Health Benefits of Green Tea
While green tea and regular tea (“black tea”) both come from the same plant, the Camellia Sinensis, green tea does not go through the same production process as black tea. It's the absence of the process known as oxidization that accounts for the significant difference between green tea and regular tea. Regular tea leaves are withered and broken in order to expose the enzymes inside to the surrounding air. This oxidization process does not happen to green tea leaves – in fact, the oxidization is actively stopped by steaming or roasting the tea leaves as soon as possible after they are harvested.
This may all sound a bit complicated, but actually the reason is pretty simple. Regular tea leaves are oxidized in order to create the flavor that we associate with black tea, and also to ensure a longer shelf life for the tea. Green tea leaves are prevented from oxidizing in order to preserve as many of the original nutrients and vitamins as possible, which would be lost or at least greatly reduced during oxidization. As a result, green tea leaves are much closer to their original state than black tea leaves, accounting for the green color of the infusion that they produce, and the fresh aroma and vegetal taste.
However, the key difference is that all those retained nutrients and vitamins are incredibly good for you! Green tea is renowned for having numerous health benefits, and was originally used in China (its birthplace) for medicinal purposes. Even today, the Chinese maintain that regular consumption of green tea is important in order to keep flushing toxins out of the digestive system.
There are many, many known health benefits of green tea, some admittedly more reliably proven than others. Green tea is full of “epigallocatechin gallate” (EGCG), while black tea has very little at all. According to research, green tea is the best known way of increasing your daily intake of EGCG. Why would you want to do that? Well, it's good for the heart, to begin with! Within half an hour of drinking green tea, large blood vessels can be widened by around 4%, which, if you drink green tea regularly (around four or five cups per day), has healthy long term effects. People who do so have been shown through extensive research to have a lower rate of heart disease and strokes.
That's just one benefit of green tea – there are lots of others. It's good for diabetes sufferers, as it plays a key role in the reduction of blood sugar levels, and it also helps to prevent the build-up of cholesterol, which is responsible for a large number of diseases in adults. Green tea is also a powerful deterrent against the chemicals known to cause high blood pressure, thanks to its main ingredient, catechin – which is also a powerful antioxidant, along with vitamin E and vitamin C. These three antioxidising agents are contained in large quantities in green tea, and they lend a lot of weight to the argument that green tea helps to suppress ageing and make you look younger! Catechins are also proven to have an effect on the reduction of cancer rates, leading to more and more interest in the idea that green tea can somehow be used to help prevent cancer.
Useful Links:
http://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/features/health-benefits-of-green-tea
http://www.umm.edu/altmed/articles/green-tea-000255.htm
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