Anti-thiamine Factor In Coffee

[messtafarian]

I've been reading a lot about thiamine and I came across some interesting conflicting statements. One -- that coffee has an anti-thiamin factor in it, binds to b1 and makes it hard for the body to use. However I've also read RP stating that coffee contains both magnesium and thiamine. I looked online at various databases and found one site that stated that coffee had ZERO thiamine in it. The same site also said that the same cup of coffee had two percent of the daily RDA for thiamine. (?)

Is there any other source of information about this? I've had an awful lot of coffee over the past couple years...

 

[Such_Saturation]

Do not take thiamine with coffee.

 

[oxidation_is_normal]

Why do you answer as if you're some kind of authority, S_S?

 

[Such_Saturation]

I don't know it seemed like a logical conclusion. Have you checked Pubmed as well as extremely similar threads of the past?

 

[pboy]

hes part of the SS

 

[messtafarian]

Yes, I've checked a lot of places. There is one study " anti-thiamine effect of coffee" from 1976. There's also just a bunch of articles ( not studies) about thiamine saying that coffee binds to thiamine. Why would Peat say coffee was a source of thiamine if it wasn't?

 

[Such_Saturation]

ANTITHIAMINS OF PLANT ORIGIN: THEIR CHEMICAL NATURE AND MODE OF ACTION

Thiamine absorption in the rat. IV. Effects of caffeic acid (3,4-dihydroxycinnamic acid) upon absorption and active transport of thiamine.

Antithiamin Activity of Polyphenolic Antioxidants

Evidence against the reported antithiamine effect of caffeic and chlorogenic acids.

The alleged antithiamine activity of o-diphenols: an artefact of oxygen in the thiochrome method?

Here is the rest of the evidence. Frankly I don't doubt that at some point or another Ray Peat's instinct of not overly thinking that particular piece of advice will pay off, and perhaps these effects will be found to be meaningless, or the coffee to be a source in some different manner. However for now I will not trust coffee to be a source of either magnesium, niacin or thiamine. You are free to examine all of that, but personally I have bigger problems than having to separate my coffee consumption from my vitamin B consumption.

 

[messtafarian]

It only becomes an issue SS when you think you are getting enough of something and you might not be. Thiamine deficiency can actually be deadly and it's implicated in several chronic illnesses. I'm just trying to make sure there really was such a massive oversight in Ray's recommendations. I don't want it to be true; I want to believe I've been getting enough thiamine somehow all along.

If cheese or milk are your main source of calories, and you are drinking coffee and eating plain sugar/drinking cokes, eating ice cream for energy, you might not be getting enough, especially if you have malabsorption issues.

It's not a problem, unless it's a problem. Then it's a problem. Yanno?

:) Thanks for the docs.

 

[Such_Saturation]

It's your choice friend, but believe me you will notice (if) you were lacking the day you take a big gulp of thiamine hydrochloride.

 

[messtafarian]

It didn't do much except give me a couple of serious episodes of hypoglycemia. Then later I tried benfotiamine and felt *something*, an increase of clarity. High dose b1 over several days made sweat and stare into space. It also helped my digestion somewhat, I think.

Regardless, every time with high b supplementation I lose potassium by the bucketful.

 

[Such_Saturation]

Then you're probably deficient viewtopic.php?f=36&t=3942&

 

[messtafarian]

Pretty likely. That's why I was trying to figure out the coffee thing.

 

[mt_dreams]

if you're drinking a couple of glasses of oj everyday, there's a decent amount of B1. I get 75% of the rda of B1 in 850 ml of oj.

 

[messtafarian]

I never drank OJ -- in fact I could not handle either OJ or milk and I finally decided I could not handle gelatin either.

But even if you drink OJ -- 75 percent of RDA if you are also ingesting a thiamine-breaker in the form of coffee, especially, is probably not enough.

Additionally the "safe starches" do not have thiamine unless they are fortified by the Western Food Powers. If people are choosing "gluten free" safe starches they are probably not getting enough b vitamins there either. Without nuts or seeds as an additional protein source, or whole grains - I can't see where adequate thiamine is coming from, eating according to these guidelines.

 

[jjhotcakes]

From what I've read, coffee and tea both have substances that bind with thiamine in the digestive system. They shouldn't deplete thiamine, but there is a possibility that dietary thiamine taken with coffee may not be absorbed well. So, as was mentioned, taking supplemental thiamine away from coffee would be sensible.

I don't think there's any reason to be concerned about it, however, at least unless you happen to have a serious pre-existing deficiency or some metabolic problem that causes a reduction in absorption or an increased need for thiamine, and even then, it's not clear that coffee would be problematic. From the research I've done into the matter over the years, the mention of thiamine binding is theoretical, but practically there are no reported cases of thiamine deficiency as a result of coffee consumption. The only reported case I have come across of thiamine deficiency also associated with high intake of thiamine binding substances was from an east Asian community that consumed huge amounts of tea AND relied on white rice as their staple food. Since beriberi is known to be associated with high reliance on white rice as a staple, I rather doubt that tea was a causative factor anyway.

 

[cantstoppeating]

From what I've read, coffee and tea both have substances that bind with thiamine in the digestive system. They shouldn't deplete thiamine, but there is a possibility that dietary thiamine taken with coffee may not be absorbed well. So, as was mentioned, taking supplemental thiamine away from coffee would be sensible.

...

If you still have the source, can you share the info about coffee binding with thiamine in the digestive system?

I remember reading one of Peat's articles (or perhaps an audio interview) where he talked about taking high doses of B1 and caffeine before a study session of memorizing french vocabulary for an exam and consequently scoring very well.

 

[somuch4food]

I have found this website: Thiamine Deficiency and its Prevention and Control in Major Emergencies: Factors influencing content and utilization of thiamine in foods: Anti-thiamine factors that mentions ascorbic acid mainly, but also citric acid and tartaric acid with the meal does counter the antithiamin factor of polyphenols and flavonoids.

 

[belcanto]

How far apart do you think we'd need to keep the thiamine from the coffee?