Should We Be Worried About Mycotoxins In Coffee?
As a small startup coffee company with a focus on health, here’s what we have learned on our journey as it relates to mycotoxins, and drinking truly clean and delicious coffee.
Over the last few years, the discussion around Mycotoxins in coffee has become a heated one, hitting the same “hot cognitions” among hard-core coffee aficionados as the primary taboo subjects and opinions held among the general population (i.e., politics, religions, diet etc…).
As a preface, it is best that we disclose upfront that we do not hold ourselves out as an official “authority” on the matter. Part of this is just because we don’t want to come off as big-headed, but with that being said, we feel that we are (at the very least) in a fairly strong position of prominence to speak confidently on the subject for a few combined reasons.
- We are major coffee enthusiasts;
- We are major health and performance nuts;
- One of our founding partners is an environmental hygienist (and BioChem Grad), who is very familiar with mycotoxins due to his career (spanning 7 years) working with them and other industrial / agricultural / environmental agents; and
- We believe in testing, transparency, and hard data vs. speculation, marketing, and hearsay.
There have been some recent claims made by people in the business that a lot of the coffee on the market is contaminated with these mold toxins, causing people who drink it to perform worse and even have a higher risk of disease. Some have often claimed that THEIR coffee has “the secret sauce” in it (which you must take their word on) and is apparently cleaner and safer to drink than other people’s coffee.
Since we worship our morning coffee and want to make sure we’re not harming ourselves we decided to take a deep dive in to the subject and see if it’s something that we really need to be concerned about or not. We set our hypothesis, began our research, and actually ended up lab testing some of our favorite coffees to validate things and see for ourselves.
Lets dive in!
So What Are Mycotoxins?
First let’s back up a minute to get “up to swing” for those who have not been following this topic. We will try to keep this as “nerd-free” as possible.
So, what the heck is a mycotoxin anyway? Simply put, mycotoxins are fungal poisons. As it relates to foods (and in our discussion coffee), these are chemical poisons secreted by molds (not to be confused with the molds themselves) which are found throughout the environment. While there are many types of these toxins (upwards of 50), the toxic “usual suspects” found in significant levels, and perhaps some of the most studied and tested for are the “Toxic 6”; Aflatoxin, Fumonisin, T-2/HT-2 toxins, DON, Zearalenone and Ochratoxin.
So what do we need to know about these? Let’s answer a few common questions about these poisons that will quickly turn you in to a mycotoxin expert and save you hours upon hours of research …
How common are mycotoxins in the environment?
Common! They can be found pretty much anywhere molds are found, and molds are, well, everywhere throughout the environment. Sadly, much like bacteria and antibiotic resistant super bugs, molds are becoming more abundant, stronger, and naturally more aggressive in the environment (potentially releasing more toxins). This may be due in part to the more aggressive methods in which we try to eradicate them. This is a common theme throughout our history in how we “deal” with and “manage” various kingdoms of life, and this of course is topic for much further discussion and debate. Generally speaking we agree with some of the claims being made on both the prevalence, and increase in both molds and mycotoxins in the environment.
How common are mycotoxins in our food supply?
Fairly common. Since many of our food sources are carbohydrates (sugars), they risk contamination by various species of fungi. These fungi are of course susceptible to produce low to large quantities of secondary metabolites — mycotoxins. Chances are you currently do, or you have in some form or fashion in the past consumed mycotoxins. Hopefully not much though. Thankfully it is a well acknowledged problem globally.
The American Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that 25 percent of the food crops in the world are contaminated by mycotoxins. This is a hard to combat problem, but there are of course choices you can make in your diet and lifestyle to help minimize the mycotoxin load your body gets exposed to. Again this can be a big and interesting topic for further discussion.
How bad are mycotoxins really for us?
BAD! Although this is a tough question to answer because in our research we have found there to be quite a significant and extreme variance. This really ranges from harmless — to severely terrible, and utterly NASTY, capable of causing chronic disease and even death (sorry … if you’re a hypochondriac).
Aflatoxin is reported by many researchers to be one of the most cancerous chemicals known to man, that of which is found in nature. These can be terrible health damaging toxins to be exposed to in smaller doses over prolonged periods of time, and lethal in higher concentrations over a shorter period of time.
Because of their pharmacological activity, some fungal produced mycotoxins or mycotoxin derivatives are so powerful they have made their way in to the pharmaceutical industry (and even biological weapons — see mycotoxin bioterrorism section here).
