Do You Know About These Green Tea Health Benefits?

Green tea benefits the heart, the circulatory system, the brain, the metabolism, the digestive system and, because of its antioxidant content, all of the cells of the body. Are green tea health benefits overstated? In some cases, the answer is “yes”.

Green tea benefits were first examined because of something called the “Japanese paradox”. It’s a little like the French paradox. Most health experts believe that people who consume large amounts of dietary fat and/or smoke cigarettes are more likely to develop heart disease and cancer. But the incidence of heart disease is low in the French, even though the traditional diet is high in fat. The incidence of heart disease, as well as stomach and throat cancer is low in the Japanese, even among smokers.

After several studies, researchers stated that one of the possible green tea health benefits was a reduced risk of stomach and throat cancer, primarily because the study participants drank a liter or more of green tea every day. After studying French populations, researchers found an antioxidant in red wine called resveratrol. They said that the antioxidant may reduce the risk of heart disease, among other things.

If we combine green tea health benefits with those of resveratrol, we might be able to lengthen our life-spans. Researchers arrived at this conclusion after feeding resveratrol to fish that normally lived for only nine weeks. After dosing a group of the fish with resveratrol, they lived an average of 56% longer than the group that did not receive the supplement. Of course, whether it has the same effect on humans remains to be seen.

If you really want to lengthen your lifespan, you need more than antioxidants. They are a good place to start, because they fight free radical damage, but they do nothing to counter glycation, a complex process caused by sugar molecules binding to protein within the human body. This binding causes a cascade of reactions that lead to the formation of advance glycation end-products or AGEs. The term AGE is appropriate, because these molecules have been implicated in Alzheimer’s, type II diabetes, heart disease, deafness, blindness, cancer and other “age” related diseases. [Read more…]

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White Tea Considered as One of the Most Expensive Tea in China

Bai Hao Yinzhen or Silver needle White Tea

Image via Wikipedia

White Tea Considered as One of the Most Expensive Tea in China

White tea is tea made from leaves of the tea plant Camellia sinensis. The leaves are harvested while very young, and the buds are still covered in very fine, white hairs. These hairs are what give white tea its name. White tea is cultivated primarily in China, mainly in the mountainous and fertile Fujian province, where white tea has a long history. The bushes on which the white tealeaves are to be grown are the ones that are best placed with respect to sunshine and rain. The finest qualities of white tea, often called Silver Needle, consist exclusively of the buds of tealeaves. These buds are hand picked during certain days in the spring, usually between March 15th and April 10th. By that time, the buds have reached the perfect balance between youth and maturity that gives the best-tasting tea. The leaves and buds are withered over a few hours, and then air-dried. The temperature and even the air moisture are taken into consideration during the production, and the art is to get a perfect balance between solar withering and indoor withering. [Read more…]

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Caffeine Benefits – Does It Boost Memory?

A Sip of Turkish Coffee

Image by Kuzeytac ( So, SO busy…) via Flickr

Caffeine Benefits – Does It Boost Memory?

Caffeine, like chocolate, often receives bad publicity. Whilst in some instances, and in excess, these can have negative effects on our body, they can also be quite beneficial.

I am not disputing that some people are more sensitive to the negative effects of either caffeine or chocolate. For example, excess caffeine can create anxiety, nausea (particularly if taken on an empty stomach), an increase in heart rate, and even depression in some people. And chocolate is certainly not something that should form the mainstay of one’s diet. If struggling with sugar addiction, or wanting to lose weight, there are more nutritionally complete foods that are available.

But scientists have turned up some interesting facts on caffeine. For example, caffeine actually blocks the effects of a neurotransmitter in the brain (adenosine) that otherwise makes us feel tired. This is why it works so well to keep us awake. It also encourages the release of another brain chemical, dopamine (as well as adrenaline). Dopamine contributes to a feeling of well being. [Read more…]

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