Coffee Contemplations

Edition: 2017-08-06T1328

In response to mentioning coffee in another thread, a UIC user sent me a PM asking for additional details. The topic has also arisen on the forum historically, and on the WB Blog from time to time.

Program Posture

Coffee is casually mentioned throughout program documents, and is an ingredient in any number of recipes.

Wheat Belly Total Health, page 121 (print edition):
“Interestingly, the heightened responsiveness of the gallbladder to CCK can make some people sensitive to caffeine in coffee, tea, and other sources because it stimulates CCK release and gallbladder contraction.”, which I take to suggest to not increase coffee consumption at the outset of the program, and be mindful of any indications of CCK issues.

Wheat Belly Total Health, page 305:
“Coffee and tea, while they fit into a grain-free lifestyle, cause modest dehydration through their diuretic action.”, so some adjustment of fluid intake might be needed.

Wheat Belly Total Health, page 306:
“But thanks to caffeine and other components, such as chlorogenic acid, 2 to 3 cups per day of caffeinated or decaffeinated coffee or green, oolong, or white tea can yield modest weight-reduction effects. These drinks also provide other health benefits, including reduced potential for diabetes and Parkinson’s disease.”

Green coffee bean extract is deprecated in several places, so it’s not a suggested supplement. If you’re after the polyphenols in coffee, drink coffee.

And that seems to be about it. These focused details were not repeated in Undoctored. My take on that is that they still apply, but they are not a high priority.

In particular, due to the TYP heritage of the UIC site, I don’t seem to find any insights specifically regarding heart disease and coffee. If your doctor has told you something different, they may have just heard it from their lawyer.

So don’t expect a UIC Coffee Protocol. For your entertainment, however, Mark Sisson posts a summary periodically from his Primal point of view. It links to a bunch of further information sources.

My Posture

I’m also presuming black coffee (nothing added). There’s no theoretical problem with adding stuff, like cream, safe sweetener, MCT oil, A2 cream or other healthy fats, and carefully selected flavorants, but I can’t cover all the possibilities.

How much is ideal for you?

Ask 23andMe. I did, and my CYP1A2 SNP makes me a “fast coffee metabolizer”, so I don’t seem to have any problem up to about 8 cups per day. There are other SNPs that may come into play as well. Here’s a 2015 paper:
Mol Psychiatry: Genome-wide meta-analysis identifies six novel loci associated with habitual coffee consumption

Timing

I personally aim to finish the pot before 2:00 PM, and never drink coffee with or after an evening meal. We face enough threats to sleep hygiene without adding caffeine.

What About Caffeine?

Caffeine is fine for you unless it’s not. Coffee is far from the only source of it. Avoid deliberately caffeinated beverages for multiple reasons.

What’s In Your Water?

I only drink coffee made with our own filtered well water, or plain coffees at Starbucks (all of their stores use RO filtering).

If you are making coffee with municipal tap water (or consuming that water for any purpose), or drinking almost any store/restaurant-prepared beverages, you may have much more serious issues than those discussed in this tweaky article.

Coffee enthusiasts discourage using distilled water for coffee, but there are no health issues with doing that. Bottled spring water is probably fine.

Amendments

Most common coffee condiments are a disaster. Sugars you’re likely aware of. Creamers are little mine fields of unwanted ω6LA at the very least.

If you’re tempted to add any prebiotic ingredients, be mindful of temperature. Coffee is normally brewed at 195 to 205°F (90.5-96.1°C), and this can convert resistant starches to available net carbs. Check the Can Cook column in my Prebiotic Fiber Sources table. Raw potato starch, for example, would be unwise in coffee.

Coffee Filter

I use an unbleached paper filter (Mellita). Bleached filters raise potential residual bleaching concerns. If you go with bleached, look for some manufacturer representations regarding residues. And again, this issue is trivial compared to chloramine in tap water.

Metal filter?
You’ll need to check into the latest pondering on the cafestol issue (which I didn’t do for this first edition of this article, and the cholesterol connection is probably completely irrelevant, other than for purposes of gaming lipid panels). Do be aware that unless you got sticker shock when you bought it, that “gold filter” is no such thing. It’s more likely heat-treated stainless steel, easily not even gold-plated. Curious that no one ever mentions mesh sizes.

Container Materials

Once brewed, coffee at our house goes into a pre-warmed stainless steel thermos, and then is consumed from an insulated glass mug (Eparé or Bodum), ceramic mug, or a well-aged insulated plastic mug that is presumably no longer out-gassing much to worry about.

Coffee to go, even at Starbucks, is going to be in a bleached paper cup with some sort of lining to prevent the coffee from seeping through the paper. So normally, I’ll have the stainless travel mug along, and immediately decant.

Thermos pre-warming is a simple matter of filling it with hot tap water, letting it stand, emptying and filling with the coffee. Why pre-warm the container? Both glass and stainless vacuum vessels represent a modest amount of thermal mass. If you don’t heat them up before hand, they’ll get heated by cooling the coffee.

Picking a Coffee

I use whole bean, burr-ground just prior to brewing. Brand and variety matter, but you’ll figure this out by trying various products. Organic is not a priority. Even less so are high altitude, single-origin, shade-grown, and low-mycotoxin.

In Closing

Coffee is one of those topics that is not helpful to the cause of gaining people’s attention on more serious nutritional issues. The breathless headlines on coffee swap from Toxin to Elixir on an annual basis. The average person thinks that such ambiguity thus applies to all foods and food-like substances.

At some point we may know the full spectrum of benefits and hazards for coffee. In the meantime, there are bigger fish to fry (but not at too high a temperature, and choose the fat carefully ). Someone tweaking coffee, but still consuming grains, added sugars, or PUFAs at typical levels, and doing nothing for microbiome, needs to re-examine their priorities. Even emulsifiers, preservatives and food coloring are likely more serious concerns.

If someone decides to quit coffee, by the way, tapering off is usually pretty easy compared to cold turkey. I’ve done it several times for varying periods and reasons (and get headaches doing it cold turkey). And yes, the reaction to cold turkey does reveal a coffee adaptation if not an addiction.

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Bob Niland [disclosures] [topics]