Guide to Tea

According to legend, Emperor Shen Nung discovered tea in 2732 BC. One day, wind blew leaves from a wild tree into his pot of boiling water. He sipped the intriguing brew and was instantly enchanted by its delicate flavor and refreshing effect. Shen Nung described a warm feeling as he drank the intriguing brew, as if the liquid was investigating every part of his body. He named the brew “ch’a”, the Chinese character meaning to check or investigate.

The Portuguese and Dutch first imported tea into Europe in 1610. Tea’s rise in England started when King Charles II married the Portuguese princess Catherine of Braganza. Britain’s new queen loved tea and began serving tea to her aristocratic friends. Word of the exotic royal beverage spread quickly. The ability to serve and drink tea with elegance and skill marked social status and indicated good breeding and intellect.

The Buddhist monk Dengyo Daishi is credited for bringing Chinese tea seeds to Japan. Tea became an integral part of Japanese monastery life and the monks used tea to help stay alert during meditation sessions. By the early 1300s, tea was popular throughout Japanese society, but its early religious importance permanently colored the meaning and value the Japanese associate with tea and directly influenced the Japanese Tea Ceremony.

Americans tasted their first iced tea at the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis, Missouri. An exhibiting tea merchant had planned to give away free samples of hot tea to attendees. When a heat wave hit, no one was interested in the hot beverage. To save his investment, he dumped a load of ice into the brewed tea and served the first iced tea. Customers lined up to try the invention. Today, Americans drinks almost 50 billion glasses of iced tea each year, accounting for more than 80% of all tea consumed in the US.

Drinking tea is less likely to produce a ‘caffeine crash’ than drinking coffee. The high levels of antioxidants in tea slow the absorption of caffeine, which results in a gentler increase in caffeine in your system and a longer period of alertness with no crash at the end. A cup of tea also has less caffeine than a cup of coffee. According to a study published in 2004 comparing 200 cups of coffee and tea prepared by consumers using their usual brewing habits, the average caffeine level in the cups of tea (black English style teas) was 40 mg compared to 105 mg in the cups of drip coffee.

When you think of avid tea drinkers, don’t you automatically assume they’re really healthy? I know I do. I feel like it’s a secret club of people that have all of this health wisdom that could easily be turned into a best-seller.

Tea is the most widely consumed beverage in the world next to water and can be found in almost 80% of all U.S. households. If you’re not regularly drinking tea, it may be in your best interest to become part of the club.