Many of these chemical toxins are incredibly harmful to other species and micro-organisms such as other fungi and even bacteria (hence the birth of some antibiotics like Penicillin). They have also given way to strange growth promotants, and other kinds of drugs like Ergotamine, an anti-migraine drug that can also be used to synthesize the hallucinogen LSD. It has been suggested that mycotoxins in stored animal feed are the cause of rare phenotypical disorders such as sex changes in hens that causes them to look and act male.
In humans, mold itself can grow in and on human tissues and cavities causing enough problems alone, but the mycotoxins they secret can be responsible for causing much more severe chronic systemic poisoning.
The war that humans often wage on mold is only one side of the coin. This is because the mycotoxins FROM the molds can carry on long after the mold is gone as they greatly resist decomposition or being broken down in the environment or by digestion (and most other processes). This means that they remain INTACT throughout multiple levels of the food chain, especially in meat and dairy products. So bioaccumulation of the toxins can occur from being eaten directly by humans or via livestock feed in other animals that we consume, long after the mold has been killed or removed.
Bottom line here is that these are nasty! We again agree with these claims that mycotoxins = no bueno! You want to limit your exposure to these as much as possible. Get these out of your diet (and out of your home — if you have mold in your home). Mycotoxins are carcinogenic, genotoxic agents that can produce cancer, shut down your liver, and wreck your DNA. Not good! But much like anything, the devil is in the details and the real danger is in the dose and your exposure over time. Once you realize this and understand your exposure risks they become much less scary (hypochondriacs … sigh of relief!).
Which foods carry the highest risk of containing mycotoxins?
Grains are the biggest. If you consume large amounts of grain, or grain-fed animal products (which get the lowest grade feed), there is a high chance you are already being routinely exposed because mold infestation and mycotoxin contamination is highest in the global grain supply and animal feed supply.
Here is a list of some of the foods with the highest contamination rates of mycotoxins.
1. Corn (one of the worst)
2. Peanuts (the runner up)
3. Booze — wines and beers, sadly are the worst one (booooo!). This is a shame and brings a tear to our eye, but many producers use grains and fruits with high contamination levels producing more than just alcohol as the “by product”
4. Cottonseed oil
5. Rye
6. Barley
7. Wheat
8. Sorghums
9. Hard and moldy (blue) cheeses
10. Rice
11. Soybeans
12. Raisins
13. Coconut oil
It may be wise for the health conscious individual to lower your exposure to these types of foods if you are a heavy consumer of low-grade versions of these, or better yet just try when possible to seek out providers who take more care in the quality of their product. Generally speaking (but not always of course) “craft” or “specialty” is often better than “mass commodity” (quality over quantity is usually the better choice). Example: buying organic heirloom corn from a local producer who grows his product with love and TLC is likely better than buying mass commodity grown gmo corn (which can come from over 1000 different farms/sources and grown under hugely different conditions from one farm to another).
OK, congratulations, you are now a quasi-expert on mycotoxins!
The web is full of excellent data on mycotoxins for those who want to carry on down the rabbit hole. Mycotoxins have been widely studied since 1962 after the mysterious death of 100,000 turkeys who died from eating peanut-meal contaminated with aflatoxins (what a waste!)
Is It True the North Americans Consume More Mycotoxins In Their Diet Than Europeans?
This has been another claim being made recently that we wanted to know more about. According to some recent research from Biomin (one of the longest running and most comprehensive surveys of its kind, which tested more than eight thousand samples taken from 75 countries worldwide in 2015 alone) North America does unfortunately appear to have higher mycotoxin exposure risk than many other parts of the world, including our European friends.
This has challenges in interpretation as different mycotoxin risks are found in different jurisdictions, and different biogeoclimatic zones in each region, and there is of course no isolated data for coffee consumption from the study.
Additionally, different jurisdictions test for different toxins however and also permit different levels of these. The USA for example tests for more types of mycotoxins, but has lower acceptance policies. The EU has more strict qualification guidelines, but tests for less types of toxins.
The problem here is that it is widely acknowledged that the complete elimination of any natural toxicant from foods is an unattainable objective.
Therefore, most naturally occurring toxins like mycotoxins are regulated quite differently from food additives. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the European Union, the Institute of Public Health in Japan, and many other governmental agencies around the world test products for aflatoxins and other mycotoxins and have established guidelines for safe doses, but there is a desperately lacking NEED for worldwide harmonization of mycotoxin regulations.
