Coffee and Tea and Blood Sugars

[Admiral Benbow]

Just wondering what you guys think about Coffee and Teas for blood sugar.
A guy in my office just gave me a large coffee from Starbucks and I don't know anything about coffee. Never really drank the stuff, although in my younger years I used to love French vanilla, or English Toffee cappuccinos from Tim Hortons. But it's pretty clear those are filled with sugar and high carbs. However, I enjoyed the coffee he gave me. Not sure if it was caffeinated or decaf. No idea.
But what about coffee? I have no idea. I don't even know how to make it. What do you know about the nutrition of coffee? Is it good or bad, and if you drink it, how often and how much of it do you drink?
I know Teas are generally very low carb like less than a gram, and won't mess up homeostasis that much, but what about coffee. Please discuss if you are informed on this topic.

 

[Inka]

Unless it was a plain black coffee, most Starbucks coffees are full of carbs. I remember once returning one as I thought they’d put sugar in it, but it was just the sweet powdery gloop they added. That was the last Starbucks coffee I had.

For normal coffee, if you have black coffee it’s basically zero carb. The carbs depend on how much milk you have. If you have a dash of cream that’s very low carb. However, some people find that coffee raises their blood sugar despite the lack of carbs. Are you testing your blood sugar?

 

[Admiral Benbow]

Unless it was a plain black coffee, most Starbucks coffees are full of carbs. I remember once returning one as I thought they’d put sugar in it, but it was just the sweet powdery gloop they added. That was the last Starbucks coffee I had.

For normal coffee, if you have black coffee it’s basically zero carb. The carbs depend on how much milk you have. If you have a dash of cream that’s very low carb. However, some people find that coffee raises their blood sugar despite the lack of carbs. Are you testing your blood sugar?

Nope I don't have a meter (yet-I want one though). It looks like it was a caffe misto v, whatever that means. It said (candy 1,steamed milk (1) and syrup 5pc/1PSG. This was all translated from Chinese. Just googling it looks like it had 13 grams of carbs and about 13 grams of sugar. I need to be more careful.

 

[harbottle]

Black coffee has virtually no carbs in it. It's what I mainly drink, and did so before I was diagnosed and haven't put sugar in it for decades. I can't stand those disgusting sugary drinks coffee shops serve (And never have) and get annoyed when I'm stuck in queue waiting for a quick espresso when the staff are spending what seems like hours mucking around with blenders to make a caramel dog poo frappa-something or other for the vacuous teenagers puckering their lips into their phones. Having said that, most coffee shops serve it too hot and burnt and render it undrinkable, and Starbucks coffee is strangely tasteless. It was a huge disappointment when the cafe on the University campus I work on switched from decent Fairtrade coffee to Starbucks and another one switched to Costa, which always tastes a bit like soggy paper to me.

I invested in a 'bean to cup' machine a few years ago and just make my own these days from beans roasted in Lancashire (Wildpen coffee, delicious). As I get free Caffe Nero vouchers with work's healthcare provider (Healthcare provider giving away vouchers for junk food?!?) I don't mind the odd Nero, probably the best of the chains. There's a Tim Hortons opening up here, but I find their places soulless and depressing. Coffee isn't bad, though.

It's easy to make - just have to mess around with the grind size and quantity to get the volume right.

 

[Inka]

Nope I don't have a meter (yet-I want one though). It looks like it was a caffe misto v, whatever that means. It said (candy 1,steamed milk (1) and syrup 5pc/1PSG. This was all translated from Chinese. Just googling it looks like it had 13 grams of carbs and about 13 grams of sugar. I need to be more careful.

I think the Misto is half coffee half hot milk, so a lot of the carbs would have come from the milk, depending on the size of the coffee. The safest bet is something like a Flat White or simply black coffee with a little cream to take the edge off.

 

[harbottle]

Black coffee with double cream... yum! Highly recommended.

 

[Deb_l]

At home I drink tea with soya milk by the gallon and I don't count that at all because soya milk is virtually carb free (the one I buy is 0.1g per 100g).

When I'm out I will often ask for soya milk with tea as most places are very vegan friendly these days and have plenty of milk alternatives.

Now coffee on the other hand: I do like a latte but it's basically a lot of carbs in liquid form. I will treat myself now and again but not very often. What I have been having is black coffee (Americano) with cream. Hardly any carbs and just as tasty as a latte. I have had a soya latte but I've found soya milk doesn't lend itself to coffee very well - that's just my personal taste though.

 

[Bruce Stephens]

I think the Misto is half coffee half hot milk, so a lot of the carbs would have come from the milk, depending on the size of the coffee. The safest bet is something like a Flat White or simply black coffee with a little cream to take the edge off.

The major coffee chains have nutritional info online, and the more common things like Cappuccino aren't too bad (10-15g).

 

[Bruce Stephens]

I don't even know how to make it.

You roast coffee beans (or rather, generally buy roasted coffee beans), then grind them and get the flavour out with hot water. Then filter because coffee grounds aren't so pleasant. (Coffee beans themselves are edible. You can buy chocolate coated ones as a rather caffeinated snack. Sometimes their added to deserts partly for flavour and partly because they're crunchy.)

There are lots of ways of getting coffee grounds into hot water and then out of it. Common ones include drip filters: coffee grounds in a filter in something of a funnel, and you pour nearly boiling water over it and let the water go through; another is espresso where grounds are put in a metal filter and nearly boiling water is pushed through the grounds under pressure.

If you want to try making a few mugs of coffee (real rather than instant coffee) an efficient way to do it is with coffee bags: basically tea bags but with ground coffee in them. Produces decent coffee with no equipment other than a way to boil water. (There are also single-cup filters available doing much the same, but using them involves disposing of quite a bit of plastic which feels wrong to me.)

If you like that, I like Aeropress as a cheap way to produce decent coffee (from ground coffee). Again, just needs hot water.

The carbs come from what's added later, particularly milk (or milk substitutes) and flavoured syrups. (There are, of course, sugar free syrups. I've got a hazelnut I like. But coffee shops aren't likely to have those, so their syrups are quite likely basically honey.)

A sprinkle of chocolate on the top (or cinnamon sugar) is probably small enough to ignore.

Caffeine is a stimulant so may well increase BG. (Or decrease it, I guess, though I'd bet for most people it'll increase.)

 

[barrym]

I like Aeropress as a cheap way to produce decent coffee (from ground coffee). Again, just needs hot water.

I agree. I like the Aeropress for its simplicity and portability.

The ‘ritual’ of making coffee in itself is addictive, always striving for that perfect cup and thinking a different method will always be better.

 

[harbottle]

Aeropress makes a great coffee. I use one at work all the time.