Coffee is one of the most ingested beverages, it is heavily integrated into our Western lives. Coffee is a herb, did you know that? Our dear friend coffee is actually a very complex beverage; it contains hundreds of biologically active compounds. Fun fact: one of these powerful herbal constituents are the diterpenes, these esters give coffee its bitter taste. Now for those playing at home, you might remember that reishi is also super bitter and its due to part of the same family, the triterpenes!
I digress.
The way we see it, if you’re going to include a herb like coffee in your diet... make sure your liver and kidneys can handle it. Let's help support your adrenal health, by simply adding tonic herbs to your coffee! One way to do that is by adding tonic herbs to your coffee to balance out the taxing and over-stimulating effect of the caffeine.
Have you ever had those jitters from your coffee? I'm actually quite sensitive to coffee I have realised (all those years of espresso martinis have maybe caught up with me ;P) and generally steer pretty clear nowadays. But, when I do, I make sure of a few things:
1. I am sitting down, enjoying the cup
If you don't have time to sit down and enjoy a cup of coffee and you're just on auto-pilot, getting take away coffees... well, is the coffee for enjoyment, or is it habit? PLUS this removes the need to take away cups. Ever. Because they hurt the environment! No excuses anymore guys to be using single-use takeaway cups...
2. I have fat with it
Apart from the fact that good quality fats are vital for overall health, hormone production and a healthy brain, adding fat to your coffee can have really beneficial effects. Adding fat to your coffee will help your body produce ketones, which means your body can then create energy from fat, rather that carbohydrates. Training your body to get energy from fat, rather than carbohydrates, can be really beneficial for balancing blood sugar and metabolism.
Fat, especially in the AM, will give you sustained energy for the day, more bang for your buck, if you will. Plus, the fat provides a nice buffer for your system against the caffeine rush; it slows the release of the caffeine so you get a sustained release instead of a spike, which means: you can ride the wave in a useful way, rather than the giant drop of high to low. This means you'll still get the nice buzz and stimulation from the coffee, but you won't ex stress outperience the come-down.
3. I have my tonic herbs mixed in (you knew that one was coming!)
We've said it once, we'll say it a hundred times, adding tonic herbs to your coffee is a) another excellent opportunity to incorporate the adaptogens into your day and b) a lovely adrenal, kidney and nervous system support while your body works with the stimulating effects of the caffeine.
Back to those jitters. Let's not get too far down the rabbit-hole of if coffee is 'good' or 'bad' today. Remember coffee is not a tonic herb (need to brush up on tonic herbs?) so it’s not intended for daily use but there's plenty of research out there that suggests the complex constituents within coffee provide several health benefits. It may help prevent some chronic issues, like diabetes and liver disease. And there are certain heterocyclic compounds that lend themselves to beneficial antioxidant activity.
Conversely there are also plenty of articles out there demonstrating some less desirable effects of caffeine on the body and its ability to stay within homeostasis (e.g. remain balanced), things like cardiovascular issues and mental disturbances like anxiety. Those at-risk populations are cautioned to be wary with coffee intake; the elderly, the young and pregnant mummas.
What we *do* know here at SuperFeast is if your body doesn't show obvious signs of distress from drinking coffee and you enjoy it, then darn well enjoy a cup! But we always suggest those three tips: sit down, add fat and herbs.
How do you include SuperFeast in your coffee? While coffee is not necessarily great for your body daily, adding tonic herbs and mushies into the mix can heavily benefit your body and reduce any excessive impact from the coffee. You can add your adaptogens to ANY coffee - short black, long black, mocha, latte, soy dandelion quarter strength decaf sprinkled with unicorn glitter. Whatever your order is. Add your tonic herbs to your brew, it's a beautiful upgrade.
If you're making a coffee at home, just blends or stir in the herbs straight, with all your other ingredients. We have two epic recipes to get you started:
Potent Nootropic Coffee Cafe De MasonCould it be any more simple?!
Ok, you rock up to your local cafe. With your keep cup, of course. Inside your keep cup, you would have already dropped in your tonic herb; 1/4 - 1 teaspoon of your fave herb, we love Neural Nectar, JING, Mason's, but honestly, every one of our herbs work (expect Schizandra / Schisandra, unless you like your coffee tart!)
Get the barista to drop a little bit of hot water on your herbs to dissolve, simply tell them it's like making a mocha, they'll instantly understand. You want to make sure that there are no clumps, we don't want no clumpy tonic herb elixir.
Check out the video below with Mason (SuperFeast founder) at the local cafe.
A note here: at SuperFeast, controlling the dose is key, we're serious about taking mushies and tonic herbs. And we want you having medicinal doses, especially if you're in a rebuilding phase, as you'll need higher doses. This is why all our products are in extract form, not capsules. Powder form allows you to control the dose. Sure, some people like the pre-made satchets and the premixes, but we're all about controlling the dose here at Super Feast. We want your intuition to be at play here, we want you to form your own personal relationship with the herbs.
See how easy it is to turn your every day coffee into a next level adaptogenic coffee elixir *instantly*?
If your barista has their finger on the pulse, they'll be pretty intrigued by your upgrade; by the powder sitting in the bottom of your cup. Once you spread the good word of how these tonic herbs support your adrenals and organ systems, chances are your barista will want in! Get them to call us on 1300 769 500 or email us and we can chat them through adding SuperFeast to their offering :)
We particularly like adding our signature nootropic Neural Nectar blend to our coffee. The herbs certainly don't effect the stimulative effect of your coffee, but rather, they ride off the back of it. By driving their brain-activating herbal magic deeper and, due to the Jing and nervous system toning effect, Neural Nectar stops the coffee from smashing your body and having any harsh come-down or shakes.
Having an array of adaptogenic herbs that work to bring adaptability to the hormonal system and support the adrenals (especially with the inclusion of mucuna, rhodiola and white peony) provide an epic upgrade to your coffee. With immune enhancing properties and brain nourishing factors (hello Lion's Mane), Neural Nectar really helps buffer the stress that the coffee can unload on the body, but you'll still get the stimulation effect, that nice buzz.
Honestly, here at SuperFeast HQ we don’t drink a coffee without tonic herbs because we see this as a yet another chance to deliver our longevity medicine into our system. Whether your choice is Neural Nectar, JING, Mason's, chaga, cordy, shiitake... the list goes on, your body will thank you.
If you're keen to learn more about brain health, join us on Brain Gains - a 21 day adventure, covering tips, research and education around a healthy healthy brain. Sign up here :) Maybe you're looking for an epic nootropic, without the caffeine? Try our delicious Salted Caramel Nootropic Latte here!
Resources
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10408390500400009 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378512213000479
Hear from Mason (founder of SuperFeast) in the below video talking about: the magic of tonic herbs, which herbs you might like to try and how to take the herbs.
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