On a lighter note, Marian Burros, cookbook author and veteran New York Times food writer, has evaluated the allegedly-healthier breakfast cereals found at alternative grocery stores. She discovered that many of these well-intentioned products are actually high in sodium, and manufactured by subsidiaries of mainline corporations like General Foods and Kellogg’s. She also says what you and I already knew, which is that many of these flax-seed-packed concoctions taste like cardboard.

But she did locate a few that she would tolerate if stone ground oatmeal were not her “daily breakfast of choice.” They are: “Arrowhead Mills Shredded Wheat, Cascadian Farm Wheat Crunch, Kashi Mighty Bites, Kashi 7 Whole Grain Puffs and Kashi 7 Whole Grain Flakes.” She fails to say if she’d drench them in organic whole milk or Turbino sugar to make them less healthy but much better tasting (like my kids have been doing on recent Saturday mornings).

I might add to her list Peace Cereal’s Granola, but like most granolas, these are caloric, and why buy a boxed granola when many whole food stores also stock earthier, locally-made varieties?

It is good that Burros mentions Kashi’s new children’s cereal Mighty Bites. Each little piece is shaped like a cute human stick figure, making for a very pretty, star-like shape. Alas, while my younger son liked it, the older one rejected it out of hand. (Oddly, this is the same kid who mouths off and mimics me when we get on the subject of McDonald’s: “Oh, I won’t eat at McDonald’s ever again,” he seethes with vehemence. “It’s not real food.” Then I surprise myself by saying, “Now honey, don’t be a food snob. McDonald’s is trying to make some good changes.”)

Cereal is always a last-ditch, in-a-rush breakfast anyway. Many nutritionists feel that many people profit from a little protein in the morning. Because of that, I like eggs, nitrate-free meats, and some low-fat cheese first thing. Soup of almost any kind also appeals to me. Here’s a writer, responding to a blog post, whose current favorite breakfast is eggs with diced, lean Canadian bacon, crumbled chevre, onions, Crimini mushrooms, and asparagus. Now we’re talking total health! Gay Hendricks, author of “Achieving Vibrance : A Seven-Minute-a-Day Plan for Feeling, Looking, and Being Younger,” believes that a peeled banana slathered with almond butter, as a pre-breafast snack eaten soon after rising, will improve the whole course of your day. And I tend to believe him.