By Susan E. Fekety, RN, MSN, CNM
I probably never told you that once I spent several weeks in Japan. I had a splendid time there because (for one thing) in Japan I am Not Short, so all the chairs were comfortable. But also, I noticed green tea stuff everywhere. Green tea for drinking (hot or cold, with or without the meditative ceremony,) green tea ice cream, green tea candy, green tea soda, green tea cosmetics and well – entire stores just for green tea stuff (typically painted a color I can only call “Asian institutional seafoam.”)* Someone explained that the Japanese revere green tea as a powerful cancer preventive. At the time, I remember thinking this was quaint. (This was years ago, before I Evolved.) Come to find out, in countries where people drink a lot of green tea there really is less cancer.
And now green tea is everywhere. Folks are all excited about stuff that looks to me like sticks in water, and patients are asking me about whether they should take the extract and, well, it IS perfect with sushi. But here’s the real thrill: Japanese scientists have found that some components of green tea can specifically block the effects of dioxins. Dioxins are a family of exceedingly toxic chemicals which cause neurologic disease, immune dysfunction, reproductive disorders, and human and animal cancers, and almost undoubtedly, there is some in your body right now. Green tea contains catechins: antioxidant chemicals which protect your cellular DNA from free radical damage caused by metabolism, pollution, radiation, etc. (All fruits and vegetables have some antioxidant capacity.) But while we used to think that all of green tea’s health benefits were due to its antioxidant effects, current research shows that catechins also work in your liver to help you detoxify bad chemicals – like dioxin. There are almost no words for how exciting this is, healthwise. (Surprise, surprise -- those quaint Japanese were on to something.)
Minor Tangent: I like to think about antioxidants and how they protect us from oxidative damage this way: Imagine you are a sweet young shrub and it’s spring and you are just starting to unfurl your new baby leaves and you are out in a field, toasting in the sun. Sun-toasting is a prime source of damage to cells and the DNA living inside them – you know that already, right? Plants can’t run indoors to protect their tender, newly-unfurled little leaves (or their priceless DNA-laden seed packages called “fruit”) from toasting in the sun, so what do they do? They make powerful antioxidant molecules and they load them into those leaves and seed packages – natural SPF. The antioxidants are usually packaged in bright-colored pigmented molecules to make them attractive to us creatures who should be eating them. Is that a deliciously clever plan or what?
Anyway -- so, why green tea and not black? (And what’s “white tea” and why is it so expensive?) All four main kinds of tea are leaves of the camellia sinensis plant. The color of the tea reflects whether, and if so how long, the leaves were allowed to ferment. White and green tea aren’t fermented; oolong tea is fermented a little bit; black tea is fermented a lot. The longer tea is fermented, the less catechins it contains. The youngest tenderest leaves have the most catechins – that’s white tea (and of course since it is young and tender it is precious.) Green tea uses mature leaves but they’re minimally processed, so if you’re saving up for new bike tires, choose green tea, not white. Black and oolong tea have less antioxidant capacity, but still more than coffee. Adding a little lemon juice appears to potentiate the health effects of your tea, as well.
In China and Japan, people typically drink ten to twenty cups of green tea in a day, so feel free to demonstrate wretched excess in this particular area. Teas from China and India tend to be heavily sprayed with pesticides, so use organic only. Don’t waste your money on green tea catechin supplements; in many studies where people are given pills containing the active antioxidant ingredients in fruits and vegetables, they just don’t work as expected (just like infant formula is no substitute for breastmilk, but I digress.) There is something in Mother Nature that wants you to have real food and perhaps a nice relaxing cup of tea and not pills. But you knew that already, didn’t you?
* They also have a brand of soda called “Pocari Sweat,” which I did not try.
©2008 Susan E. Fekety
SUSAN FEKETY, RN, MSN, CNM is a Yale-educated advanced practice nurse with special expertise in nutrition and dietary therapies. She provides comprehensive women’s health care at True North Health Center in Falmouth, and coordinates True North’s First Line Therapy program (a clinically-proven, user-friendly program for improving health, weight, mood, and energy in men and women.) Her book of affirmations for pregnant women can be found at www.pocketmidwife.com.
|
