Green Tea Leaves

Why is green tea good for you? Well, this is a question asked by many people when they see the many claims made by researchers looking into this and that property of this seemingly wonder food.

But as you'll see below in the several paragraphs in this lens, drinking green tea as part of your everyday routine has many health benefits that have been scientifically proven to work. So this is one of those natural health benefits that is not only in the minds and anecdotal evidence of a minority of well meaning people who truly believe in the power of natural cures. This is something that has been given the thumbs up from the medical profession and mainstream professionals as well.

So take your time, make yourself a cup of this wonderful beverage and sit down and have a good read, as you'll be pleasantly surprised at just what a great cup of wonder green tea actually is!

Green Tea

Modern medical science has been patting itself on the back in recent years after "discovering" some of the most important secrets of the health giving benefits and potential for alternative cures of green tea.

Green tea contains substances known as catechin polyphenols. Of these, epigallocatechin gallate is a powerful antioxidant and it is found in great quantities in green tea. Antioxidants have extremely important health benefits in that they are believed to be able to "mop up" substances known as free radicals, which can cause cell damage and lead to cancerous growths.

Other compounds found in green tea have also been found to inhibit the growth of certain cancer cells.

Here are some facts about green tea:

Cancer:

Scientists have found that by drinking green tea regularly, the risk of oesophageal cancer in Chinese men and women is reduced by about 60%. This is significant and makes it one of the most important natural cancer treatments to emerge in recent years.

Cholesterol

There has also been research that indicates that drinking green tea actually lowers total cholesterol levels. Added to that, it also improves the ratio of good (HDL) cholesterol to bad (LDL) cholesterol, thereby balancing the blood's cholesterol levels as well as lowering the risk of abnormal blood clots forming. This helps reduce the risk of thrombosis, strokes and heart attacks, especially in those already susceptible to this.

Heart Disease:

There have been links made between the effects of drinking green tea and what is known as the "French Paradox."

Researchers were puzzled for many years by the fact that despite consuming a fat rich diet, the general French population has a lower incidence of heart disease than Americans. The answer? Red wine, which contains resveratrol, a polyphenol that is known to limit some of the negative effects of smoking and a high fat diet.

In 1997, researchers from the University of Kansas found that the EGCG in Green tea is twice as powerful as resveratrol. This may go a long way to explaining why the rate of heart disease among Japanese men is also quite low, even though around 75% are smokers.

Of course that doesn't mean that you can let down your guard and go out and eat what you like and take up smoking thinking that a few cups of green tea will counteract it! Better to eat healthily and augment a healthy lifestyle with the benefits of green tea as well!

As a Refreshing Beverage

Off at a slight tangent here, but there are always nice ways to drink green tea as it is, in itself a delicious, soothing and refreshing beverage. A true gift to yourself is to sit down with a cup of green tea, leave your troubles far behind you and simply enjoy drinking it slowly.

And even better is to accompany a cup with some fresh, home baked cookies! They may not be the healthiest treats to eat, but when you bake themselves using the recipe in the website I just linked to, they are as close as you'll get being free of any artificial additives.

More reasons to drink green tea coming soon...

Weight Loss

New evidence has been uncovered to the effect that green tea may be able to help dieters.

In 1999, The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition published the results of a study made at the University of Geneva in Switzerland. Researchers discovered that men who were given a combination of caffeine and green tea extract actually burned more calories than men given only caffeine or a placebo.

As an aside from the obvious health and fitness angle and from my own findings over the last few months as my own consumption of green tea increased, I've noticed that I'm less prone to gaining weight despite my fairly sedentary working day spent sitting in front of this thing typing away like there's no tomorrow! Not getting as much exercise as I once did and not really watching what I eat, I find that drinking two or three cups of green tea every day helps me by lightly suppressing my natural tendency to snack in between meals.

That has to be a good thing and an enormous help in preventing the weight gain that I would almost certainly suffer as a result of sitting still for too long in the day. In effect, green tea is acting as a sort of natural weight loss supplement that is both enjoyable to take and quite safe in that it contains only natural ingredients.

Alternatively, for someone who is more active, green tea will act as an aid to weight loss and assist in adding to the efficiency of the metabolism.

Green Tea and a Bad Tummy!

