green tea

[shecky]

i keep reading all over the place about how green tea is an amazing elixir that will help me loose weight and feel more fantabulous. anyone here have any experience with the benefits of green tea? i am a couple of weeks into a new lifestyle (i refuse to use the word "diet") because there is too much Shecky going around for my own good. so on top of watching what i eat (calorie counting) and exercise (walking, and eventually running, every other day for 30 minutes to start, tracked with Nike+) i wanted to do some good in terms of my liquid intake. i love black teas but i have yet to really get into green tea - however i am thinking that drinking it iced (actually, drinking it cool, i do not like ice cold water) as a substitute for some of my water intake might be worth it since it sounds like the benefits are huge.

any brands we like? suggestions for brewing it cold? etc... i usually get my black tea (irish breakfast to be exact) from Adagio; i know they carry a bunch of green teas also. i also seem to be reading that adding sugar and milk to green tea pretty much kills all the benefits of it. i would never add milk to green tea but i would like sugar/splenda if i have it hot, cold i can live without any sweetener i think.

 

[epochblue]

i keep reading all over the place about how green tea is an amazing elixir that will help me loose weight and feel more fantabulous. anyone here have any experience with the benefits of green tea? i am a couple of weeks into a new lifestyle (i refuse to use the word "diet") because there is too much Shecky going around for my own good. so on top of watching what i eat (calorie counting) and exercise (walking, and eventually running, every other day for 30 minutes to start, tracked with Nike+) i wanted to do some good in terms of my liquid intake. i love black teas but i have yet to really get into green tea - however i am thinking that drinking it iced (actually, drinking it cool, i do not like ice cold water) as a substitute for some of my water intake might be worth it since it sounds like the benefits are huge.

any brands we like? suggestions for brewing it cold? etc...

I've never had it cold, so I can't speak to that (but I imagine you'll have to use a fair amount of tea bags to make it any kind of decent strength). Green tea is different from black tea, however, as the flavor is much more subtle (almost sweet). The main benefits of Green Tea come from the antioxidants that are in it, although it has other benefits as well (such as preventing plaque on teeth).

I *LOVE* green tea, and drink at least a cup or two a day. The brands I have purchased in the past are Bigelow, Stash, some loose-leaf green teas from Teavana and Tazo's China Green Tips.

Of those, they're all pretty good. The loose-leaf is going to be the most expensive, followed by the Tazo. Bigelow makes very decent green tea, and I really like their Green Tea w/ Lemon and Green Tea w/ mint. I take mine with a small amount of splenda to bring out some of the flavor, but nothing else.

Not that you haven't looked here yet, but this page will probably have some good information about what makes green tea this miracle elixir: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_tea

 

[jayb2000]

I have tried a bunch of varieties and brands.
Cinnamon Apple Green tea I think was the worst.

I try to buy it from a high-volume place, either something like Whole Foods or Wild Oats, or a local coffee/tea shop.

I like a touch of honey in mine hot. Not sure about any big benefits, but I do find it soothing on the throat and enjoy the taste.

Better than the Coke I used to drink!

 

[IJ Reilly]

Tea should be brewed hot and then iced. Brands really aren't important. Find a tea that is packed in its country of origin. It will probably be far less expensive and of better quality than any brand name tea sold in a supermarket in a fancy tin at an exorbitant price. By all means stay away from the bottled stuff. It's just plain awful.

Lots of claims are made for green tea, but since AFAIK none have actually been tested, I personally wouldn't place much stock in any of them. That said, green tea probably can't be bad for you, and if you substitute consuming green tea for things that are known to be bad for you, then the net effect is probably going to be positive!

 

[PlaceofDis]

i am certainly a tea drinker, and as IJ said, brew it hot, then ice it for sure.

i get most of my teas from Republic of Tea simply because i like their flavors, the Pomegranate Green Tea especially. it has a juicy flavor to it thats just great, imo.

i don't know that its 'powers' have been tested to be true, but again, its better than other known unhealthy things.

 

[flopticalcube]

I drink a cup in the evening, hot, with lemon. Very calming. Don't taste much of a difference between brands so I buy on price. Also good when you have a dicky tummy.

 

[yojitani]

hmm... I don't know about all these strange things added to green tea (pomegranate? ), and I would recommend avoiding all bottled green tea sold in in the US. It's often sweetened or flavored. To be honest, you might want to stay away from the bagged tea too. What is best is loose tea, brewed in hot water (in Japan, my in-laws have their kettle set to 96C for green tea). Perhaps it's just because it's what I'm accustomed to, but I think that Japanese green tea is better than Chinese - they are different. That said, I haven't found a high grade Chinese green tea in the US.

