Coffee and tea ward off type 2 diabetes

And it appears the more coffee you drink (caffeinated or decaf), the greater the protective effect.

Good news for a lot of men I know

Coffee and beer may help prevent aggressive prostate cancer.

The latest on coffee

More good news on what I'm drinking right now: coffee! A new study confirms earlier research that coffee consumption helps to lower the risk of developing dementia.

The facts on coffee

The New York Times debunks the myths about coffee. It won't dehydrate you unless consumed in excess, and moderate use may actually prevent cardiovascular disease rather than promote it. Drinking coffee helps ward off diabetes and Parkinson's disease, won't result in bone loss, and may lower the risk of liver cancer (another good reason to drink it when you've got a hangover :-).

More here.

Virtual water

An uncomfortable truth: it may take around 140 liters--37 gallons--of water to brew my morning cup of coffee. That's if you count the H2O to grow and transport the beans to me here in Vegas... and the small amount of water I actually put in my coffee maker.

People do not only consume water when they drink it or take a shower. In 1993, Professor Allan, 71, strikingly demonstrated this by introducing the “virtual water” concept, which measures how water is embedded in the production and trade of food and consumer products. Behind that morning cup of coffee are 140 litres of water used to grow, produce, package and ship the beans. That is roughly the same amount of water used by an average person daily in England for drinking and household needs. The ubiquitous hamburger needs an estimated 2,400 litres of water. Per capita, Americans consume around 6,800 litres of virtual water every day, over triple that of a Chinese person.

Food crisis discussed on NPR

The soaring price of food and the resulting hunger and political turmoil were discussed on NPR's Talk of the Nation today.

I was already on a kick of cooking at home more, and even with rising prices, buying real, whole foods is a lot cheaper than eating out or eating crap.

And I bought a new coffee maker with a burr grinder today... spending $7-8 a day at Starbuck's has begun to seem a bit ridiculous. Figured that we might as well buy a good one... and since we got a good deal, it will pay for itself in less than three weeks!

Coffee!

An item in the Daily Dish this morning reminded me that I've been meaning to post about coffee and it's health benefits. I've been collecting these stories for awhile:

• Today's latest item suggest that coffee may protect the brain against dementia
• It had separately been found to protect against Parkinson's disease
• Java has also been found to protect against liver damage caused by alcohol (yee haw!)
• It's also found to help the cardiovascular system (I've read a research report that I've now misplaced (dementia? :-) which stated that after a short-term boost in blood pressure, coffee drinkers adapt and return to their baseline pressue; interestingly, the same was not true for people who drank caffeinated sodas--their blood pressure remained elevated indefinitely)
• A couple of general articles about coffee's benefits: one and two

So make a barista happy and order a cup today. ;-)