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Breakfast Top Nutrition Scientist Tim Spector Eats for Gut Health

Breakfast Top Nutrition Scientist Tim Spector Eats for Gut Health
  • The nutrition scientist Tim Spector is an expert in gut health.
  • He has a go-to breakfast that he eats every day, which he shared with Business Insider.
  • He also shared the two common breakfast items he no longer has.

A top gut-health expert shared his go-to breakfast with Business Insider and common breakfast items that he no longer eats.

Breakfast foods such as cereal are often ultraprocessed, even if they’re marketed as healthy. So Dr. Tim Spector, a British epidemiologist, gut-health expert, and cofounder of the science and nutrition company Zoe, has a go-to balanced and gut-healthy breakfast combination that he eats every morning.

“I used to have granola with some skim milk, orange juice, and tea, and I thought that was a super healthy breakfast,” he said.

But since switching to a more gut-friendly breakfast, Spector has found that he stays full “right through to lunch” and his energy levels are consistent all morning, he said.

Here’s what he now has for breakfast.

Yogurt with toppings

Spector avoids bread, granola, muesli, and cereal in the mornings because they tend to be ultraprocessed and contain added sugar. Ultraprocessed foods have been linked to various health issues, including increased risks of cancer and type 2 diabetes. Heidi Tissenbaum, an expert in healthy aging, previously told BI that added sugar is damaging to health and longevity.

Instead, Spector has 3 to 4 generous tablespoons of full-fat Greek yogurt mixed with about 150 milliliters of kefir, or fermented milk, and tops that with nuts, seeds, and fresh or frozen berries.

He uses toppings from his “diversity jar,” which is a handy container of assorted nuts, seeds, and dried fruits that he keeps ready to be sprinkled on meals and snacks.

He likes to have kefir in the morning because it’s fermented, meaning he can check off one of the three fermented foods he tries to eat a day before he’s even left the house. Fermented foods were associated with increased gut-microbe diversity and decreased inflammation in a 2021 study by researchers at Stanford University, which said evidence suggested they should be a “key component of a healthy diet.”

Spector drinks black coffee — but never orange juice

Orange juice is “one of the worst things you can have in the morning,” Spector said, again because of the amount of sugar it contains.

Instead, he has a cup of black coffee every morning because, he said, it’s a “health drink.”

Coffee is “really good for your gut microbes, really good for your heart,” he said, adding: “And if you don’t tolerate it well, have decaf as it’s still good for your microbes.”

This is because coffee contains some soluble fiber and “defense chemicals called polyphenols, which are like rocket fuel for your gut microbes,” he said. A 2020 review of studies published in the journal Food Frontiers suggested that polyphenols were indeed good for gut health and that they helped prevent chronic diseases such as diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular diseases.

He said that even coffee with milk and sugar is beneficial, as it allows you to “drink all those good things” — he just recommended minimizing both as much as possible.

Correction: August 29, 2024 — An earlier version of this story misstated the amount of fiber in coffee. Coffee contains some fiber.


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