Teresa Santoski

Every parent wants their kids to have a good start to their day, and one of the best ways to do that is to make sure they have a good breakfast. Each parent, however, has their own vision of what a good breakfast looks like. Maybe it’s yogurt and a piece of fruit, or maybe it’s pancakes with bacon and eggs.

For our family, breakfast – and indeed, snacks in general – started out as something that should be healthy and high in fiber.

Dad occasionally refers to me as “the practice child,” and with good reason. I am the oldest, so my parents had a fairly steep learning curve from the time I was born until Oldest Younger Brother came along just before my fourth birthday.

I wouldn’t say that my parents made mistakes during those years, but I will say that there were a few things they tried with me that they didn’t try with my siblings. For example, in their quest to help me develop healthy eating habits, they told me that bran flakes were potato chips.

I assume that at the time, we didn’t have any actual potato chips in the house. Otherwise, I would’ve worked that out for myself pretty quickly. We also didn’t have any of the sugary cereals that were popular back then. All of the cereals in our house were high in fiber, and I remember thinking that Raisin Bran was quite decadent because the raisins had sugar on them.

My parents’ ruse was successful for about six months, and then I began attending a nursery school program at a local church. Since I needed to be dropped off early, I was able to eat breakfast at the church before the program started.

The priest would join us early arrivals for breakfast after he finished the morning Mass. According to my parents, I asked for the box of bran flakes, and the priest responded, “Oh, no, you don’t want the bran flakes! You want the Frosted Flakes!” And he handed me the box.

It was an eye-opening experience, to be sure. After that, it didn’t take me long to figure out that bran flakes were not, in fact, potato chips, and that the sugary cereals were far more palatable than the high-fiber alternatives. I tried and enjoyed Fruity Pebbles, Apple Jacks, Corn Pops and all the other cereals that were advertised during Saturday morning cartoons.

Now that I was coming into contact with junk food that my parents had no control over, they decided to let things take their course instead of attempting any further food-related ruses. I doubt they ever thought their subterfuge would be blown out of the water by a well-meaning priest.

Over the years, the focus shifted from breakfast needing to be high in fiber to breakfast needing to be hot. Yes, you read that correctly. It may seem like an odd standard to have, but the shift occurred when our family moved from upstate New York to New Hampshire right before I started high school.

In New York, my middle school was less than a five-minute drive from our house, and it was on Dad’s way to work. He dropped me off at school in the mornings, so it didn’t really matter if the breakfast I wolfed down in the car was hot or cold.

In New Hampshire, my high school was in the next town over, so I had to take the bus. I had been able to see the bus stop from my house in New York, and I could dash the five hundred feet or so if I needed to. In New Hampshire, my bus stop was two streets over, with one of those streets being a steep hill, and it was definitely not visible from our house.

That translated to a lot of long walks in the dark – since our neighborhood didn’t have streetlights, which was another adjustment – on cold winter mornings. Oldest Younger Brother had a shorter walk to the elementary school bus stop at the end of the street, but once he started middle school, he had to walk to the same bus stop that I did.

To make the situation more tolerable, Dad decided that we should have a hot breakfast to carry out the door with us. The definition of a “hot breakfast” was pretty flexible – it could be just about anything as long as it was warm and portable. We walked down to the bus stop with everything from toast with peanut butter and bagels with cream cheese to Pop Tarts and toaster strudels.

Dad was always on the lookout for new options to keep our hot breakfasts from becoming humdrum. We experimented with microwaveable frozen omelets, and after I graduated, ready-made food technology had evolved enough that Oldest Younger Brother was able to enjoy breakfast Hot Pockets and microwaveable breakfast scrambles.

It has always been a point of parental pride for Dad that, despite the chaos that accompanied getting ready for school each day, Oldest Younger Brother and I had a hot breakfast every school day for the duration of our New Hampshire academic careers.

And knowing Dad, who once convinced Oldest Younger Brother and I that there was a number between seven and eight – it’s “florp,” if you’re curious – it’s probably an even bigger point of parental pride that he managed to convince me that bran flakes were potato chips.

But one thing I remain convinced of, thanks to my parents’ efforts, is that having a good breakfast sets the tone for the rest of your day – whether it’s bran flakes, Pop Tarts or something else entirely.

Tete-a-tete is published monthly. Teresa Santoski can be reached at tsantoski@gmail.com or via www.teresasantoski.com.