Instead of that cup of coffee and possibly a sweet roll for your breakfast, what's a good pick-up in the morning? What would be a real good way to start the day? Did you know that fresh fruit is a real good pick-up?

So, what kind of fruit would be good to start the day? Any of your favorite fruits that's in season and can grow where you are at the time. Now, if you're in an area where fruit is not grown, eat the kind of fruit that will ripen after it's picked. Practically all fruit is picked green to ship and most fruits will not ripen after they're picked, rendering little or no value to you whatsoever.

Here are a few fruits that will ripen after they're picked: Golden Delicious apples; apricots; bananas; guava; mangoes (- yummm); papaya; pears; persimmons; pineapples; plums; pomegranates; avocados; and cactus fruit.

The fruits which will not ripen after they're picked are all the apples, except the golden delicious; all berries; cherries; citrus fruit; figs; grapes; melons; nectarines and peaches.

If you still want to have a cup of coffee during the day, have it around 2:30 or 3:00 pm. Maybe once or twice a week, instead of the coffee and donuts / sweet rolls or colas and candy bars, try your favorite fruit. This will be a quantum leap for your nutrition education and your body will reward you highly for it.

Bacon and eggs and those type of foods, are protein foods which are designed primarily for repair and not for energy. Fruit usually takes about 1- hours to digest and they are already in an energy form. The protein foods will take as much as 4-6 hours to break down into the repair/building nutrients. Then it will take several more hours to convert them into an energy source. So, logically speaking, since we need energy at the beginning and throughout the day, it would be a good idea to start the day with something like fruit. Save the protein foods for a better time of day. We'll discuss protein foods in a later "voices of experience" tape.

From Daytona Beach, Florida, this is Wayne Pickering encouraging you to invest in yourself by making quality food your first concern and not your last resort and you'll never make a bad investment!