The United States uses one set of guidelines, the European Union uses another, and Japan yet another, and many other global guidelines have also been developed. Unfortunately, sometimes the regulatory community may have set limits a long time ago, based more on available analytical capabilities at the time (which have been outdated by more advanced analytical methods in recent years) than on realistic health factors.
So to summarize on this point, we again must agree with some of these claims being made that the risk of mycotoxin exposure may be higher in North America than in other places in the world (with no direct link to coffee being more predominant than other foods).
However we DON’T agree with some of the outlandish claims that North Americans buy dirty coffee from Europeans (for pennies on the dollar) that could not pass European “clean coffee standards”, simply as there is zero data to our knowledge to support that.
In fact it is very rare for North Americans to buy coffee from Europeans at all! Coffee is not grown in Europe, and there are tons of coffee brokers, merchants, and distributors in North America sourcing and selling high quality and sustainable coffees, thus negating the need to purchase coffee from Europe, really ever.
We feel strongly from our research though, that the testing policies and tolerance standards in most countries is ripe for updating, and should certainly be reviewed and updated (and matched) among all countries. This would be ideal for global public health in our view.
Ok, So How Common Are Mycotoxins Actually In COFFEE?
Now we are getting in to the good stuff.
The answer to this question, is really a mixed bag (pun intended). Our strong suspicion based on available data, as well as our time lab testing coffees in search for the perfect cup, leads us to believe that some people may be drinking poor quality MOLDY coffee, and that some may be indeed consuming mycotoxins (in unknown quantities) as a result.
But on the flip side, we feel that more people are drinking perfectly fine (and delicious) high quality, health enhancing coffee as well. Again it’s always important to look closely at the data, and be careful not to cherry pick it, or pull conclusions from it incorrectly.
It turns out this has been studied somewhat significantly, at least in the past. Most people point to a few classic studies, but we have spent countless hours researching this and have dug up the most complete “rap sheet” we could find. Here it is….
1.) Incidence of microflora and of ochratoxin A in green coffee beans (Coffea arabica).
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14726276
2.) The occurrence of ochratoxin A in coffee.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7759018
3.) A study of the contamination by ochratoxin A of green and roasted coffee beans.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2721782
4.) A study of the contamination by ochratoxin A of green and roasted coffee beans.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/248997492_Survey_of_Aflatoxin_B1_and_Ochratoxin_A_in_commercial_Green_Coffee_Beans_by_HPLC_Linked_with_Immunoaffinity_Chromatography
5.) Determination and survey of ochratoxin A in wheat, barley, and coffee — 1997.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10028675
6.) Screening on the occurrence of ochratoxin A in green coffee beans of different origins and types.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10956159
7.) The source of ochratoxin A in Brazilian coffee and its formation in relation to processing methods.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12568757
8.) Commercial Coffees Tested in Spain exceed European Tolerances for Mycotoxins — University of Valencia
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/10/151028124003.htm
So what can we take home from these studies?
There are a few key points we can summarize from these…
· Mycotoxins have certainly been found in coffees, in low to high levels. Low discoveries have been around 10% of tested samples and high discoveries around 90%.
· The most widely studied and tested mycotoxin in coffee has been Ochratoxin A
· Most of these studies are 13 to 29 years old (with the exception of the recent Spanish study mentioned above in #8 — interestingly which sailed through Europe’s “higher standard” of testing protocol — undetected).
· Most of the tests were on general store grade coffee of unknown (or unrecorded) origin, or mixed Robusta/Arabica general Brazilian “commodity coffee”.
· The highest/extreme rates were found in coffees from Central Africa (such as Congo).
With a deep understanding of the coffee industry, many of these findings are not very shocking to us. As many of these studies are old, there have been quite a few advances in both processing, transporting, and storing coffee since they were conducted which now strongly helps to mitigate against mold formation on foods, and thus mycotoxin secretion.
Further the bulk of these studies have been conducted on general “commodity grade” coffee (CME Globex ticker symbol KT / ICE ticker symbol KC) of unknown origin.
Basically this means it can come from anywhere, and the growing/processing details are typically unknown or highly mixed. These processes do not really matter with commodity coffee. Unlike you and I who are coffee aficionados (just a fancy word for a snob) who care about ALL the details of our coffee. Whereas with commodity coffee, while there certainly are quality standards of various measurement involved in the sale and purchase of it, the main metric of value is weight.
