What is your frequently drink after water? Is green tea in your daily drink list or at least your choice sometime? It could be sure that we all have used some types of tea for this is one of the most popular drinks in the world. The interesting point related to drinks is that tea is considered to be the second most common use after water.
History of tea
Green tea is believed that to be used for a long time. Tea plants were known to be cultivated and used for thousands of year. They were believed to have origin from East Asia, at the cross of northern Burma (Republic of the Union of Myanmar) and southwest China region. Although the exact time of using green tea is not specification but tea was believed to use earliest by the Chinese around 10th century BC.
Green tea was firstly used together with other herbs there as a medicinal drink than a beverage. Green tea was used in other countries of Asia as Japan, Korea and Vietnam around centuries later. Latterly (from 14th, 15th century), tea was spread to other areas in the world such as Europe, India, US, Canada, Australia…Till now, number types of tea are used widely around the world.
Description
Tea or Camellia sinensis is plant which its leaves and buds are used to make an aromatic beverage. Tea plants are grown mainly in the tropical and subtropical areas. Some types could also be grown in the marine climates at some regions of US, Canada, Scotland, UK, Australia and New Zealand. The plant is perennial and possibly cultivated from both seed and cutting. Its height could be up to 16m, but it is mostly kept under 2m (usually at waist height) for harvesting conveniently. The young leaves and buds could be harvested from tea plants after about three years of planting. However, the seeds and cutting for cultivations must from the older plants.
Nutritional content
There are numbers of substances contained in green tea leaf. The most popularly were known are caffeine and antioxidant. The level of caffeine in tea ranges from 30mg to 90mg for 250ml serving, it depends on the type of tea. The antioxidants were known are epigallocatechin gallate and other catechins. There are also a little amount of some stimulants similar to caffeine and other substances.
Tea as beverage
Green tea leaves and buds are possibly used fresh or dried by infusing with hot water and serving after few minutes or couple of hours. Tea drink then is aromatic and would have the color ranges from slight green to dark depend on the variety. Tea when serving could have bitter flavor first but it would turn to sweet then.
Green tea is used as beverage all over world today. Depending on the places and areas, milk; sugar; flower; even spice could also be added to increase the drink flavor.
Tea is certainly known as a refreshed drink for a long time but if you have had chance to stand before a tea plantation, even without drinking, you still could feel to be much refreshed for its green color.
