Would you be able to tell your child the story of the first breakfast man ever ate, or John Harvey Kellogg’s lucky accident that gave birth to the Corn Flake? Probably not. Yet the story of breakfast is a long and complex tale that spans continents and millennia – all because one Neolithic man decided that it’d be a good idea to start the day with a hearty meal in his stomach.

Our tale begins in the Neolithic era – many, many years ago. At a time when man was already growing the same cereals that are now used to make so many of today’s breakfast products. Back then, stone querns were used to grind grains to make a sort of porridge.

Porridge was also a staple of Roman soldiers’ diets – they called it pulmentus. Indeed, we can thank the Romans for the word breakfast, which comes from the Latin disjejunare, meaning to break the fast, begun the night before when going to bed. The word was later contracted to disnare or disner in Old French, which eventually became dinner in English. So the word dinner actually means breakfast.

Would you be able to tell your child the story of the first breakfast man ever ate, or John Harvey Kellogg’s lucky accident that gave birth to the Corn Flake? Probably not. Yet the story of breakfast is a long and complex tale that spans continents and millennia – all because one Neolithic man decided that it’d be a good idea to start the day with a hearty meal in his stomach.

Our tale begins in the Neolithic era – many, many years ago. At a time when man was already growing the same cereals that are now used to make so many of today’s breakfast products. Back then, stone querns were used to grind grains to make a sort of porridge.

Porridge was also a staple of Roman soldiers’ diets – they called it pulmentus. Indeed, we can thank the Romans for the word breakfast, which comes from the Latin disjejunare, meaning to break the fast, begun the night before when going to bed. The word was later contracted to disnare or disner in Old French, which eventually became dinner in English. So the word dinner actually means breakfast.

Overweight children who never eat breakfast may lose body fat, but normal weight children do not. Since numerous studies link skipping breakfast to poorer academics, children should be encouraged to eat breakfast.

Research has shown that individuals who eat breakfast and do not snack in between meals have less than half the risk of early death Read more… than those who skip breakfast and eat snacks.

A 12-year-old who skips breakfast has the reaction time and mental agility of a 70 year old in the classroom.

Brazil produces a third of all oranges in the world of which 85% are used for orange juice. The Brazilian state of Sao Paulo alone accounts for half the world's supply of orange juice.