Coffee or Tea: Enjoy Both in Moderation for Heart Benefits, Dutch Study Suggests

ScienceDaily (June 19, 2010) — Coffee and tea drinkers may not need to worry about indulging — high and moderate consumption of tea and moderate coffee consumption are linked with reduced heart disease, according to a study published in Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology: Journal of the American Heart Association.

Researchers in The Netherlands found:

• Drinking more than six cups of tea per day was associated with a 36 percent lower risk of heart disease compared to those who drank less than one cup of tea per day.
• Drinking three to six cups of tea per day was associated with a 45 percent reduced risk of death from heart disease, compared to consumption of less than one cup per day.

And for coffee they found:

• Coffee drinkers with a modest intake, two to four cups per day, had a 20 percent lower risk of heart disease compared to those drinking less than two cups or more than four cups.
• Although not considered significant, moderate coffee consumption slightly reduced the risk of heart disease death and deaths from all causes.

Researchers also found that neither coffee nor tea consumption affected stroke risk.

"While previous studies have shown that coffee and tea seem to reduce the risk of heart disease, evidence on stroke risk and the risk of death from heart disease was not conclusive," said Yvonne T. van der Schouw, Ph.D., study senior author and professor of chronic disease epidemiology, Julius Center for Health Sciences and Primary Care, University Medical Center Utrecht, The Netherlands. "Our results found the benefits of drinking coffee and tea occur without increasing risk of stroke or death from all causes.

Van der Schouw and colleagues used a questionnaire to evaluate coffee and tea consumption among 37,514 participants. They followed the participants for 13 years for occurrences of cardiovascular disease and death.

Study limitations included self-reported tea and coffee consumption, and the lack of specific information on the type of tea participants drank. However, black tea accounts for 78 percent of the total tea consumed in The Netherlands and green tea accounts for 4.6 percent. Coffee and tea drinkers have very different health behaviors, researchers note. Many coffee drinkers tend to also smoke and have a less healthy diet compared to tea drinkers.

Researchers suggest that the cardiovascular benefit of drinking tea may be explained by antioxidants. Flavonoids in tea are thought to contribute to reduced risk, but the underlying mechanism is still not known.

Fruity Science Halves Fat in Chocolate

But WHY would they want to do so???

FATs are healthy, when they are from organic sources.  Saturated fats are crucial for health, for weight control, for all biological functions.  So to take the fat out of chocolate and replace it with fruit juice would CAUSE you to gain weight!!

Crazy!  So eat chocolate, make it dark chocolate, fair trade and organic!  Enjoy!

The article from Science Daily;

ScienceDaily (Aug. 13, 2012) — It may not make chocolate one of your five a day — but scientists have found a way to replace up to 50 per cent of its fat content with fruit juice.

University of Warwick chemists have taken out much of the cocoa butter and milk fats that go into chocolate bars, substituting them with tiny droplets of juice measuring under 30 microns in diameter.

They infused orange and cranberry juice into milk, dark and white chocolate using what is known as a Pickering emulsion.

Crucially, the clever chemistry does not take away the chocolate ‘mouth-feel’ given by the fatty ingredients.

This is because the new technique maintains the prized Polymorph V content, the substance in the crystal structure of the fat which gives chocolate its glossy appearance, firm and snappy texture but which also allows it to melt smoothly in the mouth.

The final product will taste fruity — but there is the option to use water and a small amount of ascorbic acid (vitamin C) instead of juice to maintain a chocolatey taste.

Dr Stefan Bon from the Department of Chemistry at the University of Warwick was lead author on the study published in the Journal of Materials Chemistry.

He said the research looked at the chemistry behind reducing fat in chocolate, but now it was up to the food industry to use this new technique to develop tasty ways to use it in chocolate.

FULL POST….

Weight Loss “Products”

I have never dieted,, never never taken any weight loss tea or product.  I weigh 109 and though had health problems in the past, was never overweight.   I teach my Nutrition Coaching clients how to eat 2000 calories a day and lose weight safely, while becoming better nourished. 

I ended up trying a weight loss coffee a few nights ago.  I Facebook friend posted an event at his real estate office, mentioned coffee…and I signed up.  Frankly I thought it was a networking event and they were serving coffee. He followed up later in the day by posting that it was a weight loss coffee.   Since it was in my neighborhood, only a few blocks away…I decided to go. I figured I’d mix and mingle and meet people. 

