- How to make green tea for weight loss
Drinking Tea for Weight Loss?
Most of us enjoy a cup of tea, but could the nation’s favourite drink help us shift those excess pounds?
Forget the latest diet and exercise fads. According to recent hype,
it seems losing those excess pounds could be as easy as sitting back
and drinking tea all day. It sounds like the perfect solution for a
nation that already has a healthy relationship with the teapot – in
fact, on average, us Brits get through a huge 165 millions cups of tea
day. There’s just one hiccup though – if drinking
tea is all it takes
to give us Hollywood bodies, why as a nation, are we getting fatter?
Sadly, that’s where there’s a catch. Because it’s not our humble cup
of PG Tips or Tetley’s that reportedly has the power to melt away the
pounds! Instead, we need to turn to more exotic leaves. And
unsurprisingly, it’s A-listers that have led the way!
Boost Metabolism
While everyone from Kate Moss and Kylie Minogue to Madonna and
Robbie Williams have been spotted drinking a good old cuppa, some
celebs have gone as far as ditching their regular
teabag for one that
supposedly aids
weight loss.
For years, supermodel Sophie Dahl championed the way for slimming
brews after she claimed that drinking
green tea boosted her metabolism,
helping her to drop from a size 16 to a size 12. More recently
Victoria Beckman has taken centre stage, following rumours that she
drinks pu-erh
tea, an ancient Chinese brew that reportedly helps you
stay slim and keeps you looking younger!
Burning More Calories
But whilst
green tea and pu-erh
tea have made headlines thanks to
their celebrity followers, they aren’t the only brews that have been
linked with shifting those pounds. A quick Internet search reveals
there are literally hundreds of
teas that claim to help us lose weight –
and most of them are about as far away from a cup of Earl Grey as you
can get when it comes to taste and expense!
Amongst one of the most popular is Wulong or oolong – a
tea that
falls somewhere between black and green
tea and reportedly boosts
metabolism.
Boost Energy Levels and Metabolism
Porangaba
tea has received recent media interest following reports
that Brazilian babes frequently drink it from beach stands in Rio. The
brew, which is made from the leaves of a small tree found in the
Amazon, apparently suppresses appetite, boosts metabolism and increases
energy levels.
Weight Loss Benefits
Okinawan
tea is another variety that frequently gets promoted for
its
weight loss benefits. But read beyond the hype and it’s simply a
variety of
green tea that’s frequently drunk by people living on the
Japanese island of Okinawa. Granted, the people who live on this island
are known for having one of the highest life expectancies in the world
and, until recently, have had few problems with obesity.
But experts believe their good health is due to a number of factors
including low levels of stress, regular activity into old age and a
diet that includes plenty of fish, vegetables and soya – in other
words, their longevity and slim figures aren’t just down to drinking
green
tea. As a more Western way of life is being adopted on the
island, obesity is becoming an increasing problem, regardless of
tea
drinking habits!
Reduce Cholesterol, Detox and Suppress Appetite
Feiyan
tea – a Chinese herbal
tea that includes
green tea, lotus
leaves, cansia seeds and vegetable sponge – promises a huge number of
health and slimming benefits.
As well as claiming to improve metabolism, marketing materials
suggest it will also reduce blood fat and cholesterol, reduce
bloatedness, detox the body and suppress your appetite. For a small
cuppa, these are big promises that are largely based on unfounded
science!
Herbal Tea Weight Loss
Adding to the confusion are the large number of herbal teas that
sometimes link themselves with
weight loss, thanks to specific herbs
they contain. Herbal
teas that include dandelion or nettle – two herbs
that are considered to have diuretic properties – often claim to
eliminate excess water and so reduce weight.
Teas that contain fennel –
an ingredient that reportedly suppresses appetite – sometimes make
claims related to
weight loss.
Slimming Claim
You don’t even need to surf the Net, take a trip to Chinatown or
visit your local health food shop to get hold of slimming teas, many
are now available in supermarkets. Birt & Tang’s Figuro Herbal Tea
is available in Sainsbury's and combines pu-erh
tea with cassia tora,
apple, water lily leaf, Oriental water plantain, Tianyeju, tangerine
peel, notoginseng, Chinese cinnamon and cloves.
