Nothing is better then a fine coffee
Antioxidants and Cancer-Fighting Properties
Coffee is a powerful source of antioxidants – agents that combat cancer-causing free radicals. Coffee is chock full of the compound methylpyridinium, which can’t be found in many other food items and not at the level available in coffee. You can get antioxidants from both caffeinated and decaffeinated coffee as long as the beans are sufficiently roasted.
Increased Cognitive Ability
Studies have shown that regular coffee drinkers frequently score significantly higher on cognitive ability tests, spatial awareness exams, IQ tests, and short term memory studies.
The effects of coffee on an individual’s cognitive ability appeared to be more pronounced in elderly study participants and women.
Bowel Stimulation
Coffee is a stimulant and also a laxative. Some alternative practitioners even prescribe coffee enemas to stimulate the lower colon.
However, because coffee is also a diuretic, it can cause constipation in some individuals.
Reduced Risk for Gout
A large study of over 45,000 men that was conducted over a 12-year period showed the amount of coffee consumed was inversely related to their risk or likelihood of developing gout.
Weight Loss and Metabolism
Because coffee is a stimulant, the caffeine inside can give a boost to your metabolism, helping with weight loss and energy levels. If you look at the ingredients listed for most over-the-counter weight loss aids, you’ll find caffeine is often a primary ingredient.
Be careful though, as too much coffee or caffeine can also cause jitters, anxiety and wreak havoc on your sleeping patterns.
Better Brain Function
A recent study found that individuals who drank at least one to two cups of coffee per day scored significantly higher on memory recall, cognitive ability, logic comprehension and basic IQ tests.
So, the next time you’re guzzling coffee to get you through that late-night cram session, remember that it is doing a lot more than just keeping you awake.
Reduced Risk for Type 2 Diabetes
A study done by the Harvard School of Health found that men who drank approximately 6 8-oz cups of coffee, or 3-4 standard mugs could lower their risk of developing Type 2 Diabetes by as much as 50 percent. Meanwhile, women could reduce their risk by almost 30 percent.
Remember, everything should be practiced in moderation, and health concerns should always be discussed with a medical professional. So, while a moderate amount of coffee has its benefit, an excessive amount can also cause problems. Heavy coffee drinking can lead to irritability, anxiety, sleep deprivation, cardiovascular problems and higher cholesterol levels.
For additional informative details on coffee and enticing flavors that explode your taste buds, please visit http://www.coffeetryst.com, a popular site with insights on coffee options, such as flavored decaf coffee, gourmet coffee gift baskets, almond flavored coffee, and many more!
Article Source: ArticleSpan
By articlespan.com
Yaab
Scientists in Brazil are finding that un-roasted coffee beans, which contain large amounts of globulins proteins, work well to naturally ward off insects.
Paulo Mazzafera and his colleagues are working to develop the globulins to protect food crops. Their study appears in the February 2010 issue of the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.
The insecticidal properties of the purified proteins were tested against the cowpea weevil using artificial diets; and the results showed that small amounts of coffee proteins killed up to half of the insects.
In the future, scientists could potentially breed these globulin proteins into crops so plants would theoretically produce their own defenses against insects.
And no need to worry, globulins proteins are destroyed when the beans are roasted, so you won’t be sipping on insecticide in your next cup of coffee.
View the report: “Purification of Legumin-Like Proteins from Coffea arabica and Coffea racemosa Seeds and Their Insecticidal Properties toward Cowpea Weevil (Caliosobruchus maculates) (Coleoptera: Bruchidae).”
Image: Aidan Wojtas
The Atlantic, US
September 1, 2009
Jerry Baldwin
Jerry Baldwin is co-founder of Starbucks in Seattle, where he was the first roaster and coffee buyer.
Photo by Jerry Baldwin
As a beverage, qishr (or kishr) and its variations are prepared from the husks of coffee. Qishr is the Arabic word for skin. On Ethopia’s Omo River, the beverage was called buno, presumably derived from bunna, the Amharic word for coffee. (None of these languages use the Roman alphabet, and phonetic transliterations always vary in spelling.) Though I’ve learned about the beverage during several trips to Ethiopia, because of my friend, Abdullah, I’ve saved this piece for Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting, which began the weekend of August 22nd.
When I mentioned this drink to Abdullah, a Yemeni who grew up in Addis Ababa, he recalled it fondly. His mother served dates and qishr each evening during Ramadan to break the day’s fast. There is nothing religious about qishr, sometimes called qishr buna; it’s one family’s way to break the fast. His mother’s qishr was flavored with ginger and cardamom.
