SHAKIN' IT UP; STUDY SHOWS HEALTHY WAY TO MAKE MARTINI.

Byline: Emma Ross Associated Press

Perhaps James Bond's apparent vibrant health has something to do with the way the suave secret agent takes his martinis shaken, not stirred.

Canadian researchers report in this week's issue of the British Medical Journal that martinis have more antioxidant power when shaken.

Studies indicate antioxidants can help fight diseases such as cancer and heart disease by offsetting the harm oxygen does to cells as people age.

In the martini study, scientists from the University of Western Ontario tested seven shaken martinis, six stirred martinis and five martinis with air bubbled through them.

They added hydrogen peroxide to the drinks prepared traditionally with two parts gin to one part vermouth  to simulate oxygen's action in the body, and investigated how each drink reacted with the chemical.

The martini's signature olive, which contains the antioxidant vitamin E, was not included in the study.

Shaken martinis were twice as good at neutralizing the chemical than the stirred mixtures, the researchers found. Bubbling air through the mixture gave results similar to shaken martinis, which indicated it is probably not the aeration from vigorous shaking that brings the benefit, they said.

The scientists said they didn't know why shaken martinis are superior antioxidants to the stirred variety, and simply concluded that ``007's profound state of health may be due, at least in part, to compliant bartenders.''

Beckie Moore, a nutritionist at the Medical Research Council's Human Nutrition Research unit at Cambridge University, said that while the martini seems to have worked as an antioxidant, it contains minimal amounts of the disease-fighting compounds.

``We suggest James Bond go for the fruits and vegetables,'' she said.