Black Tea

[go2]

I gave up coffee a long time ago. It smells great, tastes great, but it was too acidic for me back then. So I switched the black tea and mate - mostly mate, which I really like. Or sometimes I mix them together.

For those who can eat coconut oil, it's interesting to put some in tea after it's fully brewed. It floats to the top of course and it adds a twist to tea when it gets a little boring.

I often put a tablespoon of coconut oil or butter in a small cup of black tea in the afternoon. It provides energy as I adapt to not having a carbohydrate fix in the afternoon. I have heard ghee is added to black tea in the Himalayas. It is a little caffeine and some lipids for a quick boost between meals. I also eat a few soaked and dried almonds and raw cacao beans. These snacks have helped alleviate the low energy levels I have experienced as I become keto-adapted. One thing I have noticed is a real aversion to sweetness in food and drink, as I transition to a high percentage fat diet, with the exception of a little fresh fruit or berries.

 

[Stellaria_graminea]

I still have a cup of coffee in the morning. If I skip that, I get an awful headache. Seems like some kind of addiction!

I will wait a bit to quit all coffee, as I try to change my diet gradually.

A substitute that will "wake me up" a bit in the morning will be great. Peppermint tea, maybe?

 

[treerocks]

I still have a cup of coffee in the morning. If I skip that, I get an awful headache. Seems like some kind of addiction!

I will wait a bit to quit all coffee, as I try to change my diet gradually.

A substitute that will "wake me up" a bit in the morning will be great. Peppermint tea, maybe?

Here is a link that discusses some of the dependence and withdrawal symptoms on caffeine.

an excerpt;

Time course of caffeine withdrawal. The caffeine withdrawal syndrome follows an orderly time course. Onset usually occurs 12 to 24 hours after terminating caffeine intake, although onset as late as 36 hours has been documented. Peak withdrawal intensity has generally been described as occurring 20 to 48 hours after abstinence. The duration of withdrawal has most often been described as ranging between 2 days and 1 week, although longer durations have been occasionally noted.

I know from experience when I have quit coffee, the first day is always the worst. It did get a little easier for me day after day. I have found flushing your body with extra amounts of water helps with the detox process.

 

[Stellaria_graminea]

Here is a link that discusses some of the dependence and withdrawal symptoms on caffeine.

Thanks. I experience many of the withdrawal symptoms when I don't drink that cup each morning. The headache is the worst.

I don't like to be addicted to something.

 

[3DStudent]

I gave up coffee a long time ago. It smells great, tastes great, but it was too acidic for me back then. So I switched the black tea and mate - mostly mate, which I really like. Or sometimes I mix them together.

For those who can eat coconut oil, it's interesting to put some in tea after it's fully brewed. It floats to the top of course and it adds a twist to tea when it gets a little boring.

I often put a tablespoon of coconut oil or butter in a small cup of black tea in the afternoon. It provides energy as I adapt to not having a carbohydrate fix in the afternoon. I have heard ghee is added to black tea in the Himalayas.

Thanks for the ideas m and go2. I just tried both of these with some herbal tea. Coconut and ghee on the top with some stevia drops and a little added salt. It's an interesting way to get a fat snack. We should be craving fat anyways, and not the caffeine and sugar in the tea ;).

 

[mamadrama]

Just a head's up if you are anemic. Black tea can slow down iron absorption from plants if you drink it with a meal.

Iron Absorption

Drinking black tea alongside a meal containing iron decreases your body's ability to absorb iron from food. This is due to the presence of tannic acid in tea. Tannic acid and chemically-related plant chemicals known as polyphenols bind to the iron in food and sequester it. This is not usually a problem for most individuals. However, if your iron levels are low or if you belong to a group at risk for iron deficiency anemia, you should consider drinking tea between meals instead of alongside food.

Food Types

Black tea blocks the absorption of iron from certain foods much more than others. Drinking tea with red meats, poultry or fish does not significantly decrease the amount of iron your body receives. These animal products contain the heme form of iron, which is easily absorbed by your body. In contrast, the non-heme iron in plant foods is more difficult for your body to use and more likely to be inhibited by black tea.

_http://www.livestrong.com/article/448467-does-black-tea-slow-down-iron-absorption/#ixzz1XBCRdx6M

 

[Lirpa]

All very good information everyone. Thank you for sharing! Day 7 with no coffee and am reducing the black tea from two cups a day to one cup a day.

 

[l_autre_d]

For those who can eat coconut oil, it's interesting to put some in tea after it's fully brewed. It floats to the top of course and it adds a twist to tea when it gets a little boring.

Sounds like a good idea.

I've been using several different teas since stopping coffee; green tea, black tea, rooibos, and white tea as current favorite. I've found that rooibos varies a bit with different companies as some are good and some are just plain awful.

 

[Fester]

Just a clarification that tea (black or green) doesn't naturally contain fluoride but gets it from the soil and water. So maybe it would be safer if it was grown on the soil that doesn't have fluoride?

_http://toxipedia.org/display/toxipedia/Fluoride+Content+in+Tea

Camellia sinensis, the tea plant, produces what can be called "true teas" such as green, black, and oolong (Parkinson). Accumulation of Fluoride in the tea plant comes from its natural ability to absorb Fluoride from surrounding soil. It is estimated that up to 98% of the Fluoride content in the tea plant is deposited in its leaves, particularly the old ones, following the release of Fluoride from [aluminum] Fluoride complexes initially formed at the roots (Lu, et al., 2004). Fluoride has been suggested as an efficient, cost-effective indicator of maturity as well as a negative indicator of quality. Reason for the latter is due to the increase of Fluoride content paralleling a decline in beneficial polyphenols as the tea plant ages (Lu, et al., 2004). The most notable catechin polyphenol found in Camellia sinensis is epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG), a strong [anti-oxidant] that reduces LDL and acts as an anti-Cancer agent (Parkinson).

