Coffee Berries on the Tree

The coffee berry if the fruit that grows on the coffee plant and the beans are actually the pits inside the coffee berry.  Each coffee berry typically has two “coffee beans” inside of it, though once in a while a coffee berry or cherry will have only one seed inside which is called a “peaberry.” 

The rich red berry has proven to have it’s own benefits.  Lately there’s been a lot of buzz about the coffee berry and its health benefits as well as its use for skin care.  The coffee berry has more antioxidants than green tea and pomegranate and is now being taken internally for health and has been popping up in skin care products for its external benefits on skin as well.  While the coffee cherry (or berry) does have a good amount of antioxidants, Dr. Weil comments on the berry and offers some other foods with great health benefits that have antioxidants too.

Some call the California Buckthorn berry “coffeeberry” because it is very similar to coffee fruit.  The real coffee plant grows to be about 10-12 feet high on average, bears fruit somewhere between three to six years of age, and typically bears fruit for 50-60 years.

Coffee plantation in Vietnam

Related posts:

1. Coffee Plant The coffee plant is a shrub or small tree in...
2. Coffee Beans The journey starts in the Columbian mountains, Ethiopian rain forests...
3. Whole Coffee Whole coffee usually refers to coffee beans that have not...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

The other day, I was busy debunking myths about caffeine consumption. Today, the news is even better.

According to Dutch and American researchers, coffee actually reduces the risk of Type 2 diabetes.

The researchers spent time reviewing nine studies involving 193,473 people (including 8,394 cases with Type 2 diabetes) across Europe and the U.S.

Their findings were that ”those participants who consumed large amounts of coffee, six or seven cups, had a 35 percent lower risk of developing the disease than those who consumed two or fewer cups per day.” (In addition, gender, obesity and region had no impact on the results.)

“This systemic review supports the hypothesis that habitual coffee consumption is associated with a substantially lower risk of type 2 diabetes,” concludes the authors of the study in The Journal of the American Medical Association.

However, they say more studies are needed. “Longer-term intervention studies of coffee consumption and glucose metabolism are warranted to examine the mechanisms underlying the relationship between coffee consumption and type 2 diabetes,” wrote investigators Rob M. van Dam, Ph.D. and Frank B. Hu, MD, Ph.D.

Dr. van Dam is with the Department of Nutrition and Health, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the Netherlands; and Dr. Hu is with the Department of Epidemiology Harvard School of Public Health, Boston.

Related posts:

1. Coffee & Caffeine Myths Debunked You might be able to blame coffee for staining your...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

You might be able to blame coffee for staining your teeth or keeping you up at night, but there are some assumptions about coffee and caffeine that can finally be put to rest.

Caffeine & Hydration
Last fall, the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) reported in its “Nutrition Action Healthletter” that the caffeine is not the diuretic it was once thought to be. They said that people who drink up to 550 milligrams of caffeine (slightly more than 18 ounces) produced no more urine than when drinking caffeine-free liquids. However, drinking more than 575 milligrams (about 20 ounces) will cause a diuretic affect from caffeinated beverages.

Caffeine & Heart Disease
For people with heart disease and/or high blood pressure, caffeine has often been labeled a stimulant to be avoided. But an analysis of 10 studies involving 400,000 people found little evidence that coffee or other caffeinated beverages in “typical” dosages increase the risk of abnormal heart rhythms, sudden death, or heart attack. In fact, a study of 27,000 women followed for 15 years in the Iowa Women’s Health Study concluded coffee consumption reduced their risk of cardiovascular disease by 24 percent. Like the caveat above, the benefits diminish when quantities of coffee are increased beyond the one to three cups per day.

Coffee & Hypertension
Caffeine has the ability to induce a small, temporary rise in blood pressure. But all caffeine is not created equal. A study of 155,000 female nurses who drank coffee with or without caffeine for a decade concluded they were no more likely to develop hypertension than non coffee drinkers. However, those who drank caffeinated colas increased their risks notably.

Coffee, Cancer & Bone Loss
Coffee has been dismissed as a cause of cancer in the kidney or pancreas or liver cancer (in primarily men), and breast cancer in women. Regarding bone loss (or similar calcium excretions), adding as little as one or two tablespoons of milk, whole or reduced fat, reduces caffeine’s negative effect on calcium.

Related posts:

1. Coffee & Caffeine Caffeine is what makes most people reach for their morning...
2. Decaf Coffee Caffeine is a stimulant that is found in coffee, for...
3. Kick Cellulite With Caffeine According to Natural Solutions magazine, one way to reap the...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.