I’ll bet you had a lot of hits on your chocolate health benefits story. My survey of the news spin cycles finds that the three that always make health claims are chocolate, red wine and coffee. Decades ago, it was claimed smoking was good for you because it “exercised” your lungs. Tomorrow they’ll be claiming oil-flavored seafood caught in the Gulf of Mexico is good for you because you can get more gas in your engine. Pl ... Jump to full article >>

If you shudder at the thought of having to start the day without a cup of coffee, new research hints at why you may feel this way. Regular coffee drinkers seem to need caffeine to return to their normal state of alertness and to avoid the side effects of caffeine withdrawal such as headaches. That runs counter to popular belief that drinking caffeinated beverages offers some added boost in alertness, the researchers said. “Although caffeine c ... Jump to full article >>

Good news for javaholics: A new review suggests that caffeine consumption can help night-shift workers avoid making mistakes. At least 15 percent of workers in industrialized countries are thought to be engaged in shift work or permanent nighttime work, which can disrupt their body clocks. Some suffer from shift-work disorder, in which they only sleep for short periods of time and become sleepy on the job, boosting the risk of errors, the resea ... Jump to full article >>

For millions of coffee-lovers with delicate stomachs, scientists may have found a way to enjoy an eye-opening cup of java without gastrointestinal discomfort. European researchers studying stomach-irritating chemicals in coffee have unexpectedly found one that actually inhibits acid production in the stomach. “The major import of our work is that it provides scientific evidence that you can produce a more stomach-friendly coffee by varying th ... Jump to full article >>