It’s hard to tell how old the breakfast is.
We know a little about what ancient humans ate, but not when. That picture becomes clearer with the advent of the written word, and records more or less confirm that we have been eating breakfast for millennia.
The Iliad, written in Greece about 3,000 years ago, mentions a lunch prepared by a tired woodcutter before starting his day’s work. The word “pratarsa” is used for the morning meal in ancient Indian epics. In fact, in the Ramayana, Ravana threatens to cut the stubborn Sita into pieces for her remonstrance.
However, it meant very different things for those two demographics: workers and the elite. The former grabbed whatever calories they could get and afford. The latter would generally sit down to a meal of their choice, at a time of their choice. This is true even today.
In fact, class was so woven into the idea of breakfast that it fell out of favor even in medieval Europe. In her 2013 book, Breakfast: A History, food historian Heather Arndt Anderson writes that eating such a meal in this era meant “a person was poor, and needed precious calories to go about the business of farming”.
That complete rejection of the morning meal did not last very long. For one thing, the lunch was so elaborate that aristocrats required a light snack while preparing it. Then, in the colonial era, products like tea, coffee and chocolate arrived and a special kind of breakfast became fashionable.
It was the first major intersection of commerce with breakfast. There will be many more.
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The morning rush, war shortages, women in the workplace, and concerns about nutrition all combined into great advertising campaigns built around this food.
It began in the early years of the Industrial Revolution, when the world’s first packaged breakfast cereal, Granula, was invented by James Caleb Jackson in 1863. It was sugar-free. But then came Kellogg Cornflakes, invented by brothers John Kellogg and Will Kellogg in 1894. Will, an avowed sugar supporter, founded the company, and set out to position this sweet treat as a sensible, healthy, convenient alternative.
This was followed by a trendsetting campaign from General Foods, created in 1944, for the breakfast cereal Grape-Nuts. The slogan “Eat a good breakfast – work better” was coined. Among its radio commercials, it quoted “nutrition experts” as saying that breakfast was “the most important meal of the day”.
In these early years of advertising, this created a certain amount of panic: was the family getting the morning meal it needed and deserved?
Pay attention to packaged cereals in a variety of flavors, as well as products such as biscuits, malted beverages, condensed milk and processed meats, which are high in salt, carbohydrates or sugars and use these high amounts to present themselves as ideal sources of energy for the day.
“The message was that you shouldn’t wait until the morning, you should get there to win,” says food historian Megan Elias, curator of food and wine history at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. “And because these were the foodways of the Global North, where industrialization began, they became associated with modernity.”
Today, affluent Indian families are still attracted to packaged foods marketed with buzzwords like ‘protein-rich’ or ‘probiotic’ that signal wealth and modernity, explains Ambi Parameswaran, author and independent brand coach. Just like we replaced our nutritious and climate-friendly morning porridge with sugary coffee and tea.
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Do we want breakfast today? The debate on that continues.
Studies have shown that for people who wake up hungry, a healthy morning meal consisting of protein, fiber, fruits, and vegetables works to control appetite and can prevent snacking later in the day.
Alexandra Johnstone, professor of hunger research at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, who conducted the government-funded study between 2017 and 2022 (published in the journal Cell Metabolism), found that people who ate an adequate breakfast felt fuller for longer periods of time and were less hungry during the day. But she also found that people burned the same number of calories no matter what time they ate their largest meal of the day.
More research will be needed to establish the relationship between meal timing and metabolism. “The science of when to eat, called chrononutrition, is important but relatively new,” she says.
For now, she recommends following the signals the body gives you, as it’s basing them on your specific conditions: circadian rhythm, lifestyle, age, and metabolic health.
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Tradition in India can also serve as a good guide.
Since most parts of the country do not face shortages due to the temperate climate and lush vegetation throughout the country, traditional dishes prepared based on local conditions remain a healthy choice for humans and the planet.
The warm temperatures of South India still allow the idli and dosa batter to ferment, creating a dough that can be turned into a nutritious morning meal with a little steaming or frying.
Light and comforting, these snacks are healthy and nutritious too, says food science writer and HT Wknd columnist Sweta Shivakumar. “Fermentation breaks down some of the starches and proteins and reduces compounds like phytic acid, which binds with minerals like iron and zinc. This makes nutrients more available to the body and makes the grains easier to digest,” she says.
Of course, it’s the hours spent making the chutney and sambar that really turn these batters into a balanced meal. These could simply be made in larger batches (as the suggestion often elicits resentment), she says, laughing. “Make enough to last two or three days.”
Similarly, from rice cakes and stews to dhokla and porridge, hearty options abound across the country. (See accompanying story for more information on these.)
