Drink it while it’s fresh. That’s the best advice you’ll ever get when it comes to maximizing the benefits of your coffee. The best selling-beverage in America, valued as a stimulant, is also a storehouse of over three hundred chemicals with anti-oxidant properties. Coffee is so loaded with anti-oxidants that, according to a 2005 University of Scranton study, it is the number one provider of anti-oxidants in the American diet. And the finding holds true for both regular and decaf coffee. But those anti-oxidants, if your body is to utilize them, need to be consumed within twenty minutes of the coffee hitting your cup.
That’s because the coffee begins to oxidize at the twenty-minute mark, accounting for its increasingly bitter taste as it sits. The University of Scranton study, according to the August 29, 2005 issue of Physorg.com, examined a large variety of foods and beverages, including vegetables and fruits, tea, milk, and dates, for their antioxidant contents. The findings were then correlated to U.S. Department of Agriculture data estimating the amount of each item in the average U.S. diet. Coffee, of the more than one hundred items tested, based both on the amount of anti-oxidants in an individual serving, and frequency with which Americans consume it, was the clear winner. So, in addition to keeping you on your mental and physical toes, coffee’s anti-oxidant action could possibly be slowing down your aging processes.
Coffee has also been connected, through other recent studies, to a lessening of the effects of Alzheimer’s, and a reduction in the risk of diabetes, colon, and liver cancers. But those with a genetic inability to quickly metabolize caffeine may find coffee consumption increasing their risk of heart attack. Joe Vinson, Ph.D., who headed the Scranton study, advises that more research involving actual human studies is necessary to solidify findings on coffee’s potential healthy benefits. One more thing: based on eating “just one”, dates finished ahead of coffee in the study, but Americans don’t eat nearly enough of them to make dates the anti-oxidant champ. So drink to your health with a fresh cup of Java, and a date.
