Green Tea okay?

[Jenny1982]

Hello,

I was wondering if Green Tea or tea of any sort is allowed on a raw food diet? If not boiling hot, is it okay warm? Or boiled earlier but consumed cold?

I really love green tea but I'm just starting a raw food lifestyle and want to make sure I'm doing everything right.

Thanks for any advice!

Jenny

[rawpriestess]

Green tea has caffeine

You can make an herbal sun tea, by placing any herbs that you like in a jar of water and placing in the sun.

You can warm to the temperature you like as long as you can keep your finger in it then it will be what we call "finger warm" basically if you can keep your finger in it, it is still raw.

also add just a touch of cayenne and it will taste hot to your mouth.

I often do this with my herbal teas.

[Rawma]

Jenny,
I do the finger test suggested by rawpriestess with lemon in the morning and I find I don't crave my coffee! I think it's just the warm beverage that does it for me!
Lisa

[SamuelWilson]

Jenny, I just wanted to add that "white tea" is the closest thing to raw tea actually. Green tea is the next least processed. Black tea is the most processed and is what you drink when you buy Lipton tea bags from the grocery store.

I have inquired with white tea makers to see if the leaves were dried using heat over 120 and I have yet to get a straight answer.

I think the herbal tea is the way to go though. I recently started making my own lemonade (6 lemons, 3.5 C water, 5 oz raw agave) and it seems to mellow me out some and it is totally raw with zero caffeine. I think I found a substitute for tea, I appear not to crave my tea anymore. Instead my craving for tea was replaced with a craving for cooked pasta in a heavy sauce :(

[sport]

I would have thought that the reason we did not cook our food was to preserve the goodness that was in it and not kill it. I feel that the amount of goodness that is in the herb tea is not making a significant contribution to my daily intake and I can afford to kill it without depriving me of much neutrients so I still put my herb tea in boiling water and let them cool just a little. Does anyone know of a good reason why I should not do this.

[joy]

Sport, I agree.

To me, tea is not a "living food" to begin with (I mean the fired leaves, not the fresh tea leaves), and various kinds have been used for medicinal purposes for centuries. The benefits of some kinds of teas and tisanes (herbal infusions) far outweighs my concerns about whether or not it is "really raw."

Ultimately, this seems to be one of those things that is left to the individual, based on how particular s/he wants to be about rawness. Some use vinegar, some don't, some use miso, some don't...some drink tea...

...I do. But I'm biased, as I used to be a pastry cook in a tearoom ;)

[Arky]

Without getting specifically into the 'rawness', or otherwise, of green tea, you might care to peruse the following thread, for other considerations on the topic:

http://www.rawfoodtalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4917

However, there are potential health benefits which I feel may make the consumption of green tea viable, if consumed in small quanitities, despite flouride concerns. By this, I do not refer to the much-vaunted (but not as well-proven as is claimed) antioxidant status of the catechins etc in green tea, but to it's usefulness as a substrate for Kombucha, which has many health-supporting benefits, not least by assisting one's body in drawing the maximum number of nutrients from whatever food one ingests:

http://happyherbalist.com/kombucha.htm

If you're not strictly vegan, you could consume goats milk kefir instead of Kombucha, for much the same benefits, thus rendering the Kombucha argument redundant as support for the inclusion of green tea in one's diet. Note that it is also possible to get non-dairy kefir variants, which may serve as non-tea and non-dairy alternatives.


J.

[Mike]

Go for it!

The hot water won't destroy the nutrients in Green Tea.

I heat my water to 110 degrees or less so
the herbs are still raw.

Green tea has many beneficial nutrients and
unique anti-oxidants not found in other foods.

I love the green tea's with added ginger and echinacea.

I also love the "Yogi" Detox tea, Pau D'arco and
Cat's Claw teas, Yerba Mate, echinacea immune
support tea, milk thistle, dandelion, ginseng, and
many others.

I feel the caffeine and flouride levels in green
tea are very small and our body doesn't have
any trouble dealing with them. The caffeine
level is insignificant and won't harm the body.