Some are being crowded out by recent inventions, ranging from packaged indulgences to Instagram trends. Together, the choices represent something less visible: an environmental footprint that is increasingly shaped based on what we choose.
For example, in the first study of the carbon footprint of sandwiches, researchers at the University of Manchester found in 2018 that an all-day breakfast sandwich (filled with breakfast meats like bacon and sausage and condiments like mayonnaise and ketchup) generated 1,441 grams of CO2eq, the equivalent of driving a car for about 19 km. This is mainly because of how carbon-dense meat is; How much packaging and refrigeration is involved; And how far the components have to travel before they can be manufactured.
Not many sandwiches are eaten for breakfast in India; Here, sugar is one of the most water-consuming ingredients at the breakfast table. So, what should one choose instead?
“When it comes to planetary and gut health, few breakfasts can compete with traditional fermented or millet dishes,” says Mridula Ramesh, climate-tech investor, Wknd columnist and founder of research body Sundaram Climate Institute. “Fermented options like good old idli or neeragram are great for the gut. The latter is an easy way to use up leftover food. Millets have more fiber, protein and nutrients and are hardy and climate resistant, making them a better choice than rice or wheat.”
“But millet cannot compete with sugar in taste, and big companies do not support it. Without this support, and without solid innovation in recipe innovation, as is happening in Odisha, millet cannot become big,” says Ramesh.
This is one of the major problems with breakfast: noise. Urban India has the answers, waiting in childhood memories and old recipe books. What is needed is to silence the noise and reclaim them.
As the Smithsonian Museum’s Elias says, “We may think we’re eating what we want to eat,” but our desires are rooted in culture, and they are shaped by the marketplace.
Of course, it’s not just breakfast. Sit down to any meal and ask yourself: Who actually chose what was on your plate?
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Rush Hour Specials: Check Out Breakfast from All Over India
Kochi
A pinch of peas: Called chura matar, it is a winter dish of green peas and flattened rice, eaten in homes in winter, and often served with carrot halwa at street stalls. Packed with the flavor of roasted melon seeds and ground amla along with a complex blend of spices, it makes for a delicious and nutritious sweet-sour-salty snack.
Kolkata
Puris and Stews: In Musalman Para or Muslim areas, fried puris made from chickpea lentils are served with fatty, spicy salan (or thick gravy of meat and offal). Incidentally, Dalpuri has its roots in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. It reached Kolkata through indentured labour, traveled to the island colonies and was transported through Calcutta. In Kolkata, it is commonly used to prepare Tomato Ishtu, a soupy mutton curry with the tangy tang of dried tomatoes.
Bakarkhani: This golden, crispy bread, made from refined flour, eggs, milk, sugar and ghee, is drizzled with butter and served with tea (or nihari; or thick Mughlai rezala meat gravy) as a morning meal for the day.
Shillong
Porridge Porridge: A dish of rice (usually unpolished red rice) cooked with pork and flavored with spices, jadoh is sold early in the morning at kong shops run by Khasi women (kong is Khasi for sister). A popular accompaniment is a pork “salad” made from pig brain, boiled or steamed with onions and ginger in a banana leaf.
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Kettle Cake: A range of rice cakes are eaten in north-east India. At breakfast stalls in Shillong, one will often find soft-boiled versions called putharo that are perfect for gravy of pork cooked in black-sesame paste (or a protein-rich sauce made from fermented soybean paste).
In Assam, bowl-shaped pieces of rice, jaggery and coconut pieces are cooked in moist muslin by placing them in the open top of a tea kettle, giving them their name: Tekeli Pitha. A variation in Mizoram is made by steaming a thick paste of glutinous rice in parcels of banana leaves and serving it with a drop of honey or melted jaggery and tea.
Ahmedabad
Aloo-Puri-Halwa: Crispy and spice-rich Bedmi puris, which have their roots in rural Uttar Pradesh, are made from a mixture of wheat flour, ground lentils and spices like dry mango powder, chilli powder and asafoetida. In Delhi they are served with a thin gravy of tomatoes and potatoes. Often available with halwa-nagari, a dish in which small deep-fried dough balls are filled with semolina pudding, and sometimes a little spicy potato curry is added on top for a sweet-salty taste.
Mumbai
Bhakari-Kanji: Vada Pav, Omelette Pav and In a city of constant change, the traditional breakfast of Mumbai’s fishermen – bhakri or rice chapatti with kanji or leftover fish curry – is still eaten in Koli households. The fishermen leave very early to prepare fresh food, so the leftover curry is slow cooked to enhance the flavour. In Koli areas, the staple food is also available at food stalls: bhakri and fish curry, sometimes with boiled eggs. In winters, to make the food more delicious during cold mornings, fenugreek laddu is added to the food.
