Benefits of White Tea

I‘ve posted about green tea and black tea, now it’s time to feature white tea and recognize the benefits of drinking it. Do you know that white tea is often considered the oldest form of tea? Made from immature tea leaves, white tea has many varieties, depending on the ratio of leaves to buds that are used in each mixture. Read on to know just some of the benefits of drinking white tea that I’ve gathered.

1. It has anti-cancer properties. White tea has flavonoids, a class of antioxidants that inhibit the growth of cancer cells and prevents development of new ones. Scientists have also found that the white tea extract can protect skin after exposure to sunlight to protect against skin cancer. Studies have shown that white tea is even more effective than green tea when it comes to cancer-fighting properties.

2. It is loaded with antioxidants. Like green tea, white tea is also loaded with antioxidants that protect the body against damage and promotes overall health. White tea has also been found to have prophylactic applications that slow down growth of harmful bacteria. It also contains catechins, a group of antioxidants that can reduce cholesterol.

3. It’s good for relaxation. Well, I think this is the trademark of all teas. They’re great to drink when you want to focus, clear your mind, or simply relax. White tea is no exception.

Care to share more benefits of white tea?

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Black Tea

There has been much fuss all over the globe over the health benefits of green tea. But today let’s talk about the health benefits of another kind of tea: black tea.

Black tea is the type of tea used to make the popular iced teas. However, its purest form is less popular than green tea, which is China’s favorite drink and considered to be one of the most beneficial beverages in the world. Nevertheless, black tea is not to be left behind as it has millions of consumers as well and has its own health benefits to boast of. The following are just a few of these health benefits that I’ve gathered.

1. Black tea can reduce risk of stroke and heart attack. In various studies, it has been found that polyphenols in black tea can block damage associated with tobacco and other toxic chemicals that can lead to cancer, stroke, or heart attack. In fact, black tea is packed with flavonoids which are potent antioxidants that prevent free radical damage and increase good cholesterol in the body. Black tea also improves blood flow by relaxing and expanding arteries.

2. Black tea is good for oral health. Black tea can promote oral health by preventing bad breath and improving the condition of the teeth and gums. How? Polyphenols, one of the components of black tea, has been found to inhibit growth of oral bacteria. Black tea can also help prevent mouth infections like cavities.

3. Black tea can prevent viruses. Researches have shown that black tea can neutralize germs that causes various diseases like diarrhea as well as infections on the skin. This is also why black tea is good for the mouth because drinking the tea can wipe out the viruses in our mouths.

Know more healthy benefits of black tea? 🙂

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Benefits of Chamomile

Chamomile is a great herb often found in Europe and North America. Believed to be the world’s most soothing herb, it is well known for its relaxing properties and is often made into tea. But did you know that drinking chamomile tea can give you a whole lot of other benefits aside from relaxation? Read on to know just what I’ve gathered about this excellent beverage.

1. Stressed because of your period? Having the usual stomach cramps? Drinking chamomile tea may help you as its anti-spasmodic properties makes it a great treatment to various pains like stomach cramps, menstrual cramps, diarrhea, and other stress-related pains. Drinking chamomile tea has also been associated with increase in urinary levels of glycine, an amino acid that relieves muscle spasms and which is also known to be a nerve relaxant.

2. Having a hard time sleeping because of some problems that worry you? Try drinking chamomile tea which is used to relieve anxiety and insomnia.

3. Had a little too much to eat? Is your digestion all messed up? Chamomile can be used to treat bowel inflammation, digestive disorders and heartburn because of its anti-inflammatory properties. It soothes the muscles lining the digestive tract to relieve pain.

4. Suffering from skin and eye problems or bacterial infections? Chamomile has also been found to be a great treatment to skin disorders, sunburns, and eye problems. If you want to relieve tired or puffy eyes, you can soak a wash cloth or cotton on a cool cup of chamomile tea and place the cloth over your eyes a few times a day.

5. Having a bad day? One glass of chamomile tea may be all you need to relax and improve your mood. Studies have shown that not only does chamomile tea relax; it can also lighten up a bad mood.

6. Feeling a bit weak? Not too conditioned lately? Drinking chamomile tea regularly may help you get in your normal top condition as studies have shown that chamomile’s antibacterial properties boost the immune system and fight infections associated with colds.

Care to share your knowledge on chamomile tea?

