A few months ago I seem to have become a green tea advocat, since I have realized that it is probably the most healthy beverage ever invented (including water).
The enormous study “Green Tea Consumption and Mortality Due to Cardiovascular Disease, Cancer, and All Causes in Japan” took 11 years with over 40.000 participants, and got the following result:
Green Tea Benefits in Woman
- 23% lower risk of dying from any cause
- 31% lower risk of dying from CVD
- 62% lower risk of dying from stroke
Green Tea Benefits in Men
- 12% lower risk of dying from any cause
- 22% lower risk of dying from CVD
- 42% lower risk of dying from stroke
On my quest for the perfect cup of tea, I have looked for scientific analysis and have found the enlightening paper “Factors Affecting the Caffeine and Polyphenol Contents of Black and Green Tea Infusions”. Here are the most important findings of it:
How to get the most out of a tea bag. The more extracted solids / catechins, the better.
Brewing
- doubling the bags doubles the extracted solids (which is good!)
- Increasing brewing time from 1 minute to 2 minutes doubles the catechins. 5 minutes tripple the catechins.
Teabags vs. loose leafes
- Loose leafes are better than teabags.
- When teabags are left floating, the flow resistance of the material blocks almost everything! This is very bad.
- Continuously dunk a tea bag and the extraction is 4 times better!
- Loose leafes are still about 20% better than dunked teabags, and after about 2 minutes the water is saturated (no need to wait any further)
Leafe size / packing
- loose leafes? extraction is faster with smaller leafes. No need for dunking.
- teabag with small leafes / tightly packed? Continuously dunk it
- teabag with large leafes / loosely packed? Leafe it static (the flows are driven by convection)
Conclusion
- loose leafes are the best. Brew for 2 minutes and you have everything they got.
- If you have to use teabags, dunking the bag gets you 4 times the catechins!