El Residente
12 Musings from the Golden Gringo by Bob Normand
Costa Rican Coffee: How Do I Love Thee; Let me Count the Ways Editor’s Note: This article was previously published in the Golden Gringo Chronicles in March 2020. It is reprinted here with permission.
I
f you're as old as me (or, now that I think of it, even considerably younger) you remember the 1960s, 70s and 80s when nutritionists and the medical industry regularly bad-mouthed coffee. How times have changed. Now we find coffee being virtually touted as a health food, or at least containing some ingredients that are aids to good health.
Before anyone starts hurdling epithets at me for praising coffee, let me assure you I know that caffeinebased coffee is not for everyone, particularly those with higher blood pressure or those who may be prone to anxiety and/or insomnia. For most of us though, the caffeine in coffee is a mild and useful stimulant and can
be thought of as the most commonly used psychoactive drug in the world. Coffee also contains a "suite of antioxidants" that can provide various benefits.
In recent, i.e., the last two decades, studies, numerous results indicate that the ingredients in coffee can indeed help certain health problems. Almost five years ago I put together a summary on the evolving understanding of the benefits of coffee. These include a lower chance of contracting Type II diabetes (although I developed it anyway), a lower chance of stroke when used in conjunction with green tea, better long-term memory (I forget what they said about short term memory), a lower incidence of certain types of cancer, and it has