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Quick Breath Fresheners

Want to freshen your breath after a dinner date but hate to go to the comfort room and keep your special date waiting? Certain herbs, it seems, are specially made for women and men to surreptitiously freshen their breaths after dining.

One such wonder herb that is famous for quick breath freshening is the seemingly useless parsley. Contrary to what some people think that it is just a decorative ingredient, parsley has a high chlorophyll content that diffuses “bad toxins” in the mouth that causes odor. What’s also great about parsley is that it’s easy to chew and doesn’t taste too bad. Parsley can also be dipped in vinegar before chewing and swallowing to double the effect.

Other great remedies to bad breath are cloves with its antiseptic properties and peppermint tea. Actually, taking herbal teas, fruits, and vegetables after a meal of bad breath culprits like cheese, meat and garlic works wonders to tainted breath. Just make sure to chew, eat or drink some greens after your pizza or steak and you’ll be fine.

JASMINE TEA HEALTH BENEFITS

As I promised before when I started talking about the many tea health benefits, I started drinking tea. Yesterday I tried a new combination of mint, green and jasmine tea. It might seem like a weird combination, but it was actually very nice. I personally love it and I still have another tea bag that I’m planning to use very soon.

Since I came to China I noticed that probably one of the most popular teas among Chinese people, besides green tea, is the JASMINE TEA. I remember whenever I used to go to a tea shops someone would offer me jasmine tea saying that is was good for women. At first I didn’t believe it, I thought it was just another kind of marketing, but since I’ve been doing so much research on the tea field, I realized that jasmine tea is actually very good for women’s health. 

Apart from some of the other tea health benefits I’ve mentioned before, JASMINE tea is said to be very beneficial for relaxing and for its anticancer benefits.

Jasmine tea is usually made from green tea leaves that are scented with jasmine flowers. Scented jasmine tea is produced slowly and requires a lot of labor from the farmers. Jasmine flowers are harvested during the day and stored in a cool place during the night together with the other tea leaves. During the night, the flowers bloom its full fragrance and the tea has fully absorbed it. Then the flowers are removed and layered over the tea leaves during the scenting process.

Fresh flowers should be layered on 5 or 6 times to produce high quality jasmine tea, with a long lasting deep fragrance. The best jasmine tea has few or almost no flowers.

The quality of this tea is determined by the quality of green tea used as its base and the effectiveness of the scenting.

As I mentioned before, tea, and jasmine tea among many other teas are very efficient to prevent cancer. While it can’t be considered as a treatment itself, it’s been scientifically proven that jasmine has potent chemo preventive efficacy in experimental mammary carcinogenesis. Other studies are warranted to isolate and characterize the bio-active principle from jasmine. So this might be one of the reasons why the tea shops sellers always advice women to buy jasmine tea.

Jasmine tea’s odor it’s proven to have an effect on automatic nerve activity and mood states. Jasmine tea can cause a significant decrease in heart rate and significant increase in spectral integrated values at high frequency component. Jasmine tea produces calm and vigorous mood states.

As you can see, the jasmine tea benefits are definitely very significant specially for women’s life, so you should drink it 3 to 3 times a week, but the rest of the time you should alternate it with some other different kinds of herbal teas that are usually available in health food stores.

Is always a good idea to alternate different kinds of teas in order to get all the different beneficial substances that other different teas can offer to us.

I personally didn’t know all this benefits of drinking jasmine tea, so if we add to all this the fact that jasmine tea is very tasty, I think I’ll drink it more often.

Some people also say that Jasmine tea also make women beautiful, but I couldn’t find anything about it. If you have some information about it don’t hesitate in share it with us.

Do you know any other JASMINE TEA benefits? 