Just a side note here for those who may not know — coffee is a massively traded soft commodity, and the second most widely traded (and sought-after) commodity in the world — second only to crude oil (you can see we have a fetish for “black liquid things”). The commodity coffee market is worth over $100 billion worldwide, yet 4 companies buy approximately half of all the commodity coffee — Nestle, Proctor & Gamble, Sara Lee, and Kraft). Commodity coffee consists of “most coffees” and while there are some delicious coffees found therein, this also includes lots of old, stale general grocery store coffee you buy on the shelf, to the day old liquid sludge you find at many gas stations. It is general coffee that most people drown with milk and sugar. This is typically not the craft/specialty coffee market.
The other studies were conducted on Brazilian coffee. Again, Brazil is the largest producer of commodity coffee in the world, and actually ends up largely dictating the global commodity price. Droughts in Brazil directly cause global price fluctuations among speculators.
Being the world’s biggest producer and exporter of commodity coffee they are also a major producer of the Robusta coffee bean, which is used in most of the cheaper pre-ground blends and instant coffee varieties. Indonesia and Vietnam are the other big producers for lower quality Robusta beans and commodity grade coffee.
The point here is that we aren’t surprised that these were the coffees selected for tests (they are the most common and most widely drank coffees around the world), and likewise we are not surprised that these are the coffees that tested the heaviest for mycotoxins (we general advise against drinking standard Robusta commodity grade shelf coffees. Not only do you increase risk of mycotoxin consumption — but a lot of them taste bad!)
So… (Drumroll) What Were The Results of Our Lab Tests?
As part of our ongoing research and experiment we needed some reliable and meaningful data of our own, and wanted to test some coffee. We engaged the services of a specialty agricultural laboratory in Canada (familiar with mycotoxin testing and using the latest state of the art equipment). We had them conduct a mold count and full panel mycotoxin test (which we are happy to share transparently with anyone interested). We conducted the test on 3 of our favorite specialty coffees (based on 2 months of cupping) from micro lot farms we know in Kenya, Colombia, and Mexico. The results?
1.) Each coffee contained a minute trace amount of mold spore. The Mexican the lowest, the Colombian a slight bit more, and the Kenyan the highest, which according to our lab consult, this is common for the instrumentation to detect this and is completely trivial. Still the Mexican and Colombian were the cleanest and had almost negligible traces, whereas the Kenyan had a bit more (which we speculate on below).
2.) None of the coffees contained any detectable levels of mycotoxins above what the laboratory equipment could measure. This was the panel result for each:
What Did We Learn From Our Testing and Our Research?
These results alleviated many of our fears we had originally had around potentially drinking dangerous toxins in our morning cup of bliss. While we feel one shouldn’t necessarily turn a blind eye on the subject, we feel strongly that drinking highly quality specialty coffee presents very little risk to those concerned about ingesting mycotoxins.
We also learned that anyone can quite easily test their coffee. It will run you a few thousand for a handful of tests, but if you are like us and want data to back up your assumptions and help sift through the noise, then this is certainly within reach of any one to do.
Here are a few other take homes from our research…
· We learned that as per many older studies, some coffees we had hoped to be good, actually did in fact test for low levels of mycotoxins. Yet most tested for undetectable amounts, most of the studies were old, and most were on mass commodity coffee.
· We learned that quite a few coffees tested negative for mycotoxins, but some still tested positive for high to very high mold counts. This is not as bad as having mycotoxins, but still not ideal, as who wants to drink a cup of coffee full of dead mold? (Since it dies in the roasting process.)
· We learned that roasting does not necessarily kill mycotoxins (the data in some of the studies above shows that it may, or may not, and does sometimes and doesn’t other times), but it does undeniably kill mold. So when lab testing, it is always important to test the raw GREEN bean first, right before roasting (at the end of its journey). This means that it makes much less sense to lab test roasted or brewed coffee. Thus, you can have a cup of brewed coffee that is free of mycotoxins, yet full of dead mold (from roasting). This we feel is a quite common.
· Just because your coffee does not test positive for molds, or mycotoxins, doesn’t mean it is clean. It can still of course have other impurities such as heavy metals, pollutants, and/or other contaminants in it (discussion for another post).
· We learned that there are many great labs out there who are experienced with testing for mycotoxins. While it is not cheap per se, it’s not that bad and it is not nearly as difficult as one is led to believe.
· Separate to most of this testing, we learned that while certifications such as organic, fair trade, ethical sourced, rain forest alliance, etc etc… all have unique benefits, they are not a guarantee of purity. One of the most sustainably impactful types of coffee in our view is “shade grown coffee”.