A quick google search: this site looks best to me http://www.o-cha.com/

YT

One other thing: Green tea s high in caffeine. I like to drink dark coffee late evenings, but I would never drink green tea (at least not made with fresh leaves) after 8 or 9...

 

[IJ Reilly]

For quality Chinese teas, including green, you can try:

http://www.tentea.com/index.html

They also operate tea shops in the United States and elsewhere as Ten Ren Tea. I've been in the San Francisco Chinatown store a few times, and generally been the only non-Asian in the place.

Green tea should normally have somewhat lower caffeine levels compared to black tea or coffee, but of course that depends entirely on how they are prepared. Unlike black tea, green should be steeped "off boil." If they do it at 96°F in Japan, then I'm going to guess this is probably the perfect temperature -- the Japanese love their green tea, especially the variety with brown rice in it!

 

[devilot]

For quality Chinese teas, including green, you can try:

http://www.tentea.com/index.html

They also operate tea shops in the United States and elsewhere as Ten Ren Tea. I've been in the San Francisco Chinatown store a few times, and generally been the only non-Asian in the place.

Heehee. I know that brand! That's just one kind my mom has layin' around the house. And I do think there's a shop nearby. Interesting. I dunno what's great vs. "meh" tea. I can probably discern between great and bad tea, but that's about it.

Thanks for the link, IJ.

 

[Georgie]

I drink a lot of coffee and I admit I'm a snob about it. Simply through experience I've learned how to appreciate good coffee. I may not be able to verbalize all the qualities and characteristics of a given coffee, but the difference in character between good and bad coffee is substantial.

I avoided tea until my fiance started to get into it. Now I love tea as well. Here in Columbus Ohio there's a fantastic coffee shop called Stauf's. Well I never noticed before a few months ago but they also have a great selection of loose leaf teas. The difference in taste between high and low quality tea is day and night, far more substantial than the difference in coffees. Or at least the difference is more obvious. There are so many subtle and not-so-subtle flavors, it's really a fascinating world that's much easier to appreciate than coffee. Tea is worth it. High quality loose leaf tea is doubly, triply worth it.

I object to any claims that loose leaf is more expensive than baggies. If that's true then you're paying too much for too low-quality of tea. Teavana has a pretty storefront, but they don't sell great tea. Stauf's sells teas ranging from $10/pound to $140/pound. I usually buy the stuff between $50 and $100/pound. That sounds like a lot, I know, but realize that 1/10th of a pound, so just $5 to $10 worth of tea will brew many many gallons of delicious tea. High quality teas can be steeped four, five, six, some even eight times, or you can make large pots from not a lot of tea. The reason this is true for high quality loose leaf tea is due to the size of the leaves you're using. Those relatively large leaves have relatively low surface area (similar to a coarser ground of coffee) and require more steeping time to draw out the flavors. Compare that with bagged tea, 95% of which is fine tea-dust left over from packaging the better loose leaf stuff. Those can be used just once and even then, if you're not careful, the resulting tea will be harsh and bitter.

Explore loose-leaf teas. They are cheaper than bagged tea, and a world of difference better in flavor and enjoyment. And as far as health benefits go, you will get more antioxidants and health benefits from the less-processed loose-leaf stuff as well.

Is it possible to be a tea fanboi?

I mentioned above that Stauf's sells a tea for $140/lb. It's an interesting and rare tea, very young, the leaves of which have been partially pre-digested by locusts. It's good though: complex, like wine. That's probably a good description for tea in general: tea is very much like wine, much more so than coffee.

 

[shecky]

you guys are preaching to the choir about loose-leaf teas; there is no way i would ever buy anything else.

i have some green tea samples from adagio i never got around to trying, i will give those a go - they are only a month or two old and well packaged. i think the basic sencha or maybe genmaicha sounds the best, i am not one for fruit flavors in tea.

maybe i will be daring and try some matcha one of these days too.

 

[IJ Reilly]

Is it possible to be a tea fanboi?

Oh, sure -- but it's a tough row to hoe in the U.S.! Though it's growing in popularity, Americans still really don't "get" tea. Even many supposedly fine restaurants don't know that it should be served in a pot with boiling water poured over the leaves. It's so simple. Cups of warmish water with a tea bag on the side will never make palatable tea, no matter how much the tea cost.

I'm a fan of loose, if only because I can adjust the strength and make my own blends. In the end, it's also less expensive.

 

[spicyapple]

All teas are good. The bitterer it is, the better. My fav is artichoke tea.

(bitterer is not a word, wait... apparently is it!)