Some tea recipes

Here’s another very interesting post about tea preparation. Since I started drinking just a few days ago, I had a really hard time figuring how to prepare it. If you are also starting drinking tea for the first time, here are a few recipes, preparation ways that will help you have a nicer experience drinking tea. In the future you might be able to create even more complicated recipes, but this is just perfect for beginners.Lemon tea: This is a very common and easy to make tea that I personally love it.Ingredients-3 cups of water-1 tablespoon loose black tea (or 3 to 4 orange pekoe tea bags)-4 to 8 fresh mint leaves (you can use even more if you like mint)-3 cups ice water of 3 lemons or limes sugar-Honey or sugar (at your consideration)Preparation: Step 1: Boil 3 cups of water and remove from heat when boiling.Step 2: Add the tea leaves and mint leaves.Step 3: Cover the pot for 5 minutes (if you want a stronger flavor you can live it longer)Step 4: Remove tea leaves and mint leavesStep 5: Strain (if you are not using infusers), add sugar or honey as desired.Step 6: Add ice water and lemon or lime juice.Green tea: This is probably the easiest tea to make. In China is very popular in restaurants, hotels and waiting rooms. Here’s an easy guide to make the perfect green tea.Ingredients: -Water (according to the amount of tea you want to make)-Small sauce pan-Your selected teaPreparation: Step 1: Pour a mug of cold water into the sauce pan at low heat.Step 2: Boil the water in a pan for black tea but not for green tea.Step 3: Heat the water until steams and starts making light bubbles, turn the heat off just before the water starts boiling. (Boiling green tea can make it bitter)Step 4: Pour the hot, steaming water over the tea bag in your mug.Step 5: Cover the pot for three to five minutes (never more than five minutes)Even though is not common, you can of course add some sugar or honey as desired. As you can see this is a very easy to make kind of tea, so don’t waste any more time and start making your first cup of coffee right now.Chai tea:Chai (Indian word for tea) is a very exotic kind of tea. I tried before at school when some Indians classmate made it for us. I didn’t imagine at first that was so difficult to make, but since it has such a unique taste, I want you to try as soon as possible. The original tea is black tea with sugar, some spices and milk. On the recipe I’m going to share with you, you’ll use whole spices, but you might as well use Indian tea masala or tea spice mixture.Ingredients: -3 to 5 cloves-3 to 5 peppercorns-2 to 3 thin slices fresh ginger roots-2 tablespoon of sugar-2 cardamom pods-crushed-1 large cinnamon stick-1 cup of milk-2 rounded tablespoon of black teaPreparationStep 1: Mix 21/2c of water in a small pot with sugar, cloves, ginger, cardamom pods, cinnamon stick and peppercorns.Step 2: Slowly bring to boil over medium-low heat and simmer for a few minutes.Step 3: Add 2 rounded tablespoons of tea, turn off the heat, cover and let steep for 3 to 5 minutes.Step 4: Add milk to the pot; turn the heat back on to medium-lowStep 5: Strain the tea into mugs or a teapot and serve.I hope you find it interesting to try all this kind of teas and in future posts I’ll be explaining other different ways to prepare tea for beginners and even for not so new tea drinkers.If you are like me, a coffee drinking just starting to drink tea, don’t force yourself to love it or to drink many cups of tea a day. I still haven’t drink more than one cup a day and honestly I don’t do it every day. I just think that tea is very beneficial for our health in many ways, so if we really want a healthy diet and life style, I advice you to start drinking tea little by little.The first week you can just try one or two cups, then the second week you can start drinking more often, maybe every two days.Have the tea always handy for a moment when you feel like drinking some water or some coffee, have a cup of tea instead.If you know other tea recipes, share it with all of us.

Weight Loss Problems

People are always asking me how I lost 25 pounds since the fall, and actually I lost it by drinking tea. Yup, drinking tea, it’s pretty amazing and I would not believe it if it did not happen to me. The tea I drank is a DeTox tea, it provides optimum health inside your body. It helps your body combat free radical exposure and filters toxins that enter your body. According to a study done by a nutritionist and author of the book “The Fast Track Detox Diet” your liver is the bodys main defense in detoxification, energy production and weight loss.

Your body has 2 natural filters, the liver and the kidneys. Detox tea helps improve both the liver and kidney functions; it also contains herbs that help with PMS, especially the bloating that so often occurs with “that time of the month”. A common misconception of Detox anything is that it ties you to a bathroom for elimination of waste. This detox tea is not designed to do that. It helps the liver, which is your first line of defense of toxins in your body. Your liver actually has more then 500 functions it performs. The number 1 function is to detoxify everything you put into your body and your blood stream. This Detox Tea helps your body absorb ONLY the nutrients you put into it and eliminate the toxins by cleansing (urinating or bowels).