· That unless you test every bean, it is impossible to have 100% assurances of no mycotoxins. Even in a single grainpro bag, you can have “pockets” of molds or toxins in one section vs the other. If you test from the top, you could have toxins in the bottom. You can have one bag contaminated and another perfectly clean from the same source. There is no guarantee nor exact science. The best that one can do is test some and identify your top farms, continually test, and stick with those that you find to be continually clean, trusted, (and delicious).
So How Can I Reduce My Risk of Drinking Mycotoxins in Coffee?
The first and easiest way would be to buy your coffee from sources who your trust, or that you know test and who will transparency share their tests with you (i.e., they know from data, and aren’t guessing). The problem is most coffee shops do not test for this as they are not overly concerned about it.
If you do not have easy access to this, there are a few things you can look to with regards to the type and source of coffee you are purchasing. It simply requires you to be a conscious consumer of your coffee, just as you would with any other food you buy.
This is of course no panacea to holy grail cups of coffee, but merely our opinion based on our research as to reducing your chances of mycotoxin exposure in coffee. Here is a list to help guide you.
1.) Try to buy these types of coffee: single origin, micro-lot, “specialty”, local-cooperative, single estate, or even single FARM coffees.
There is a lot of jargon tossed around, but generally this means smaller scale, specialty sources vs. mass commodity. Think of it as buying a prime tenderloin from a local small scale family rancher vs. a mass factory farm CAFO operation. Mass commodity coffee, and big geographic blends, almost guarantee you are getting a “mixed bag” in terms of quality, processing, storage, travel, and types of coffee, hence increasing your odds of getting some lower quality and (potentially toxin containing) coffees in the mix. Reverse this and you stack the odds in your favor of getting good high quality clean coffee grown and processed with TLC.
2.) Try not to buy “blends”, even if specialty coffee.
This is a tough one for some seasoned coffee drinkers to buy in to, but in our opinion, it is for the same reason as above. The more you mix your coffee, the higher your odds are of getting lesser grades and/or more contamination. If you find a good and clean source, don’t mix in unknown variables. Leave it alone and enjoy it! Contrary to popular belief, blends to not necessarily improve taste. It’s often (but not always) more of a marketing gimic to “mask” low grade bitter robusta or high chlorogenic acid coffees. Modifying roasts and brewing processes is a much better approach to change up flavor profiles in our view.
3.) Buy 100% Arabica coffees (not Robusta) grown at higher elevation, and/or those on the outer fringes (the northern and southern parts) of the “bean belt”.
While this does not guarantee anything per se either, it is generally a good formula one can use to increase odds of buying high quality coffee for both taste, and with a lower chance of mold development. Molds are less abundant in cooler climates, drier regions, and higher elevations (coffees are stronger and hardy in these biogeoclimatic zones and get better flavors too — resulting in a win-win).
4.) Buy wet and/or mechanical processed and properly dried and stored coffees.
Basically growers who handle their product with care. This one is important, and not easy to verify. However these factors can have such a critical result on the quality and taste of coffee. Again these do not give any guarantees, but the wet and mechanical coffee cherry processing methods and pulping may help prevent mold formation more than the natural washing methods.
Likewise the drying, parchment, and storage/transport methods are critical to mold formations and taste! The drying process reduces the organic content of the seed (essential for flavor development during roasting), so over-drying can be death’s kiss to cup quality, while under drying can set a potential stage for mold + toxins during its transport time.
This is where farm and production experience and reputation in terms of coffee quality and integrity largely come in to play. The good news is specialty coffee producers are becoming more and more aware of this. Some specialty growers are obsessed with cupping quality and dial in every stage of producing the bean from growing to processing to packaging. These types of farms pay more attention to this again vs. commodity grade coffee who’s primary measuring stick is simply weight and volume.
5.) Choose Caffeine over Decaf.
Almost universally in all tests decaf tests higher for mycotoxins than caffeinated coffee. This is because caffeine naturally inhibits the growth of molds. We realize some are sensitive to caffeine yet still enjoy the taste of coffee. Drinking cleaner coffees, Arabica beans (which have less caffeine) and more importantly LOW ACID coffees (with less chlorogenic acid) can often open up a new world to “caffeine sensitive” coffee drinkers.
The decaf process in general, whether Swiss or not, does not add any benefit (health or taste). The less processing of a food, the better. But on a personal note, why bother? This to us is like drinking alcohol free beer. We love the taste of good coffee AND enjoy the mild buzz you get from it. The buzz is the true cherry on top ;).
