The Breakfast Food Giada De Laurentiis Only Eats For Lunch And Dinner

It can be exciting to discover what celebrities eat during the day. These quirks humanizes the people we celebrate. For example, did you know there's a breakfast food that Giada De Laurentiis only eats for lunch and dinner? That breakfast food is eggs. She told Food & Wine, "I am not a protein person for breakfast — it's not my thing."

So you probably won't find the celebrity-chef cooking omelettes or scrambled eggs in the morning. Instead, De Laurentiis, who is Italian-born, prefers carbohydrates. You're probably thinking light pastries, like croissants, danishes, and cakes, similar to the traditional dishes you'll enjoy for breakfast in Italy. However, there's actually an unusual breakfast combo De Laurentiis eats every day: Brown rice "swimming in olive oil," as she told Delish in 2017. When she does not have time to cook fresh brown rice, she'll swap it out with oatmeal. The olive oil must be the extra-virgin kind and it's non-negotiable. The fats of the EVOO keeps her satiated throughout the day, more so than a heavy plate of bacon and eggs or Greek yogurt loaded with toppings. 

To season the brown rice, she adds sea salt, making it savory. When she makes oatmeal instead of brown rice, she'll add Marcona almonds and spiced mandarin oranges, as she told Food & Wine.

De Laurentiis inspired us. So, for breakfast, we made a quick and creamy oatmeal. We added a cup of water and half a cup of whole grain rolled oats to a saucepan and cooked it down until it was creamy for about 10 minutes. In honor of De Laurentiis, we mixed in 2 tablespoons of EVOO, which actually wouldn't meet her standards since she adds about 3 tablespoons of olive oil to 1/4 cup of brown rice. For flavor, we added maple syrup, maca and acai powder, and a tablespoon of coconut milk, keeping our hearty, fat-heavy oatmeal completely plant-based. It was good and satisfying and we can see us making this again for breakfast. 

As for lunch, we're craving Italian, though if you're like De Laurentiis, you might be having eggs, like a frittata, for the second meal of the day. But if you are craving Italian food, note that De Laurentiis elevates authentic Italian food from her kitchen and take a page out of her book. If you need more ideas, we've compiled a list of 25 Italian meals that you must try at least once, one of which is sure to be ideal for lunch or dinner this week. Just be sure it has some protein. "If I don't eat protein at night, I don't sleep well," De Laurentiis told Food Network.