Another of the amazing properties of green tea is that it can destroy certain bacteria found to induce food poisoning. This could be a godsend to those of us prone to enjoying a good curry but suffering with "Delhi Belly" the next day!

Green Tea and Teeth

Green tea can help to prevent tooth decay. In a similar manner to the way its bacteria-destroying abilities can help prevent food poisoning, green tea can also kill the bacteria that causes dental plaque.

Green Tea and Asthma

A substance called Theophylline, which is found in green tea relaxes the muscles which support the bronchial tubes, reducing the severity of asthma and its symptoms. Also, the calming effect of drinking green tea reduces stress, which is one of the triggers of asthma attacks.

Green Tea and HIV

Present in green tea is a substance called Epigallocatechin gallate (EGCg), the major tea catechin and is known as a potent anti-bacterial agent. In addition to this important property, EGCg has anti-tumor, anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant and anti-virus activities.

Scientists in Japan have found that the EGCG (Epigallocatechin Gallate) present in green tea can actually prevent the HIV virus from binding to healthy immune cells.

Green Tea and Allergy

The same EGCg found in green tea is known to be able to relieve allergies. Therefore if you have allergies of any kind, drinking green tea could reduce the symptoms for you.

Green Tea and Diabetes

Does green tea help diabetics? Well, I'm not entirely sure about that one, so I'll have to do some research and see if I can come up with any hard evidence that it does. So don't throw out those diabetic shoes just yet!

By now it must be plainly obvious that by drinking green tea on a regular basis, ie every day, your health can improve in many ways.

You also benefit from the important protection that the antioxidants in green tea gives you from the harmful effects of free radicals.

Here's your chance to get hold of a downloadable ebook version of a comprehensive guide to green tea that covers everything you need to know about this incredibly healthy and health giving brew.

You can click on this link (or the picture of the book's cover): The Complete Guide to Green Tea to visit the author's website for more details.

Of course to make the perfect green tea, you need to start with the purest of the basic ingredient - water.

In most of the world, the water that comes out of your tap is just not good enough, containing impurities, heavy metals, pesticide residue and a whole host of other nasties that your government will not admit to.

To be on the safe side, many people are now fitting drinking water filters to their supplies. Gaiam supply a range of water filters that can either fit beneath your sink, or sit on the worktop or wherever you like. Here's just a couple from their range. Click on the images to visit their site to see the whole range.

Of course you could carry on poisoning your system with less than clean water...

Every type of tea, from green tea to black tea and oolong tea are all produced from the Camellia sinensis plant. The best teas are plucked by hand and only the top two leaves and a bud are taken. This is because the youngest leaves produce the finest teas and this goes for green tea as well as the others . That is why machine picked leaves are never of equal quality.

Different methods are used in the processing of each tea. While black and oolong teas undergo a fermentation method, the fresh leaves are simply steamed straight after being plucked from the plant to produce green tea. This prevents the oxidation (fermentation) of the leaves which allows the leaves to remain green in colour.

The leaves are then rolled and further dried, often in ovens, to prevent any oxidation taking place.

By this method, many of the important natural health and fitness giving properties are maintained in the leaves of green tea that the oxidation process carried out for black and oolong teas substantially reduces.

Longjing

In Chinese, its name translates as "dragon well". Hangzhou is where the most well-known of famous Chinese teas come from. This is pan-fried and has a distinctive flat appearance. Falsification of Longjing tea is common. Most of the tea sold on the market is actually produced in Sichuan Province and therefore not authentic Longjing.

Hui Ming

This tea is named after a temple in Zhejiang.

Long Ding

A tea from Kaihua County known as Dragon Mountain.

Hua Ding

A tea from Tiantai County and named after a peak in the Tiantai mountain range.

Qing Ding

This is a tea from Tian Mu and is also known as Green Top.

Gunpowder

This is a popular tea that is also known as zhuchá. It originated in Zhejiang but is now grown elsewhere in China.

Bi Luo Chun

This Chinese tea is quite famous and also known as Green Snail Spring, coming from from Dong Ting.

As with Longjing, falsification of this tea is common and most of the tea marketed and sold under this name may actually be grown in Sichuan.

Rain Flower

A beautifully named tea from Nanjing.