We equate this to people consuming large amounts of diet soda. The intention is good, but there is strong emerging evidence that many of the artificial sweeteners used wreak more havoc than even the high sugar content. A better approach would be a higher quality source of a similar beverage, with better natural ingredients, less processing, and then simply used in a tolerable moderation.
6.) Buy coffees close to where you live, so they travel less to get to you (*important).
This was a big discovery for us! In our tests the further coffees traveled the more molds they tested for. If you live in North America, buy Central American coffees, or those just below (like Colombia). If you live in Asia, buy Asian ones. Look, we get that “variety is the spice of life”. So don’t be scared of mixing up your regions from time to time and trying new coffees. But keep in mind the longer the journey your coffee has to get to you, the greater the transit time, and the higher the chance it will have to “sweat” due to different temperature fluctuations and travel conditions (think hot and cold, dry and humid etc…), and the greater odds there are for mold to develop. It does not take much for even a tiny amount of mold spores to explode during multiple modes of transportation and environments.
Not only this, but buying closer to home has a much smaller carbon footprint! North Americans buying coffees from East Africa — often means that these transit down the Indian Ocean, around the southern tip of South Africa (The Cape of Good Hope), and then across both the South and North Atlantic oceans before hitting land again. Then the land journey begins. This is an enormous distance for these little beans to travel! Contrast that to the fact that it is possible for Mexican coffees to arrive by truck to major North American hubs in as little as 24 hours.
Putting It All Together
We feel that the key to enjoying a good cup of coffee, is simply educating yourself about coffee, becoming a conscious consumer, and deciding what is most important to you (transparency, mission, cost, taste, all, or some of the above etc…). Try to find a good reputable coffee supplier who you like and trust, and who sources excellent beans from sustainable farms.
Understanding these few key elements can have a huge lasting impact on how coffee fits in to your life by helping to ensure you are drinking high quality health promoting coffee that tastes great without having to live in fear or buy in to a monopoly based on potentially false claims or fear mongering with zero transparency.
Drink Good Coffee, Feel Great, and Live Longer
Remember that even despite some of these concerns, according to most studies the benefits of drinking coffee (lets assume that it is high quality and clean coffee of course) still far outweigh the negatives and new data keeps pouring in to support this! How awesome is that?
In a brand new observational study involving nearly 20,000 people, those who consumed up to 4 or more cups of coffee daily had a 64% lower risk of early death compared to those who never or rarely consumed coffee. The reduction in risk was even more substantial once people reached the ripe age of 45. So no need to cut this habit as we age, as it may be even more beneficial to consume coffee as we grow old.
These findings reinforce the recent results of another large observational study funded by the National Cancer Institute which found that coffee drinkers simply live longer.
Is there some kind of magic fountain of youth in these beans? Well, as much as it sometimes feels like that this mainly boils down to coffee beans having unique antioxidants and beneficial acids. Coffee has been proven to help reduce the risk of many diseases, including type 2 diabetes, liver disease, colorectal cancer, Alzheimer’s and even skin cancer, while many of the compounds commonly found in coffee have been related to better insulin sensitivity, liver function and reduced chronic inflammation.
However one of our hunches is that a deep rich flavorful morning cup of coffee is so delicious, therapeutic, relaxing, and brings so much pleasure, that it simply showers us in pure “feel good” bliss. Throw in a morning routine, a nice view, or good company of friends and family to enjoy this with, and this only gets magnified.
Much like many have speculated that the sheer anticipation, joy, happiness, fun, and satisfaction that a young child gets from having an ice cream on a hot day creates such a strong a biochemical cocktail of happiness hormones like endorphins and serotonin that it may actually supersede the negatives associated from the sugar consumption and insulin responses, we feel something similar is happening with that magical cup of morning coffee.
For many people the world over, this is their start to a fantastic day, or an awakening of their taste buds and senses, or their brief moment of peace and tranquility in an often busy and hectic world.
Either way, we all know that coffee is one of those simply pleasures of life so don’t live in fear over the mycotoxin subject. We … stressed over it, researched it, tested it, and have come full circle to a place of appreciation and no fear at all. Life is simply too short to fret over mycotoxins. There are much more scary things out there to be afraid of such as you know, Hippopoto-monstro-sesquippedaliophobia (the clinical fear of very long words).
Bottom line, like all aspects of a healthy lifestyle and health strategy, simply try your best to stack the odds in your favor of reducing potential exposure to ALL types of toxins in both the foods you eat and the drinks you drink, and get out there and enjoy your favorite cup of mojo!
