waffles with fruit spread, hard boiled egg, low-fat yogurt with berries, low-fat cheese with apple or pear slices, trail mix, whole grain toast with fruit spread, fruit smoothie.

If you prefer eating breakfast out while on a diet, then you can opt for some healthy choices like: hot or cold cereal with fresh fruit, soft or hard boiled egg with toast, egg white and vegetable omelette with low-fat cheese, quesadilla with low-fat cheese.