Polyphenols in coffee and tea

[Yvonne Smith]

Dr. Gundry talks a lot about the polyphenols which are in both coffee and tea. He said that they have prebiotics in them which help our gut to stay healthy, and that the lighter the coffee roast, the more polyphenols are in the coffee.

Polyphenols in coffee and tea offer a range of impressive health benefits. Here are some of the most important ones, as explained by Co-Pilot AI:




However, he says that adding milk to the coffee or tea inhibits the polyphenols. The milk casein binds to the polyphenols, so the body can’t use it.
This is really upsetting to me because i have always used some sort of milk or cream in my coffee, and I know that the non-dairy creamers are unhealthy. I have tried plant milks, like coconut, almond, and soy milk, but they do not add the same flavor and it takes a lot of the plant milk to lighten up the coffee.

What I have decided to do, after researching this morning, is to get a container of vanilla plant-based protein powder, and will use that to lighten my coffee.
Not only does it have added protein, it has vitamins and other healthy things added to it. I ordered an Orgain Superfood blend protein powder, which should have a lot of health benefits, as well as allowing me to drink my coffee with something like creamer.
Here is what Dr. Gundry says about polyphenols and milk protein.

 

[Axel Slingerland]

Never heard of him...

 

[Yvonne Smith]

Never heard of him...

I am surprised !
He is a well-known heart surgeon who developed several important techniques that are used by doctors in open heart surgeries. However, after he had one patient whose heart was too clogged to operate on , and who then went on a healthy diet and supplements for 6 months, and almost completely cleared up the heart blockages, Dr. Gundry changed his thinking about using nutrition to help heal people.

In the book I am reading, “Diet Evolution”, he explains how our genes can be programmed to either help our health or make it worse, and how learning more about this has helped many of his patients to get well without having to have surgery.
Here is a short video that explains how this doctor changed from being an operation-based doctor, to one concerned about protecting and increasing people’s health instead.

 

[Sheryl]

I watched the second video. It seems to me that he is advocating living on plants and supplements.

Could the changes that took place be from the supplements, not the dietary changes? Does he sell supplements?
I can't believe that fruit is not healthy.

By the way, I just had my semiannual lab work done. I got an excellent report. I try to eat healthy with lots of fruits and vegetables. And ain't nobody going to make me give up cream in my coffee.

 

[Yvonne Smith]

He is not advocating a plant-based lifestyle, although he does say that his program can also work for people who are vegetarian or vegan. He just thinks that we need more foods in our diet that are nutrient dense with vitamins and minerals, and that most commercially raised meat animals are not grass fed nowadays, and not everyone can afford to buy the ones that are grass fed.
So, we have to do the best we can, with what we have.

He is not against fruit at all.
What he says in the book is that our early ancestors and some other mammals ate fruit when it was ripe, and it signaled our genes that winter was coming and that the creature/person needed to store fat for the upcoming winter. So eating fruit is fine, but if we overeat, it can send a message to our genes to store fat for winter.
I definitely do not want to send that message to my body !
People who are not “easy-keepers” like me can probably have all the fruit they want and not worry about it storing fat.

He explains in the book that it used to be that most food animals were pasture raised, and so they absorbed the plant nutrients as they ate the grass and plant leaves, and we got those nutrients when we ate the meat from a pasture raised animal.
Now, they live in tiny cages , with no sunshine, and are fed mainly grain products, as well as growth hormones (to make them fat faster) and antibiotics, all of which are in the meat we eat .

I am not enthused about having anything except cream in my coffee either, but if it is going to ruin the polyphenols, then I am going to learn to do something different.
I definitely want to turn on the genes for healthy living; so I am going to give this a try and see how it goes.

 

[Axel Slingerland]

I am surprised !
He is a well-known heart surgeon who developed several important techniques that are used by doctors in open heart surgeries.

That isn't exactly something we talked about... The closest thing I ever had to a heart problem was when I was in a coma in January 2023, Atrial Fibrillation was one of the many things that happened that I still have almost no knowledge of. My Doc put me on something called Amiodarone, and I've never had a problem since then. That I know of anyway...

While I got a vague description of everything that happened, there's a lot of it that I am clueless about. One thing I am fully informed about was how much those 96 days in three different hospitals cost... Medicare sent me copies of the bills and after adding up and it was over $400,000.

After the Afib thing, I had a Transesophageal Echocardiogram (they sedate you and intubate you with a small camera and take pics of your heart) and I had to pay 20% of the bill for that, which was about $500, and after that my Medicare deductible was paid for the year. I can't tell you how many times I have said "Thank God for Health Insurance."

However, if Polyphenols in coffee and tea are a good thing, I must be getting something from it, as after the two cups of Coffee in the morning, and the occasional Mocha Frappé, I drink Iced Tea all day long.

 

[Yvonne Smith]

I think that you would know it if you still have a fib. Mine felt like a bird trapped inside my chest and struggling to get out, it shook so bad when it was in a fib. Amioderone is supposed to stop a fib, but it is a bad medication , and I was glad when they took me off of it, so it is good you only had to take it for a little while.
After being healthy and active for most of my life, I went from walking several miles a day after work, to not being able to walk out to my mailbox from the house because of the a fib and heart failure; so now I try to research anything that might help me stay as healthy as I can.
I am glad that you are not having any heart problems anymore, @Axel Slingerland .

 

[Axel Slingerland]

I miss riding my bicycle every day. But while I might be able to still ride, it's starting to get pretty toasty around here lately. When it get really hot I can't ride at all. I make all of my Doc appointments for summer time at the beginning of the 3 - 4 months that it's really hot, so I don't have to go out in the day time. I have trouble breathing when it gets over 100°. So I tell my Docs I will be back in to see them when it's cooler, and stay home where I can deal with the temperatures better. I can deal with 80°, but it was 110° to 115° every day for almost three months last year.