I feel the flouride in green tea is beneficial and
healthy. When you hear about how flouride is
bad, toxic, and unhealthy, it is generally refering
to inorganic flouride, a man-made chemical.

The flouride found in green tea is in organic
plant form and our body can use it to create
health. The flouride added to drinking water
is toxic because it's a chemical and not in
organic plant form.

Another example of this is the mineral iron. We need
iron in organic plant form. The inorganic form of iron
found in soil is toxic and cannot be used.

One of my favorite blends is Dr. Richard Schulze's
Detox Tea, it is powerful=>

http://www.herbdoc.com/p30.asp

This tea has numerous health benefits, it is literally an
all-purpose herbal tonic. First, it is based on a famous,
ancient East Indian digestive tea formula. Over the
years in my clinic, I have seen my patients leap off the
food programs and eat almost anything.

Detoxification Tea is so powerful, they could eat almost
anything and survive, especially if they drank a cup before,
during or after the meal. It is a powerful stimulant to the
entire digestive process, especially the stomach, liver and
digestive side of the pancreas.

This tea also cleanses the skin and detoxifies the blood,
liver, and gallbladder, and is the perfect tea to use after
the Liver Flush Drink (See my 5 Day Cleansing and
Detoxification Program).

It stimulates your liver to produce more bile and then
flushes away the bile and fats that congest your liver
and gallbladder. It is an immune system tonic and also
a mild diuretic and disinfectant to the kidneys and
bladder and will cause you to urinate more within an
hour after ingestion.

This tea is also an excellent coffee replacement. It is a
hot beverage, dark in color, and tastes good. It’s even
better when a little pure maple syrup is added to the brew.

It also increases your circulation, but has no caffeine. I
used it in my clinic successfully for years to help people
kick the coffee habit and.......

[rawpriestess]

The original question was is this allowed in a raw food diet?

The answer is no, it is not raw.

If it is heated above 120 degrees it is not raw.

It will have no enzymes left, especially sitting in this hot water for a long time.

That does not mean it doesn't have some benefits or has some nutrients, ALL foods, even cooked have some nutrients.

But the questions was not, does this have nutrients, it was is this acceptable on a raw food diet?

And the answer is still NO.

However everyone does have their own choices, and many have decided that tea or coffee or cacao nibs, or canned black olives or ketchup whatever will be their "ONE" food that is not raw.

There is nothing wrong with this, but it doesn't work for me.

I must be 100% raw, or not at all, I know myself this well.

[Jenny1982]

Thank you all for your answers and comments! It was my first post and everyone was really generous and helpful.

This is a great forum!

Jenny :D

[Punky]

To me, tea is not a "living food" to begin with (I mean the fired leaves, not the fresh tea leaves), and various kinds have been used for medicinal purposes for centuries. The benefits of some kinds of teas and tisanes (herbal infusions) far outweighs my concerns about whether or not it is "really raw."

Ultimately, this seems to be one of those things that is left to the individual, based on how particular s/he wants to be about rawness. Some use vinegar, some don't, some use miso, some don't...some drink tea...

...I do. But I'm biased, as I used to be a pastry cook in a tearoom ;)

For me, I agree with Joy; meaning I still drink herbal and green teas without much worry. Do I think it is raw? no, it is not. So one has to come to their own conclusions if they want to still include them in their raw lifestyle.

[nemo]

herbal tea, and 'raw' (which really aren't) supplements are the reason that i no longer consider myself '100% raw'... now i'm more like 80-90% raw with herbal teas, and natural 'supplements' making upthe rest... i don't feel like i 'need' them i just like them.

to each their own though.

nemo

[Arky]

While I remain to be convinced about the acceptability of the flouride in green tea, I do appreciate the fact that using tea for the purposes of brewing Kombucha may yield benefits that possibly outweigh the negatives of flouride.

There's a discussion on the differences between a few different types of tea, here:

happyherbalist.com/differences_in_strains.htm


J.