QUESTION: Please tell me something about the vegetable called kohlrabi. ANSWER: Botanically, kohlrabi (the name derives from the German word for cabbage and the Latin word for turnip) belongs to the cabbage family. Although the leaves are edible, the turnip-like root is usually considered the best part.Nutritionally, a half-cup cooked contains about 40 calories and provides some B vitamins and vitamin C. It is an excellent source of potassium, a useful vegetable for people taking diuretics that cause them to lose that nutrient.
While it can be easily diced and cooked until tender, it can also be braised in broth, whipped with potatoes, served with sauces, stuffed, cooked in soup, or served cold with vinaigrette dressing. Introduced in China from Europe during the 7th century, it appears in various Chinese recipes.
QUESTION: I know that different studies have presented conflicting information about the link between coffee drinking and heart disease. Has anyone checked into whether different brewing methods might be a factor?
ANSWER: Researchers from the Tromso, Norway, heart study recently focused on just that question, using a group of 18,000 men and women between the ages of 20 and 59. They were asked how many cups of coffee they drank each day and what method was used to prepare it. By far the most common method was boiled coffee, a process in which the grounds are in longer contact with the water than in other techniques.
In fact, 8 percent of the subjects drank boiled coffee most or all of the time. Next most popular was filtered coffee, while decaffeinated and instant coffee were used only rarely. Only 7 percent of the men and 9 percent of the women drank no coffee.
The investigators found that serum-cholesterol levels rose significantly with increasing coffee consumption only among those who drank boiled coffee. Indeed, among men who consumed a formidable 9 cups of coffee or more a day, cholesterol concentrations were 11 percent higher than among men who drank none. In women, the difference was 8 percent.
The investigators suggest that differences in brewing methods may help explain the fact that their results differ from those of other groups who have found no effect. They suggest that some unidentified substance in coffee may affect cholesterol levels. In Norway, the combination of high consumption and widespread use of boiled coffee may represent a special case. Indeed, they suggest that in Finland, some of the decline in serum cholesterol may well be attributed to a change in brewing methods since the 1960s.