Pass on Bulletproof Coffee

Are you a coffee drinker? I'm not yet I still love the aroma inside a coffee shop and totally understand how this can be a ritual for many people.

Because as with many rituals we can get very particular with the details involved. Some people will only drink coffee from a particular brand. Others need to have the right mix of sweetener and cream. And then there are the purists who just like theirs black.

Regardless of where the coffee is from or how it is flavoured there is one type of coffee you will probably want to take a pass on. And this is Bulletproof Coffee.

Without getting into the whole background of Bulletproof coffee we can tell you this term was coined by Dave Asprey and claims drinking coffee in this way boosts cognitive function and accelerates weight loss.

First it's important to understand there are no studies supporting the claims regarding Bulletproof Coffee are any more effective than regular coffee. As well, Asprey is not a medical researcher, a nutritionist or a dietician. He is a businessman hoping to convince you to spend way more on coffee than is necessary and possibly bad for a few reasons.

What exactly is Bulletproof Coffee? Well to make it you need to buy Bulletproof Coffee beans, some medium chain triglyceride (MCT) oil and some grass-fed butter. 12 ounces of beans and 16 ounces of MCT oil will run you $38 (plus taxes & shipping I assume). And you will need to track down some grass-fed butter.

Once you have your ingredients you add 2 tablespoons of MCT oil, and 2 tablespoons of butter to a cup of coffee and blend until frothy. Some say the consistency is similar to that of a latte, but again not being a coffee drinker I'm not sure on this.

Reason #1 to Pass on Bulletproof Coffee - No Vitamins, Minerals or Fibre
Part of the reason we eat food is to fuel our bodies and to provide the necessary nutrients for metabolism to occur at an optimal rate. Many of the vitamins, minerals and fibre we need to eat daily come from fresh fruits and vegetables.

Proponents of Bulletproof coffee say it can take the place of a regular meal, such as breakfast, and keep you going for hours. While there be some truth to a caffeine surge helping some people get going in the morning this doesn't address the fact that coffee doesn't have any of the nutrition a breakfast with eggs, fruit, vegetables or oatmeal can provide.

Reason #2 to Pass on Bulletproof Coffee - No Fuel
If you are an athlete you understand that carbs fuel your workouts. And when we are carb depleted our performance suffers. It suffers in the way that we cannot sustain as high of an intensity for as long.

Starting the day with coffee, oil and butter is not the recipe leading to success for an athlete (unless your sport is racing to the bathroom). And let's face it, although we may not be competing for championships and trophies our physiology is the same as athletes and we should do likewise if we want to perform well during our workouts, our days at the hill skiing or even going for a run.

Reason #3 to Pass on Bulletproof Coffee - Extra Calories
At the beginning of this post I mentioned that coffee is a ritual for many. For example, during a mid-morning break many people will have some coffee and maybe a bakery item of some type. They enjoy the thought of some water-cooler talk with their colleagues as they sip on a hot cup of coffee and enjoy a bagel, muffin, donut or something else.

But here's the problem.

A regular cup of black coffee has a negligible calorie count. Let's say 10 calories just to put a number on it although this is high. Add creamer and sweetener and this number can be anywhere from 50-100 calories, depending on the types and amounts of each product added.

Bulletproof coffee adds an additional 450 calories to your daily intake.

Compare this to having two poached eggs, a slice of whole grain toast and a cup of black coffee which totals approximately 225 calories. You will basically have doubled the calories consumed by having Bulletproof coffee instead of a more traditional breakfast.

The problem gets worse when you consider very few coffee drinkers are one-cup-a-day people. Two cups per day adds 6300 calories per week or 327,600 calories per year to a nutritional plan. That's a lot of marathons, granfondos, triathlons or whatever exercise you're into to burn that off.

What about the mycotoxins?

One of the purported benefits of drinking Bulletproof coffee is that it has fewer toxins than regular coffee. In particular they are fewer mycotoxins which are basically the molds formed by fungi. One type of mycotoxin is ochratoxin A (OTA) and this is the one that, if we follow the Bulletproof lifestyle, should be eliminated from our daily coffee ritual.

In mice and rats OTA may be a possible carcinogen. In humans the evidence is less clear.

But let's assume the link was there and that it applied to humans as well.

How much coffee are we talking about drinking to put ourselves at risk? Well depending on who you follow this limit could be 1.5 to 14.3 ng/kg/day. A nanogram is one billionth of a gram. In other words this is a pretty small amount. Multiply this by your weight in kgs and you'll know the range of safe limits for daily OTA consumption.

Let's assume we are dealing with a male weighing 85 kg. The range would be 85(1.5) to 85(14.3) or 127.5 to 1215.5 nanograms of OTA per day. If we use 5 ng per cup of coffee this would require an individual to drink almost 250 cups of coffee per day to exceed the safety limit.

Besides coffee, OTA can also be found in pork products, grapes, licorice and some spices such as nutmeg, ginger and paprika. So unless you are prepared to eliminate all foods with OTA it's hard to say how effective Bulletproof coffee would be at ensuring there was none in the diet.

So what's the take home message?

Unless you've got tons of cash to burn and your diet consists solely of pork, licorice and nutmeg you can probably take a pass on Bulletproof coffee. There are better ways to ignite your metabolic furnace and have clear thoughts.

Chris [fb-like]