The Detox Tea also helps support kidney functions. The kidneys regulate fluids in the body. They filter 50 gallons of blood per day. Between the liver and the kidneys your body has a natural double filter for toxins. The natural herbal blend in the tea helps the body stimulate red blood cells, it helps regulate blood pressure and it also helps in maintaining Bone Maintenance.

The tea is more like a daily tonic to help break down toxins and then adds them to urine or bile for elimination. even if you consider yourself to be a healthy eater, your body still benefits from the Detox tea as it helps eliminate harmful molecules that have already been stored in your cells and soft tissues.

Each year Americans consume:
566 cans of soda in one year
150 pounds of sugar in one year
that is equal to 52 teaspoons of sugar per day!

This sugar overloads your liver and kidneys. The herbal blend in the tea offers anti-oxidants, and helps rid the body of free radical damage. Did you know that your body naturally produces free radicals internally from the foods we eat, whether they are organic in nature or not?

One of the herbal ingredients in the tea is milk thistle. Milk thistle has been seen in scientific studies to help the liver re-generate itself. Milk thistle supports and protects the liver, gall bladder, the bladder. It is rich in anti-oxidants. Lemongrass, peppermint and sarsaparilla are part of the ingredients that help support digestion, and provide anti-oxidants. Burdock root promotes proper kidney function; fennel fruit helps with PMS symptoms (such as bloating) and helps in digestion.

Ways to know that your liver and kidneys are not working at their optimal levels:

1. You have frequent blemishes or rashes
2. Severe PMS that lasts over 48 hours
3. Headaches, indigestion, bloat or fatigue after eating
4. Trouble sleeping through the night
5. Cellulite that won’t go away, even after weight loss
6. Chronic yeast infection
7. Feeling forgetful, foggy, spacey or confused
8. Low immunity to colds and flu

A quick detox cleans for 36 hours should help alleviate all, if not most of these symptoms not to mention you can drop a full dress size! Ingesting the right blend of nutrients can cleanse and heal that sluggish liver and help improve the ability to neutralize toxins in your body. This will all help you metabolize the fat stored in your body by as much as 23%, according to researchers at Health Science Institute in Baltimore Maryland. Three days is all that is required for your liver to regenerate the bad cells for good ones making it easier for the liver to flush the toxins out of the body.

Other studies are being conducted on detoxifying that show that having a healthier liver free from toxins can also nourish the nervous system, making you calmer, have steady moods, feel less fatigued, and even sleep better!

This tea is a comprehensive approach to weight loss and a healthy body!

All About Tea

Tea is an amazing thing! I recently got hooked onto drinking tea more then coffee. I make the entire tea experience into an art form. I bought myself this adorable little cast iron tea pot that has a strainer fit to the interior. I but tea leaves that are larger in size from reputable places. Smaller tea leaves have less potency and typically companies like lipton and tetly use tea dust for their tea bags as it is more cost effective for them to do so.Tea is commonly grown in lush hillsides of China, India and Japan. The fresh leaves for Oolong, Gree, or Black Teas typically are withered first before being processed. After withering occurs, Green tea is either steamed, or pan fried before they are rolled and then dried. Whereas Green tea is Steamed or Fried, Oolong tea is shaken to remove bruised leaf edges. Then it is partially fermented before being pan fried or enters the drying process. Black tea requires being fully fermented and fired for the drying process. The size of the leaf and the type of processing makes for the quality of all tea.Some properties of teas are as follows:Red Tea improves digestions and is great for the skin and allergies. It is naturally high in vitamins and minerals and has more anti-oxidents then green tea.Green Tea may help prevent cancer and lowers cholesterol. It also has been proven to help regulate sugar level. It too is very good for digestions and helps in preventing cavities and aging.Black Teas help lower cholesterol as well and helps in preventing tooth decay. Black tea is very good for the heart and can act as a gentle stimulant, it tends to be a stronger flavored tea.White Tea is a very high anti-oxident. It helps regulate blood sugar and also helps in lowering cholesterol. It has a one of the highest levels of caffeine in a tea. Typically white tea is high in vitamins and minerals.Tea can be very confusing. The best way to know which tea is right for you is for you to sample some tea and then choose which ones you like. I switched from coffee to tea, just because the health benefits are huge in drinking tea and the variety is awesome. Flavored teas all have a base of one of the teas I mention above. The flavoring in teas may also be additional anti-oxidents and offer additional nutritional and health benefits.