Just one for breakfast, thanks: what shake mix should I buy?

• What meal-replacement solution will give me the easiest, most tasty breakfast without requiring a second mortgage? It should be something that can either be kept in a file cabinet at work and grabbed at need or something that I can grab out of the fridge on my way out the door. Special snowflake details: I have always found breakfast difficult, and have been a breakfast-skipper most of my life. This is not good for my blood sugar, my health, or my crankiness level, so I've been trying a variety of things to try to make sure that I get SOMETHING in my system before 1pm. So far, the only things that I have managed with anything approaching success are keep-it-at-my-desk foods like granola bars or peanut butter crackers, or grab-it-from-the-fridge foods like yogurt or string cheese. However, I forget my grab-it-from-the-fridge stuff often enough that I wind up with tons of expired yogurt. Meal bars and crackers are OK, but they are so dry that I sometimes have trouble choking them down. After some thought I think I would like to try drinking some sort of meal-replacement or protein shake for breakfast on the days that I go in to the office. However, there are about five million different kinds and if you search online you seem to find roughly equal reviews for all of them saying that they are awesome and that they taste like moldy socks. Also, though some brands can be bought in single-serving packets at the health food store, not all can, and I really would rather not pay $40 for a giant tub of something I won't use. Here are my criteria/preferences: -Tastiness is the most important factor, but it does need some nutrition/ability to satisfy hunger, or I would just drink Nestle Quik and call it a day. -I am not trying to lose weight or to gain muscle necessarily, just to find something that will non-offensively sustain me from 9am to noon. -I would prefer something that would taste fine made with either water or milk, and is mixable using a blender bottle. (I want to be able to keep a tub of the stuff and a blender bottle at work.) -I prefer something that has a good amount of protein and at least some fiber. -While I would prefer it not be a liquid candy bar, some amount of actual sugar is fine. In the non-caloric sweetener world, I like stevia best, then splenda. Nutrasweet is a distant third. -Would prefer products that can be purchased either locally (Costco, Trader Joe's, grocery or drug stores, vitamin stores) or on Amazon. I would consider buying from another web site but NOT if it requires some sort of subscription service where they automatically ship you stuff. I also don't want anything sold through a MLM scheme. (My worst childhood nightmare involved Amway. Long story.) -I am willing to do some amount of make-your-own if it involves shelf stable ingredients (protein powders, powdered peanut butter, etc.) but I am not interested in anything that needs to be mixed with fruit, yogurt, etc. to taste good/be nutritious. Previous similar questions all seem to be from some time ago so I wanted to get an idea of the latest available products out there. I am also aware that it would be better if I found a way to eat real actual food for breakfast. This is not going to happen. I'm not seeking to replace real actual food with shakes, I'm seeking to replace NOTHING with shakes.

• Answer:

  I'm a reformed breakfast-skipper and realized recently how much I need protein in the morning, so protein shakes have been my friend for a while. I use a Magic Bullet blender to do this almost every morning -- it's quick (about 5 minutes) and easy: frozen banana milk (maybe a third of a cup?) vanilla Greek yogurt (2 or 3 big heaping tablespoons worth) peanut butter (tablespoon) chia seeds protein powder from Costco baby spinach crammed in the rest of the space left in the cup The spinach makes the shake green, but I find it also makes it sweeter -- you can't taste it otherwise. I'e tried kale but can taste the bitterness. http://www.theyummylife.com/Refrigerator_Oatmeal is also a good grab-n-go breakfast too that you can prep the night before.