Loose Leaf Teas

For thousands of years humans have enjoyed the delicious taste and the health benefits that go along with drinking quality loose-leaf tea. People who drink tea on a daily basis know that tea not only tastes amazing, but it improves the overall quality of life.

It is interesting that although tea is the most popular drink in the world after water, in many countries, loose-leaf tea is not highly recognized. Hopefully this will begin to change as more tearooms emerge offering various types of loose leaf tea. The word is slowly getting out just how amazingly beneficial these kinds of teas can be.

Fortunately there are now over a thousand tearooms in the United States and more and more grocery stores are offering shelf space to tea products.

The water that you use with your loose-leaf tea is just as important as the tea itself. Many of these teas require carefully boiled water so that they can be steeped to perfection. In order for this to happen a tea kettle is necessary. If you are looking for the perfect tea kettle to get you started with your new love of tea then check out this list for the best whistling tea kettle. Whistling tea kettles are a great option because they convey an old fashion feeling while getting the job done. The mood is just as important as the tea drinking itself. Tea drinking, is after all, an activity of it’s own.

Thousands of Types of Tea

Many people do not know that for the most part, tea comes from one plant. The plant is called Camellia Sinensis. It’s incredibly that one plant alone can give us thousands of different kinds of teas. The distinct flavors that come from this plant to create different teas depends on many things such as the soil, the weather conditions, and geographic location. It also depends on the way the plants are blended and processed.

While there are thousands of types of teas, they generally fall under three main categories. These categories are black tea, green tea, and oolong tea. Two less common categories are White and Pueth teas. All of these type of teas have their own unique qualities that come from the different processing methods that are used to make them.

Black tea accounts for almost 70 percent of tea consumption in the world. Black teas process involves oxidation for several hours. Some varieties of black tea include English Breakfast, Assam, Darjeeling, and Irish Breakfast.

Oolong tea is the least popular of the main tea categories with less than 3 percent of tea consumption in the world. Oolong teas are partially fermented leaving it with a delicate taste. The caffeine content is much less than that found in black teas but more than what is found in green tea.

Green tea is not fermented at all leaving a leafiness to the quality of the tea. Freshly harvested leaves are rolled and heated without oxidation. Green Tea has a much lighter taste than most other teas, and is well known for it’s health benefits.

White tea is the most delicate of all teas and has its own natural sweetness. White tea is made from young shoots without any kind of oxidation.

Caffeine in Black Tea

When people are looking for a pick me up during the day, most of the time they will go for a nice big cup of coffee. However black tea has the same kind of caffeine that is found inside of a cup of coffee. This boost from caffeine can help to increase alertness and improve your overall concentration.

Many believe that it is best to stay away from caffeine all together but there is a great amount of benefits that can come from consuming it. Caffeine can help to reduce heart disease and it also helps the overall performance of the human brain.

If you are looking to indulge in some caffeine without overdoing, black tea is the perfect alternatives. A typical cup of coffee has 16mg of caffeine while a cup of black tea has half of that. So drinking a few cups of black tea through out the day is far less dangerous than it would be to have several cups of coffee.

Black tea undergoes a complete oxidation process which is responsible for the amount of caffeine and he strong taste that it has compared to other teas. How long you decide to steep your tea will also account for the amount of caffeine that will be found inside of your cup.