Many people forbid anyone from speaking to them before they put a cup of coffee in their body every morning, and almost all of us start the day with one.
Happily, drinking coffee has some proven health benefits: Improving memory and alertness, and even contributing to a longer lifespan because it has powerful antioxidants.
But wait, before you rush to make yourself another cup, remember that adding sugar or regular milk lessens coffee’s health benefits.
And, of course, iced coffee, which is mostly sugar and milk, just adds fat to your diet and there aren’t any benefits from the small amount of coffee.
The conclusion is that drinking coffee can be healthy or not, depending on how you drink it. And just as sugar and artificial flavorings turn coffee into a dessert, some ingredients ensure that your coffee is healthy.
Replace sugar with cinnamon. Scattering a little of this spice in your coffee can greatly help speed up your metabolism.
Adding a little cinnamon to a cup of coffee will help your body burn fat faster, according to a new study from the University of Michigan Life Sciences Institute.
The researchers exposed samples of human fat cells to a substance called cinnamaldehyde, the substance that gives cinnamon its unique taste and smell, and saw that the cells began to produce more genes and enzymes that caused them to burn fat instead of storing it.
Although at this stage the study can’t say how much weight you’ll lose if you switch from sugar to cinnamon, researchers have shown that it boosts the body’s metabolism.
In future studies they hope to prove how much people will benefit from foregoing all sugar, sweeteners and flavorings in favor of hot milk and cinnamon.