If you read my blog regularly you know I don’t eat “products”, I eat real food…and teach my clients how to do the same.   There are no shortcuts or products that will make you healthier…only great nutrition and exercise. 

I got to the meeting, there were only 6 people,,,disappointing.  They offered my a cup of coffee, told me the main ingredients were coffee and yerba mate’. I drank about half the cup and as they were doing there sales spiel I noticed my heat racing.  Now, I’m no wimp when it comes to caffeine…I drink one cup of Turkish coffee each morning and have no issues or jittery-ness.

About an hour into the whole meeting I was bored by listening to how I could make a fortune on this stuff, still had seen no label or ingredient list…and my heart was racing..   The people putting on the meeting were saying they were drinking this coffee, eating the same and losing 5 or 6 pounds a week.  They assured us that it was good for you, helped brain function because of the herbs and coffee, didn’t keep you up at night….

I got home and realized I was feeling as though I had taken a dose of speed.  My son told me I wasn’t taking breaths between sentences.  I cleaned, couldn’t settle down, wasn’t hungry at dinner time.  I ate a small bowl of soup.  Cleaned some more…Usually I am asleep by midnight…at two AM I was still reading and my heart was still racing.   I was not happy. 

Finally went to bed, didn’t sleep well (which never happens to me!).  I got up and for the first time in years, didn’t have coffee…my heart was still racing intermittently.  And my stomach was upset.  It took until that afternoon for me to feel better, normal.

People want easy solutions to weight loss.  This product, Javita, is another products promising people an easy answer. The website claims that portion control is the key to weight loss and that this product helps you control food intake.  It does this by suppressing the appetite.  This is not a good idea because you need nourishment, need foods  composed of a healthy mix of fat, protein and crabs.

As most of us have discovered, there are no easy answers to dieting…only great nutrition keeps us healthy, or can repair and restore health.  Weight loss is about getting the right amount of nourishment; 2000 calories a day from the right foods,. Period.

High Dietary Antioxidant Intake Might Cut Pancreatic Cancer Risk

Sources for Selenium;  Brewer’s yeast, liver, butter, fish (mackerel, tuna, halibut, flounder, herring, smelts) and shellfish (oysters, scallops, and lobster), garlic, sunflower seeds, and Brazil nuts are all good sources of selenium.  (Although whole grains contain selenium, they are not a natural food for humans and cause health issues including weight gain, depression, leaky gut and diabetes).

ScienceDaily (July 23, 2012) — Increasing dietary intake of the antioxidant vitamins C, E, and selenium could help cut the risk of developing pancreatic cancer by up to two thirds, suggests research published online in the journal Gut.

If the association turns out to be causal, one in 12 of these cancers might be prevented, suggest the researchers, who are leading the Norfolk arm of the European Prospective Investigation of Cancer (EPIC) study.

Cancer of the pancreas kills more than a quarter of a million people every year around the world. And 7500 people are diagnosed with the disease every year in the UK, where it is the six commonest cause of cancer death.

The disease has the worst prognosis of any cancer, with just 3% of people surviving beyond five years. Genes, smoking, and type 2 diabetes are all risk factors, but diet is also thought to have a role, and may explain why rates vary so much from country to country, say the authors.

The researchers tracked the health of more than 23,500 40 to 74 year olds, who had entered the Norfolk arm of the EPIC study between 1993 and 1997.

Each participant filled in a comprehensive food diary, detailing the types and amount of every food they ate for 7 days, as well as the methods they used to prepare it.

Each entry in the food diary was matched to one of 11,000 food items, and the nutrient values calculated using a specially designed computer program (DINER).

Forty nine people (55% men) developed pancreatic cancer within 10 years of entering the study. This increased to 86 (44% men) by 2010. On average, they survived 6 months after diagnosis.

The nutrient intakes of those diagnosed with the disease within 10 years of entering EPIC were compared with those of almost 4000 healthy people to see if there were any differences.

The analysis showed that a weekly intake of selenium in the top 25% of consumption roughly halved their risk of developing pancreatic cancer compared with those whose intake was in the bottom 25%.

And those whose vitamins C, E, and selenium intake was in the top 25% of consumption were 67% less likely to develop pancreatic cancer than those who were in the bottom 25%.

If the link turns out to be causal, that would add up to the prevention of more than one in 12 (8%) of pancreatic cancers, calculate the authors.

Antioxidants may neutralize the harmful by-products of metabolism and normal cell activity — free radicals — and curb genetically programmed influences, as well as stimulating the immune system response, explain the authors.