Shui Xi Cui Bo

A lesser known tea from this province.

...as I source more information on these and other Chinese green teas, I'll update these modules...

Yu Lu

A steamed tea known as Gyokuro (Jade Dew) made in the Japanese style.

...I'll try to source some more info for this module...

Xin Yang Mao Jian

A famous Chinese tea that is also known as Green Tip.

...I'll also try to source some more info for this module...

Chun Mee

Originally from Jiangxi, its name means "precious eyebrows". It is also grown in other provinces, but is best known from Jiangxi.

Gou Gu Nao

A well-known tea within China that has received numerous national tea awards for its excellence.

Yun Wu

This wonderful tea is also known as "Cloud and Mist".

Anhui Province is the home of several famous Chinese teas:

Da Fang

A tea from Mount Huangshan which is also known as Big Square.

Huangshan Mao Feng

A famous Chinese tea also from Mount Huangshan.

Lu An Guapian

A similarly famous Chinese famous tea also known as Melon Seed.

Hou Kui

A famous Chinese tea also known peculiarly as Monkey tea.

Tun Lu

A Chinese tea from Tunxi District.

Huo Qing

A tea from Jing County, that is also known as Fire Green.

Hyson

This tea is sourced from many provinces and is an early harvested medium-quality tea.

Green tea (ryokucha) is so popular in Japan that it is most commonly referred to as simply "tea" (ocha) or sometimes "Japanese tea" (nihoncha).

The various types of tea are graded depending on the quality of the leaves and the parts of the plant used. There are substantial variations in both price and quality for the different strains of the more common teas. In addition to these, there are many specialty green teas that fall outside this spectrum.

The very best Japanese green tea is said to be that originating from the Uji region of Kyoto.

Shizuoka Prefecture is also famous for its quality green tea.

Brands of Japanese Green Tea

Gyokuro (Jade Dew)

This variety is selected from a grade of green tea known as Ten-cha. Gyokuro's name refers to the pale green color of the infusion. The leaves are grown in the shade before their harvest, which subtly alters their flavor.

Matcha (rubbed tea)

A very high-quality powdered green tea which is used primarily in the tea ceremony. Matcha is also a popular flavour of ice cream as well as other sweets in Japan.

Sencha (broiled tea)

A common green tea in Japan made from tea leaves that are exposed directly to sunlight.

Genmaicha (Brown-Rice tea)

This is a lend of the Maicha and roasted Genmai (brown rice) varieties.

Kabusecha (covered tea)

kabusecha is Sencha tea, the leaves of which have grown in the shade prior to their harvest, although for not as long as Gyokuro tea. It has a rather more delicate flavor than Sencha.

Bancha (common tea)

This variety is basically Sencha harvested as a second-flush tea between the summer and autumn. The leaves are larger than Sencha and the flavour is described as less full.

Hojicha (pan fried tea)

This is a roasted green tea.

Kukicha (stalk tea)

A green tea made from stalks produced by harvesting one bud and three leaves of the plant.

Tamaryokucha

A tea that has a taste that is best descried as tangy and berry-like, with a long almond-like aftertaste. It has a deep aroma with delicate tones of citrus, grass, and berries.

Okinawan Tea

...more to follow...

Despite the many tests and experiments made on green tea and its effects, to date the only negative side effect that has been reported from drinking green tea in large amounts is insomnia due to the caffeine that it contains.

Despite this one drawback, it's worth noting that green tea does contain considerably less caffeine than coffee or black tea.

There are approximately 30 to 60mg of caffeine in 6 to 8 ounces of green tea, compared to over 100mg in eight ounces of coffee.

Nothing to lose any sleep over, then!

Here's nothing quite as good as keeping up a good some health image so just in case you're in need of a little help from this friendly natural health related lens. We all should ensure we get enough vitamin B complex in our diet and if we can't get the full daily amount from the food we eat, then we could boost the levels of vitamin B complex with some natural vitamin supplements.

Another way of ensuring we get enough general healthy nutrients is through eating natural herbs in our diet, and there is a good herbal product supplier here for sourcing this. Of course, you could always seek guidance if you read tarot cards, as interpreting tarot cards can really set you straight. Lastly, here's a place to check out where to source your moisture cream to keep that skin looking as young as you can!