Dr. Tea: Welcome to Dr. Tea's. I am Dr. Tea, author of 'The Ultimate Tea Diet,' where you are going to learn all about tea's secret weight loss abilities, and we are going to be guiding you over the next few weeks with a lot of tea information about losing weight and improving your health, one cup of tea at a time.
So let's get started with the basic fundamentals about tea today. 'Tea 101' with Dr. Tea. So first and foremost, this is Cami, my affectionate name for Camellia sinensis, the tea plant, and all tea in the world comes from this plant. White tea, green tea, Oolong and Black tea, all come from this plant.
So it doesn't matter which tea you drink for good health. It doesn't matter which tea you drink for weight loss, because they all come from the same plant. The key for you is to find the tea that you love to drink, and you would be on your way to weight loss and good health, one cup of tea at a time.
So when they produce white tea, they take the leaf and the baby leaf, which is just budding right there, called the bud, to the plantation. They clean it and dry it. That's white tea.
Green tea, the leaf and the bud taken to plantation, cleaned and dried, and then in Japan they steam the tea and in China they throw it into a beautiful wok.
Oolong tea, you take the mature leaves, usually four or five of them, clean it and dry it, and then they put it on to bamboo baskets of the plantation. They blow air underneath it, and that's called withering the leaf. It softens the leaf and in the old days they actually use to roll the leaf like this up. Today it's done by machine, and the process of rolling the leaf breaks the outer membrane, so the oils of the leaf actually are exposed to the air and the oxidation takes place, turning the leaf from green to blue green, and it has that fantastic color and smell.
Black tea, same as Oolong tea, except typically today they chop the tea out to expedite the oxidation, put some green, to blue green and then to black. One plant four different types of tea, so it doesn't matter which tea you drink. They are all going to give you the health benefits.
So let's get started. For those of you who are not familiar with making a pot of loose leaf tea, it's simpler than making a cup of coffee. You take your pot. You add a little hot water like so. That's called preparing your vessel. You do that for two reasons. Number one, it lays a little coat of water at the bottom of the vessel. So the leaves will stick and most importantly what it does is, it allows the tea leaves to open up. So I am going to add a little bit of my white blueberry. Now tea is not like coffee. So less is more, and I just need enough tea to coat the bottom of the vessel, and you can see the bottom is completely coated with a thin line of tea and believe it or not, this pot of tea is going to provide me six to eight different pots, because I am able to re-steep tea leaves whereas with coffee you use it just once.
So I wish you could smell this. Those beautiful leaves are opening up. The blueberries were starting to happen. I will add a little hot water, and of course, it really doesn't matter how long you steep the leaves. That's the matter of personal preference. I always say, one to two minutes. Some people prefer 2-3 or 3-4, but you find out what's best for you.
So while that's steeping there, let me explain to you for all you individuals that are very susceptible to caffeine, and that is, that you can decaffeinate any tea in the world. All what you have to do is, prepare the first pot like this. Thirty seconds later, take the liquid. Pour it out. Then take those saturated leaves without the water. Add water to it, and drink caffeine free from the second, to the sixth steep on.
I know my wife is very susceptible to caffeine and I drink the first pot. She drinks the second. I come back and finish it off because I am Dr. Tea, and I have got to have my six day cups of tea a day. So why don't you give that a taste and let me know what you think of that? One of our clients here at the tea bar today. Nice, you can taste that blueberry? It blends in nice with the white tea, and of course white tea is renowned, because it was a originally provided only for the royalty of China and now it is provided to everybody around the world.
So, for all of you out there, it's been a pleasure talking to you today, and stay tuned for my next podcast, where we are going to talk about the additions to tea. Lemon, milk and sweeteners. This is Dr. Tea from Dr. Tea's on Melrose, and I will see you soon.
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