A brief review: coffee cherries contain seeds wrapped in “parchment.” First, the flesh of the fruit is separated, leaving the seeds, later to become coffee beans, in parchment. The seeds are dried and remain in parchment until they’re prepared for shipping. At this point, the beans are milled, separating the husks from the beans, which are then sorted and bagged for shipping.
When neighbors gather for buno, news of the tribe from this village and others is shared. Government visits, conflicts with other tribes, and harvest or planting news are all reported.
In most places, the husks are used for compost or burned as fuel to power the coffee processing operation. In Yemen and Ethiopia, parchment is sold to make qishr. In Ethiopia, the equivalent of 12 cents would buy about a quart volume of husks. This beverage may be available in other coffee-growing areas, but I’ve only encountered it in these countries.
Like coffee itself, various levels of care and consumer preference produce different taste experiences. When fermented fruit from the coffee cherries is left mixed into the husks, the taste changes considerably. In my cups, the fruit seemed to have been culled before brewing.
Although I’d heard of this beverage, I didn’t actually get a cup until I visited the lower Omo River. I accompanied my photographer wife, Jane, on one of her many visits among the tribes who still live traditionally along the river. On a few occasions we were invited to someone’s ono (the Kara house made of sticks, roofed with long grasses) for buno. As is often the case with coffee (e.g. the Ethiopian coffee ceremony in the Highlands has its own elaborate protocols), the Kara rituals surrounding this simple beverage greatly enrich the experience.
Our camp was adjacent to the Kara village of Duss, and we were privileged to be invited to morning “coffee” with Ari and Karsche. The structure of this pre-dawn occasion was remarkable. The embers of the evening’s fire are kept burning through the night. When Karsche arises, she revives the fire. The pot of water is put on the fire, and the husks are added to the boiling water.
Morning coffee occurs before dawn. No food is taken in the morning; this is breakfast. As invited guests arrive, they are seated according to gender and position or age. The man of the house always sits by the door, with a respected elder across from him. The other men sit to his left arranged by seniority, and the women sit on the opposite side, with the woman of the house by the fire.
The man of the house is served first, followed by important guests, the other men according to their seniority, and then the women. The buno is ladled from the pot into individual half-calabash gourds. Members of the household have specific ones reserved, just as we have our special mugs.
When all have been served, everyone waits for the host to begin. He blows across the surface, and he calls barjo (pronounced bario), the Kara (and Hamar) life force, as best I understand it. Barjo is everywhere. People have barjo, as do natural elements like clouds. Prospective bridegrooms are interviewed to evaluate their barjo. A person with the best barjo would be most harmoniously integrated into the society.
When there are no guests, the family still observes this ritual each morning.
When the man of the house is absent, as was the case on another occasion, his calabash is still served first. Later, after we had begun drinking, our hostess ladled from his calabash to hers, then added hot buno to each calabash. Serving the man’s buno in his absence is to acknowledge his spirit in the ono.
When neighbors gather for buno, news of the tribe from this village and others is shared. Government visits, conflicts with other tribes, harvest or planting news are all reported. When someone is speaking before he has brushed his teeth, he is thought to always tell the truth. Although government schools are now in most Ethiopian villages, the oral tradition is maintained at home. All Kara social gatherings at home start with buno. We observed a gathering of men discussing conflict with another tribe across the river. Buno came first. When Jane was invited to a female, mid-morning “coffee,” buno started the conversation.
Although the Kara drink also directly from the river, the water for buno is always clarified. After a very short time of stirring the water with a block of Kulup wood attached to a stick, the turbidity precipitates, and the water becomes clear.
I’m sure there are variations in strength, but each time I drank it, buno smelled and tasted like a very weak black tea, with a slight tang of tannin. There were no additives, and there wasn’t much flavor, certainly no coffee flavor, though the husks probably contain some caffeine. Other parts of the plant, including the leaves, have caffeine.
My buno (qishr) was really an innocuous drink, quite different from the sometimes sweetened and spiced version. While I can’t recommend it over a cup of roasted coffee, I strongly suggest you take any invitation to enjoy the social gathering surrounding a cup of buno. But you’ll probably need a cup of coffee soon after.
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Oregon's unemployment rate has improved since the soldiers left for their final pre-deployment training, but it's still quite high. The rate was at 10.1 percent in February, according to the Oregon Employment Department.