And whilst, the product doesn’t blatantly make a slimming claim on
its packaging, it does infer
weight loss by highlighting that it’s “for
people who care about their figures”. Dr Stuart’s Slim Plus, also
available from Sainsbury’s, combines fennel with linden leaves,
dandelion root, corn silk, galangal root, green oat and natural orange
flavour, and claims it’s “a really refreshing way to kick start your
day and get into shape”.
But can having a brew really help you lose weight?
It sounds too good to be true – and according to most experts that
really is the case. In fact, some herbal
teas may actually do more harm
than good if they include certain herbs that have potent diuretic or
laxative effects. Excessive urination, diarrhoea and stomach cramps may
be just some of the side effects associated with some of the more
unusual ‘
tea’ preparations that can be bought on the Net or from
practitioners of traditional Chinese medicine.
Limited Scientific Evidence
There’s also limited scientific evidence to confirm that slimming
teas actually work to shift those pounds. To date, most research has
focussed on
green tea. Both green and black
teas come from the same
plant – Camelia sinensis – but the leaves are processed differently.
As a result, both
teas contain similar amounts of flavonoids, which
act as powerful antioxidants in the body. However, because of the
processing differences, they contain different types of flavonoids. As
black tea is fermented, the flavonoids have a more complicated
structure and consist of theaflavins and thearubigins.
In contrast, unfermented
green tea contains flavonoids called
catechins, which have a simpler structure. The most abundant of these
catechins is epigallocatechin gallate or EGCG.
Together with caffeine – which is found in both green and
black tea –
it’s thought that catechins, and specifically EGCG, are responsible
for the slimming effects of
green tea. Consequently, research has
focussed on these ingredients.
Fat Burning Properties
Sadly though, whilst studies have revealed that
green tea may reduce
fat and boost metabolism, most work has been carried out in test tubes
or animals such as rats and mice. In fact, very few studies have
looked at the fat-burning or
weight loss potential of
green tea in
humans – and in many cases, although a positive link has been found
between
green tea consumption and
weight loss, these studies have been
poorly designed or included only a handful of subjects.
Calorie Counting
Bottom line: more well-designed clinical studies are needed to firmly confirm the
weight loss benefits of
green tea.
Cynics argue that any
weight loss benefits are probably down to the
calorie savings made by switching from a milky, sugary cup of black
tea
to a calorie-free cup of green or herbal tea. And in reality, this is a
feasible argument. A standard mug of tea with semi-skimmed milk and
1tsp sugar contains 38 calories.
Four cups a day totals 152 calories, adding up to a massive 55,480
calories a year – ultimately, enough to help you lose 16lb in a year if
you replaced those mugs with calorie-free green tea! Plus, chocolate
digestives don’t taste as good with green tea!
Slimming Benefits Need Investigation
It’s clear that the slimming benefits of tea need more
investigation, but that shouldn’t put you off drinking your regular
brew. Whether you prefer black or green tea, there’s plenty of evidence
to suggest that both can potentially benefit health, thanks to the
antioxidants they contain.
Health Benefits Clear
Whilst the slimming benefits of green tea remains unclear, a large
amount of robust research has focussed on the overall health benefits
of flavonoids in tea. As a result, many health experts now suggest that
as part of a healthy lifestyle, four cups a day could help to protect
our bodies from the effects of free radicals – potentially harmful
molecules that can damage cells. In turn, this may help to lower our
risk of many health problems including heart disease, cancer, strokes,
Alzheimer’s disease and even cataracts.
Tea is a natural source of fluoride, a mineral that’s important for
healthy teeth. And even though both green and black teas contain
caffeine, health experts say there’s an insufficient amount in a cup of
tea to cause a diuretic effect. As a result, both the Food Standards
Agency and the British Dietetic Association say that tea counts towards
our daily fluid requirement.
So even if a cuppa won’t make you slim overnight, chances are it’s
not going to do you any harm. Our advice: put the kettle on, skip the
sugar and biscuits and enjoy your favourite brew!