 

[Abstract]

I have eaten lunch at "Ten Ren Tea" (never heard of it being called "Ten Tea" since "Ten" really should be romanised to "Tien/Tian" to mean sky (if I remember correctly)), and it was delicious. All their food is made from tea. I used to go there once a week, and the food was cheap. A cup of tea was expensive, but the food tasted fantastic for the price.

I'm drinking green tea right now. Sometimes I feed it to my plants.

 

[toontra]

I drink (too) many cups of green tea a day. Used to source it from a Chinese wholesaler on the outskirts of London. I also used to get friends to bring it back from China when they visited - some wonderful loose-leaf stuff, especially the jasmine blends. But since I gave up caffeine I've been forced to buy Tetleys Decaf Green Tea from the supermarket - it's the only decaf green tea that I'm aware of in the UK.

Not sure about the health benefits - mainly a taste thing for me. I wanted to cut out milk and it tastes much better without milk than black tea (too bitter). That said, I'm feeling pretty healthy at the moment!

 

[IJ Reilly]

I have eaten lunch at "Ten Ren Tea" (never heard of it being called "Ten Tea" since "Ten" really should be romanised to "Tien/Tian" to mean sky (if I remember correctly)), and it was delicious. All their food is made from tea. I used to go there once a week, and the food was cheap. A cup of tea was expensive, but the food tasted fantastic for the price.

Where was that? I don't recall the Ten Ren Tea in San Francisco serving food.

I hadn't heard of "Ten Tea" either until I looked up Ten Ren Tea on Google. I suppose Ten Ren must have started Ten Tea as their online sales arm. Their websites are nearly identical, except on Ten Tea you can order online. BTW, I really like their 4 oz tea canisters.

 

[devilot]

Where was that? I don't recall the Ten Ren Tea in San Francisco serving food.

If the store I'm thinking of (in Cupertino) is in fact a Ten Ren Tea place, they sell those tea hard-boiled eggs (really similar to soy-sauce hard-boiled eggs). Dunno what else they have though. Just always see the sign and smell 'em as I walk by.

 

[EGT]

I only drink Jackson's green tea with mint. It is lovely when sweetened with a bit of honey. It is the best I have tried so far.

I don't feel right without some tea to start the day!

 

[Abstract]

Where was that? I don't recall the Ten Ren Tea in San Francisco serving food.

I hadn't heard of "Ten Tea" either until I looked up Ten Ren Tea on Google. I suppose Ten Ren must have started Ten Tea as their online sales arm. Their websites are nearly identical, except on Ten Tea you can order online. BTW, I really like their 4 oz tea canisters.

In Chatswood, Sydney. Ten Ren is a Taiwanese company, and Chatswood has a lot of Chinese and Taiwanese people there.

If they serve a noodle soup, the soup would be made with tea rather than just water.

Ten (10) Tea sounds too American for me to take seriously. Again, "Ten" is really "Tian", which means "Sky" in Chinese. When I saw the references to the tea on the Ten Tea website being "A Perfect 10", I really wanted to throw up a bit.

 

[spicyapple]

I'm drinking green tea right now. Sometimes I feed it to my plants.

Isn't that like plant cannibalism? Not much different than feeding rendered bone meal back to cows. You are one sicko!

 

[SpookTheHamster]

Isn't that like plant cannibalism? Not much different than feeding rendered bone meal back to cows. You are one sicko!

My sister's parrot loves the taste of chicken...

 

[IJ Reilly]

Ten (10) Tea sounds too American for me to take seriously. Again, "Ten" is really "Tian", which means "Sky" in Chinese. When I saw the references to the tea on the Ten Tea website being "A Perfect 10", I really wanted to throw up a bit.

All the same company, apparently, so I'd say it has more to do with the vague use of English from a native Chinese speaker than anything American.

 

[jenny172]

I love green tea too..

I used to take teabags but read from amazing-greentea that some research has proven drinking loose tea is better and has more benefits. Since then I have switched to brew my own green tea.

It is fun too. I bought a chinese small 3 pieces teacups, i cant remember what is it called. So far the experience has been great!

I'm learning to drink more chinese an japanese green tea. I'm leaning to appreciate Long Jing from teacuppa.com. This tea is easy to be recognized. So I am trying out their Bi Luo Chun green tea and jade pole green tea. Kinda tough!!!

 

[extraextra]

Personally I love Tazo green tea and Twinning's green tea.

I'm a sucker for packaging but the tea itself is really nice too!

I usually drink mine with a bit of honey to sweeten it, I hope that doesn't cancel out any of the good stuff. (like milk apparently does)

 

[erickkoch]

I tried green tea from Teavana, it was Lemon Green Tea and I didn't care for it. I tried making it into iced tea but it didn't taste great. I drank it anyway figuring it's healthy but I wish it tasted better.