Drinking tea to promote weight loss?

Most of us like to drink a cup of tea, but can this drink help us lose our extra pounds?

Forget about the latest trends in diet and exercise programs to lose weight. According to some articles and studies, it seems that it is enough to sit and drink tea all day long to lose all your extra kilos. This seems like an ideal solution... There is just one small problem - if drinking tea is enough to lose weight then why don't we have a perfect body?

Unfortunately, this is where there's a catch. It's not just one classic cup of tea a day that will be enough to radically change our silhouette! We need to see more exotic tea leaves.

What are the benefits of drinking tea for our health?

Stimulating the metabolism

While stars like Kate Moss, Kylie Minogue, Madonna and Robbie Williams were photographed drinking a good cup of tea, some other celebrities have moved away from their regular tea bags to drink teas from other places that are supposed to enhance weight loss.

For several years, model Sophie Dahl has advocated the consumption of green tea to increase her metabolism and lose weight. More recently Victoria Beckman has proposed Pu-erh tea, an ancient Chinese brew that would have helped her stay slimmer and look younger.

Burn more calories while drinking tea

But while green tea and Pu-erh tea have become known to their famous followers, these are not the only infusions known to help you lose pounds. A quick search on the Internet reveals that there are literally hundreds of teas that are intended to help you lose weight - and most of them are a far cry from your traditional Earl Grey cup, either in terms of taste or price!

One of the most popular is Wulong or Oolong - a tea that is said to be somewhere between black and green tea and is known for its stimulating effects on your metabolism.

Boost your metabolism and energy levels

Porangaba tea has recently received a lot of media attention after its popularity in Brazil, especially among those who exhibit on Rio's beaches. The drink, made from the leaves of a small Amazon tree, apparently suppresses appetite, stimulates metabolism and increases energy levels.

Benefits of drinking weight loss tea

Okinawan tea is another variety often talked about for its benefits in the context of weight loss. But beyond the fashion side and the fad around this tea, it is simply a variety of green tea that is often drunk by people living on the Japanese island of Okinawa. Certainly, the people who live on this island are known to have one of the highest life expectancies in the world and, until recently, have never experienced any problems with obesity.

But experts believe that the health of the inhabitants is mainly due to other factors, such as low stress, regular physical activity even when they are elderly, and of course a diet of lots of fish, vegetables and soybeans - in other words, their age and fitness are not just due to the fact that they drink large amounts of green tea. And the adoption of a Western way of life by the inhabitants is beginning to create problems of obesity, regardless of their tea drinking habits!

Cholesterol reduction, detoxification and appetite suppression

Feiyan Tea - a Chinese herbal tea containing green tea, lotus leaves, fatigue seeds and loofah - has many benefits for your health and your line.

This tea would also improve metabolism, some articles suggest that it also reduces the level of fat and cholesterol in the blood, decreases bloating and discomfort during digestion, promotes detoxification of the body and would have an appetite suppressant effect. For a simple cup of tea, these promises seem a bit excessive.

Weight Loss Tisane

In addition to the general confusion that prevails when you have to make your decision, you will also find a large number of teas that often promise to promote your weight loss, especially thanks to the specific herbs they contain. Herbal teas containing dandelion or nettle - two herbs considered to have diuretic properties - are often intended to help reduce water retention and therefore weight loss. Tea containing fennel - an ingredient that would reduce appetite - is also known to help lose pounds.

Tea's slimming effects

You don't even need to surf the net, go to your herbalist or a specialized Chinese grocery store and you'll discover dozens of slimming teas, many of which are now available in supermarkets. Tea made from apples, lily leaves, tianyeju, tangerine bark, ginseng, cinnamon or cloves.

But can an infusion really help you lose weight?

This seems a little too good to be true... In fact, some herbal teas can do more harm than good if they contain certain herbs that have powerful diuretic or laxative effects. Urinary problems, diarrhea, and stomach cramps may be some of the side effects associated with some teas. Especially if you buy preparations online or from traditional Chinese medicine practitioners. Limited (if any) scientific evidence

Scientific evidence is limited when it comes to demonstrating the effects of teas on weight loss. To date, most research has been conducted on green tea. Green and black teas come from the same plant - Camellia sinensis - but the leaves are treated differently.

As a result, both teas contain similar amounts of flavonoids, which act as powerful antioxidants in the body. However, because of differences in their treatment, they contain different types of flavonoids. As black tea is fermented, the flavonoids become more complex in structure and are composed of the flavins and aubigins.

In contrast, unfermented green tea contains flavonoids called catechins, which have a simpler structure. The most abundant catechin is epigallocatechin or EGCG.

Combined with caffeine, which is found in green and black tea, catechins, and specifically EGCG, are believed to be responsible for the slimming effects of green tea. As a result, scientific research has focused on these ingredients.

Fat Removal with Tea

Unfortunately, while studies have shown that green tea can boost fat loss, most of the work has been done in test tubes or on animals such as rats and mice. In fact, very few studies have analyzed the effect of green tea in humans in terms of weight loss - and in many cases, although a positive link between green tea consumption and weight loss has been found, these studies have been poorly designed or conducted in a handful of subjects and therefore cannot be conclusive.

Calorie Counting

What to remember: Well-designed clinical studies are needed to confirm the weight-loss benefits of green tea.

Cynics claim that all weight loss benefits are likely due to reduced caloric intake when replacing their chocolate milk with a cup of black, green tea or herbal tea that does not count calories. And actually, that's a more than plausible argument. A cup of tea or coffee with semi-flavored milk and sugar contains about 38 calories.
Four cups a day are about 152 calories, a massive addition of 55,480 calories each year - a total of calories that can take up to eight kilos in a year! But if you replace these drinks with unsweetened green tea, you will lose those ten pounds! And chocolate drinks are not as good as a great cup of green tea!

Clearly, the slimming virtues of tea must be justified, but this should not prevent you from regularly drinking a cup of tea or an infusion. Whether you prefer black or green tea, there is ample evidence to suggest that these two types of tea may potentially have health benefits, especially thanks to the antioxidants they contain.

Health Benefits

While the benefits of green tea for the line remain uncertain, much research has highlighted the overall health benefits of the flavonoids contained in the tea. As a result, many health experts now suggest that four cups a day, as part of a healthy lifestyle and balanced diet, can help protect our bodies from the effects of free radicals, potentially harmful molecules that can damage cells. Tea can help reduce many risks of health problems such as heart disease, cancer, stroke, Alzheimer's disease and even cataracts.

Tea is a natural source of fluoride, a mineral that is important for maintaining healthy teeth. And although green and black teas contain caffeine, health experts say the amounts in one cup are insufficient to cause a diuretic effect.

So even if a cup of tea doesn't make you thin overnight, it can't hurt you. Our advice: heat up your kettle, and forget about cookies, sugar and milk to enjoy your favourite drink.