“We're going to be pushing in every nook and cranny of our state to find employers who are willing to hire vets and I think we can do it,” said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon).
A new website, FortOregon.com, is being created to help soldiers find jobs and services.
Worksource Lane, the Lane County's employment office, already gets federal funding for three veteran's services officers who work to find returning and current vets find jobs.
The above is from Laura Rillos' “Home from Iraq — and looking for work” (KVAL — link has text and video) which is the latest attempt by the media to draw attention to the problems facing returning service members, especially those serving in the National Guard. The whole country is facing an unemployment crisis and a recession. For members of the Guard, returning home can be a lot like being laid off or fired in terms of money coming in. The Congress could address this and Wyden has proposed adding 90-days of pay for Guard members so they return with a cushion but whether or not the Congress will get behind such an idea remains to be seen — thus far, it appears no. Possibly most indicative via Rorye O'Connor's article for the Mt. Vernon Register-News on Senator Dick Durbin visiting an outpatient center in Mt. Vernon where he apparently made no mention of the economy or the way it weighs on those returning from deployments. Maybe the answer will be governors? Lance Renaud (KFJB via Radio Iowa) reports on two bills Iowa Governor Chet Culver has signed:
The first bill stipulates that veterans with service-connected injuries who qualify for unemployment or who receive benefits from the Veterans Trust Fund do not have to pay taxes on those benefits. The second bill directs the Iowa Department of Human Services to coordinate with the Mental Health Planning Advisory Council to ensure that a “knowledgeable” veteran serves on the council.
The Governor's Office issued the following press release on the bills Tuesday:
MARSHALLTOWN — Governor Chet Culver today signed two pieces of veterans’ legislation at the Iowa Veterans Home in Marshalltown. House File 2532 allows benefits from the Veterans Trust Fund to be exempted from individual income tax, and Senate File 2175 provides for veteran representation on mental health policy bodies.
“As Commander-in-Chief of the Iowa National Guard, I am proud of the men and women who have served our nation in war and in peace, abroad and at home,” Governor Culver said. “Their commitment and courage is unrivaled and must always be honored. I am proud to work for those who have served, returned to their homes and families and, in some cases, need our support. My hope is that this legislation will provide the support and appreciation they all deserve.”
Below are summaries of the legislation the Governor signed:
House File 2532
Allows the two benefits of the Veterans Trust Fund – travel expenses related to follow-up medical care and unemployment assistance – that provide direct payments to the veteran to be exempted from individual income tax. The bill applies retroactively to January 1, 2010, for tax years beginning on or after that date.
Senate File 2175
Directs the Department of Human Services to coordinate with the Mental Health Planning Advisory Council so that a military veteran who is knowledgeable about behavioral and mental health issues of veterans is on the council. The council is required by federal law as a condition of receiving federal mental health funds. DHS does not make this appointment but can work with the council to identify and appoint a veteran. Also adds a member, appointed by the Governor, who is a military veteran knowledgeable about behavioral and mental health issues to the Mental Health, Mental Retardation, Developmental Disabilities, and Brain Injury Commission.
John Larson (Tacoma Weekly) notes the problems experienced by a Guard member returning from deployment and a service member leaving the military:
Chris MacDonald served in Kuwait for a year in the Army National Guard. When he returned to his home in Vancouver in 2008, the only work he could find was as a security guard. He quit and was on unemployment for a while. He has found the skills he learned in the military are hard to transfer into civilian work. MacDonald is pursuing work as a pipe fitter now.
Deidre Connor of Bonney Lake left the Army after nine years in 2005. She got an offer to clean kennels for minimum wage. “That is not what I want to do,” Connor said. “It is not putting my skills to use.”
Peter Hirschfeld (Vermont Press Bureau via Rutland Herald) reports on the “66 members of Vermont's Air Ambulance Unit” who will deploy to Iraq in September and are scheduled to serve there until September 2011 and notes that this will be the unit's second deployment to Iraq. Meanwhile Dusty King is serving in Iraq and, Kris Betts (KTEN News, link has text and video)reports, fourth graders in Sherman, Texas are sending his platoon coffee which they would not otherwise have. The teacher of the fourth graders is Gerri King, Dusty's mother, who says, “They feel forgotten over there. He said tell them thank you. It's such a wonderful thing to have someone remember us and send us coffee.”
The following community sites updated last night (and we'll include in On The Wilder Side to give them a link):