Added: There is also this:

Due to modern day environmental pollution fluoride and aluminum have also been found to occur in tea, with certain types of brick tea made from old leaves and stems having the highest levels. This occurs due to the tea plant's high sensitivity to and absorption of environmental pollutants.

So the solution appears to be, to either find a place where one can buy tea grown on soil without pollutants or soil fertilizes, or to plant a tea tree. :) Then one can enjoy all tea's benefits without the added poison.

Here is also a study that made a comparison of the fluoride content of four tea brands (Lipton, Ceylon, Golestan and Mozafar). They concluded that there was a significant difference between the fluoride concentration of these four tea brands, and Lipton appeared to have the highest floride concentration.

If so, maybe it would be safer to go with smaller companies and brands than big corporations as Lipton that probably pollute the soil like hell. It also explains why in the past tea was so well known and used for its health benefits. Then they still had clean soil.

I have always hated coffee, and as a result, I drink LOTS of tea. (Am cutting waaaay down btw) I only drink Dilmah leaf tea. Dilmah usually put in the packet a pamphlet explaining the quality of their tea. It states that Dilmah is better because they only use the tea buds and the tiny new leaves just under them, whereas most tea companies use basically the whole plant. This explained to me why cheap tea has that nasty, cardboardy taste. Would this also mean that Dilmah tea would have significantly less fluoride? I have no idea as to the soil quality in the Ceylon/Dilmah tea plantations, though.

Also, as far as growing your own tea is concerned, I remember reading somewhere that the altitude that the tea is grown at has a lot to do with the flavour and strength of the tea. For instance, Assam tea (very dark, intense, strong) is grown at around the 1000 (feet, i think) altitude, whereas teas like Darjeeling (light, mild, pale) are grown at much higher altitudes. How this would affect home grown tea, I don't know, except that it would not taste the same.

Another thing I remember reading somewhere is that adding milk to tea apparently causes proteins in the milk to bind with the tannins, which prevents them from binding to other sources.

 

[SolarMother]

One caution: Teechino uses tree nuts, so if you have an allergy to tree nuts, don't try that one.

Teechino also has barley and rye in it. It's so tasty, so it was a slight bummer to give it up.

I like Bengal Spice tea (celestial seasonings) with non-sweetened almond milk in it.
It's a funny thing, I was never a coffee fiend, but liked to have it now and then. Now, whenever I smell it I want to have some!
I stop myself most of the time, but have to say that about a month ago I had some espresso! I still hope to have high fat cream some day--in my tea!

 

[Slow Motion Mary]

Anyone ever think of making stevia tea? I hear the plant is really easy to grow. It would be naturally sweet I would think.

I never developed a taste for coffee, so I drink tea. I usually have black or herbal teas. I grow stevia and use it with the herbs in a tea ball. I never thought of just using the stevia, I think I'll have to try it! I haven't tried the grocery-store version of stevia, which I think are extracts and I'd rather get the "whole thing", so to speak. (I'm into the "whole thing" due to chemical interactions which may not be present in an "extract".)

Many herbs can be anti-inflammatory, antiseptic, antiviral, antispasmodic, etc., so if you have any particular health problems it might be worth checking out. For example, sage is antiseptic and great for colds, while peppermint calms an upset tummy. Interestingly, I haven't had a cold or the flu for several years.

 

[3DStudent]

In an effort to drink up some herbal teas, I've come to like them. I don't know if it's the hot liquid, or the stevia, or both. I've been looking into Yerba Mate and the traditional way of drinking it with the gourd. I've tried the tea bags and it tastes like regular tea to me.

I'm wondering if any of the bits ever get through the straw? And how many carbs would be in a gourd? Some sites say that per 100g of Mate, there are from 17-30g of carbs. But I would think that this means if you actually ate the leaves. Per 8 oz /240 ml of tea there is supposedly 1 carb, and .5 carbs for herbal tea. Wondering if anyone does the traditional Mate method? And remember to count your teas as a carb! ;D

 

[Gertrudes]

White tea, which despite its name is also black, can be a good alternative since it seems to contain little caffeine:

All teas contain caffeine to some extent, but white tea contains less than others teas. The exact concentration of caffeine in the brewed tea depends on many factors, but when white tea and green tea are steeped for three minutes in water at 175 deg F, the green tea is measured to hold about 20 to 30 mg per serving, while white tea contains about half that. Black tea, on the other hand, contains 40 to 60 mgs. For comparison, black coffee contains about 120 to 150 mgs.

Personally I don't like rooibos, and I don't like green tea. Funny enough, both of these teas don't seat well in my stomach, so my taste buds and stomach are luckily in agreement with these two.
After being caffeine free for more then two years, I recently started drinking black tea again, more specific Earl grey. I love it! It doesn't give me the exaggerated caffeine boost with shacking and subsequent blood sugar drop that coffee used to give me, but I seem to feel a little bit more alert after drinking it. I only drink it in the morning though.

Chicory isn't bad, but I just gave up trying to have coffee substitutes because they all just made me miss coffee even more.

For me that was the problem with coffee substitutes. They are substitutes, so they basically kept feeding my need for coffee, otherwise I wouldn't have kept drinking them. They were helpful during the transitional period, but eventually I also gave them up.

 

[Laura]

Just a head's up if you are anemic. Black tea can slow down iron absorption from plants if you drink it with a meal.

Which just re-emphasizes that one shouldn't be eating the plants to begin with.

 

[mamadrama]

Well, when you get down to the nitty gritty, it's probably healthiest if you avoid both.