Other trials using antioxidant supplements have not produced such encouraging results, but this may be because food sources of these nutrients may behave differently from those found in supplements, they say.

"If a causal association is confirmed by reporting consistent findings from other epidemiological studies, then population based dietary recommendations may help to prevent pancreatic cancer," they conclude.

Giving…

Dieting vs. Exercise for Weight Loss

Why Exercise has Little Effect on Weight Loss…

Two groundbreaking new studies address the irksome question of why so many of us who work out remain so heavy, a concern that carries special resonance at the moment, as lean Olympians slip through the air and water, inspiring countless viewers to want to become similarly sleek.

Gretchen Reynolds on the science of fitness;

And in a just world, frequent physical activity should make us slim. But repeated studies have shown that many people who begin an exercise program lose little or no weight. Some gain.

To better understand why, anthropologists leading one of the new studies began with a research trip to Tanzania. There, they recruited volunteers from the Hadza tribe, whose members still live by hunting and gathering.

Providing these tribes people with a crash course in modern field-study technology, the researchers fitted them with GPS units, to scrupulously measure how many miles each walked daily while searching for food. They also asked them to swallow so-called doubly labeled water, a liquid in which the normal hydrogen and oxygen molecules have been replaced with versions containing tracers. By studying these elements later in a person’s urine, researchers can precisely determine someone’s energy expenditure and metabolic rate.

The researchers gathered data for 11 days, then calculated the participants’ typical daily physical activity, energy expenditure and resting metabolic rates. They then compared those numbers with the same measures for an average male and female Westerner.

It’s long been believed that a hunter-gatherer lifestyle involves considerable physical activity and therefore burns many calories, far more than are incinerated by your average American office worker each day. And it was true, the scientists determined, that the Hadza people in general moved more than many Americans do, with the men walking about seven miles a day and the women about three.

But it was not true that they were burning far more calories. In fact, the scientists calculated, the Hadza’s average metabolic rate, or the number of calories that they were burning over the course of a day, was about the same as the average metabolic rate for Westerners.

The implication, the scientists concluded, is that “active, ‘traditional’ lifestyles may not protect against obesity if diets change to promote increased caloric consumption.” That is, even active people will pack on pounds if they eat like most of us in the West.

The underlying and rather disheartening message of that finding, of course, is that physical activity by itself is not going to make and keep you thin. (It’s worth noting that the Hadza people were almost uniformly slight.)

FULL POST…

Addition Reading;

WHY EXERCISE HAS LITTLE EFFECT ON WEIGHT LOSS

THE WHOLE GRAIN LIE – LOOKING BEYOND GLUTEN

AMERICANS ARE STARVED FOR  FATS

For a 30 Day Guide with Menus and Recipes on how to lose 25 pounds in a month, safely- The Criterion Diet

Deviled Cauliflower Casserole

This is the best cauliflower dish I have ever had.  I have made it lactose and gluten free..

Serves 4

1 large head of cauliflower- in medium flowerets   
7 Tablespoons organic butter
3 large shallots- minced
2 cups almond milk- plain
4 Tablespoons Dijon mustard
2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
1 bay leaf
1/8 teaspoon cayenne
salt and pepper
1 1/2 cup gluten free bread crumbs

1)  Heat the oven to 350°F and arrange a rack in the middle. Coat a 13-by-9-inch baking dish with butter; set aside.

2)  Steam cauliflower until al dente.  Drain in a colander; set aside.

3)  Return the saucepan to medium heat and melt 4 tablespoons of the butter until foaming. Add the shallots and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 4 minutes.

4)  Reduce the heat to low, add the flour, and whisk until smooth and the raw taste has cooked off, about 1 minute. Gradually whisk in the milk. Add the mustard, Worcestershire, bay leaf, cayenne, and measured salt and season generously with pepper. Cook, stirring often, until the sauce has just thickened, about 10 to 12 minutes.

5)  Discard the bay leaf.  Add the reserved cauliflower to the sauce and stir to coat.

6)  Transfer to the prepared baking dish and arrange in an even layer. Bake until bubbly and the edges start to brown, about 35 to 40 minutes.

7)  Meanwhile, heat the remaining 3 tablespoons butter in a medium frying pan over medium heat. When the foaming subsides, add the panko and season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until lightly browned and toasted, about 6 to 8 minutes. Place on top of casserole and return to the oven for about 5 minutes.

8)  When the casserole is done, let it sit for 5 to 10 minutes.