Coffee...Oh, Coffee!

My uncle and I were talking the other day {he's not a raw foodist by any means but he's a health NUT and he owns a supplement company. He drinks green smoothies, makes everything fresh, eats only organic meat, goes on radical cleanses and so on} as we do from time to time about health and food. 

Our topic on this particular day was COFFEE! Yes, coffee, which I indulge in from time to time. The reason I brought up coffee was because I had read something that REALLY freaked me out. I mean, deep down I know that coffee is far from a healthy beverage. It's a Fake-Out and a stimulant and bad for the kidneys and nervous system to some degree, it stimulates the bowls, and so on and so forth. Then you hear on the news sometimes that small amounts are actually "healthy for us"! Come on! I don't believe that {although I listen in hopes that I hear something new and interesting as to why I should drink that espresso}. I mean, MAYBE the good {it's a great pick-me-up when you are tired} outways the BAD sometimes and won't really HARM us in a permanent way. Now that I can see! 


Back to my story: the blurb I had just read that day was out of Sarma and Matthew's Raw Food Real World. I had received the book as a gift about 5 years ago when it first came out and hadn't really read much of it. Of course one of the first pages I turned to was the page on COFFEE and how bad it is for us.

I've already heard all the negative things so what NEW information could this page possibly contain. I almost just turned the turned the page...

But I didn't! I read their perspectives on the matter and I was surprised by what I had read. 

They reference a book called Caffeine Blues by Stephen Cherniske because in that book, Stephen calls coffee a "biological poison used by plants as a pesticide," noting that "caffeine gives leaves and seeds a bitter taste, which discourages their consumption by insects and animals. If predators insist on eating a caffeine-containing plant, the caffeine can cause central nervous system disruptions and even lethal side effects. Most pests soon learn to leave the plant alone."


"the so-called 'stimulating' effect of caffeine is merely our body stepping up the system to flush the poison out as quickly as possible. In fact, coffee beans were first employed as a drug to 'detoxify' the sick. 

"it's also damaging to the liver, which has to detoxify the caffeine in it. Decaf is NOT an okay contains a variety of damaging chemical, including those cancer-causing agents found in barbecued foods."


But it's the biological and scientific "stories" {truths} like this that keep my mind working. I love this stuff. I mean, I HATE to hear it, but that to me makes total sense. 


So, I asked my uncle what he thought about coffee. His take: "if it comes from nature and is minimally processed, I'm not against it!" {hmmm, do cocaine and crack fit that bill because that doesn't seem right}. But I get his take on it. What I guess he means is that he drinks wine from time to time, eats chocolate, drinks coffee and tea, and eats meat too. But he avoids all the manmade chemicals and preservatives and colorings and dies and pesticies. 

But...what about the natural ones? I'm still torn.

I would definitely NOT recommend pregnant women drink decaf as a drink of choice during pregnancy. Kind of like I don't recommend diet coke as an alcohol replacement. But again, do what you gotta do to get through your pregnancy. 
