Doing my best to answer your question...the links all lead to my website which has a lot of information about different types of tea.
White tea is not just immature green tea leaves. It's a less processed type of tea...the tea is withered and dried, but not steamed or pan-fired the way green teas are. There are many different kinds of white tea as well as many different kinds of green tea. Caffeine content varies greatly from one type of tea to the next; "tippy" teas made with more buds and fewer mature leaves tend to have the most caffeine. Thus, silver needle / bai hao yinzhen white tea, a white tea made only out of buds, tends to have more caffeine than shou mei, a white tea made out of large leaves.
Some roasted green teas, such as hojicha or Japanese roasted green tea have very little caffeine, as the roasting destroys the caffeine. Unfortunately, it also destroys most of the catechins (hojicha has very little EGCG left).
If you're interested in the benefits of tea but without caffeine, you may want to look at rooibos or honeybush. Both are plants native to South Africa, which have been found to have many similar health benefits to the tea plant, and both are naturally caffeine-free. Also, you may want to look at pu-erh tea, an aged tea which is often much lower in caffeine because it has broken down. In addition, there are many other herbal teas that have been found to have health benefits...try looking up mint or lemon balm!
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Doing my best to answer your question...the links all lead to my website which has a lot of information about different types of tea.
White tea is not just immature green tea leaves. It's a less processed type of tea...the tea is withered and dried, but not steamed or pan-fired the way green teas are. There are many different kinds of white tea as well as many different kinds of green tea. Caffeine content varies greatly from one type of tea to the next; "tippy" teas made with more buds and fewer mature leaves tend to have the most caffeine. Thus, silver needle / bai hao yinzhen white tea, a white tea made only out of buds, tends to have more caffeine than shou mei, a white tea made out of large leaves.
Some roasted green teas, such as hojicha or Japanese roasted green tea have very little caffeine, as the roasting destroys the caffeine. Unfortunately, it also destroys most of the catechins (hojicha has very little EGCG left).
If you're interested in the benefits of tea but without caffeine, you may want to look at rooibos or honeybush. Both are plants native to South Africa, which have been found to have many similar health benefits to the tea plant, and both are naturally caffeine-free. Also, you may want to look at pu-erh tea, an aged tea which is often much lower in caffeine because it has broken down. In addition, there are many other herbal teas that have been found to have health benefits...try looking up mint or lemon balm!
I hope this helps!
October 21, 2009 - 12:38pmThis Comment
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