I laughed when PG&E told me to set my thermostat to 70° to save energy. I told them I would have to turn the thermostat down 10° if I did that, which would use more energy, not less. It was almost always 80° in our house in Eureka, even when it was in the 60° range outside. So I got used to 80°. The good thing about that was when it was 30° to 40° outside, it was always 50° to 60° in the house, thus no need for a heater.

 

[Yvonne Smith]

I still hate black coffee ! I tried to drink my coffee black, I really did. What happened was that the cup of coffee just sat there and i didn’t drink it at all. Since I don’t get the polyphenols unless I actually drink the coffee, I realized that it does not matter if i drink coffee with cream or just do not drink coffee, because it is the same result either way. So, I am back to having coffee with cream, at least until I try something that I can use in the coffee and actually still drink it.
I will just have to get my polyphenols some other way .

 

[Axel Slingerland]

He explains in the book that it used to be that most food animals were pasture raised, and so they absorbed the plant nutrients as they ate the grass and plant leaves, and we got those nutrients when we ate the meat from a pasture raised animal.
Now, they live in tiny cages , with no sunshine, and are fed mainly grain products, as well as growth hormones (to make them fat faster) and antibiotics, all of which are in the meat we eat .

I knew I saw this somewhere and forgot where I saw it... I don't eat much red meat. Only if I am making a big pot Hamburger Soup or Spaghetti Sauce, which is somewhat rare. (Mostly when I miss Cindy...) I tend to eat more free range chicken and pork raised with no growth hormones or antibiotics. Growth hormones are major contributors to Dunlop Disease, where your belly dun lops over your belt because you're too fat... And since my body tends to seriously balloon up with less exercise anyway, I eat a lot less red meat. I seriously need to get my bike fixed, or buy a new one.

 

[Jacob Petersheim]

Black coffee is fine for me. I haven't had it any other way since I was a pre-schooler.

But he also dropped a caution about berries and yogurt. I can use that, I bought both yesterday and now I know to keep them separated over the day.

 

[Don Alaska]

I started drinking coffee when I was 5 years old. I drank it with milk and sugar then. My parents thought it was no worse than soft drinks, and they were probably correct in that. I soon dropped the sugar, as I usually dunked cookies or something in my coffee then, and the sugar was just too much sweet for me. Sometime later I also dropped the milk as well and have consumed black coffee in rather large quantities since that time--probably late elementary school. I like almost everything I drink "straight, be it whiskey, coffee, iced tea, or water.

 

[Sheryl]

Yvonne, I don't remember ever hearing about polyphenol until you mentioned it here. I've been looking for info about it since then. It turns out that a lot of the foods we are eating has it. So, I think we are good.

The only time I drink my coffee black is when I have fasting lab work. It's not good but it's wet. Thankfully, that's only twice a year.

 

[Axel Slingerland]

I actually didn't like coffee until about 2012 or somewhere around there. When my friend and future business partner Gary and I were waiting for our discharges to get processed so we could out of the Army and could go on the bike trip we had been talking about since 1973 when we first went into the Army.

The Captain in charge of the holdover station would put us to work doing some of the world's most stupid military activities, like painting jeeps with a brush, running all over the place to deliver messages when he had a perfectly good, working phone. His favorite things for me to do were office work, and that included making coffee. Meanwhile, Gary was usually driving all over the base running his stupid errands for him.

We didn't really think much of the fact that we had been waiting for a month, you get used to the Army way of "Hurry Up and Wait", when one day the base CO's aide, a totally Army full bird Colonel, stormed in and started screaming at the Captain that he heard he was shuffling paperwork to the bottom of the pile to keep guys in holdover longer. "I want them all of them on their was home tomorrow!" he screamed. Come to find out he was keeping Gary because he was a good gopher, and me because I made good coffee.

I had never even tried coffee up to that point. I just made the coffee the way my Mom liked it. Strong enough to put hair on a horse's chest. And I didn't even taste it until I was at a Relay for Life in Eureka and the owner of the local McDonald's was there passing out coupons for free Mocha Frappes. (By the way I'm tired of tracking down the accent that is supposed to be on the e in Frappe... So the American way will have to do.) That began my love for coffee. Hot, iced, with or without Mocha... At least twice a day. Just like my Mom and Dad used to do.

 

[Yvonne Smith]

After reading the food combining books, that is another reason not to use regular milk or cream in my coffee. I bought a container of oat milk creamer, which works fine and tastes okay, but it is really expensive to buy it, and who knows how much chemicals and preservatives are in that stuff; so I have decided to just make my own plant-based milk for coffee and tea.

Before, when I made almond or oat milk, I used my blender, but I gave away my Vitamix to my daughter-in-law when they were here and now all I have is the lightweight little Oster blender, which doesn’t blend as well for plant milks. Now, Amazon is having Prime days specials, and I am looking at getting a small device that is just for making plant based milks.

They comes in several sizes, all the way from the 20 oz size to at least 50 oz ones, which is way larger than I would need or want, so i am looking at the 20 oz size. It would make the plant milk either at room temperature or warm temperature, which would be perfect to make and add to my morning coffee, and then refrigerate whatever was left over.

Since it is made by me, it would not have anything except the nuts/grains in it and fresh filtered water, and would not cost much to make, compared to buying it at the store, and It should still be good for getting the polyphenols from the coffee.
This is what I am researching.