Green Tea for Heart Health
Hi Byte Wellness Fam,
How are you feeling?
I’m excited. We’re stepping into a new era in our community- one that, hopefully, gives you more of what you need to make great wellness decisions for yourselves. As you do that, check out the recording of this week’s #PhyteWellWednesday Workshop. If you didn’t get an invite to the workshop, send TEXT to 1(866)717-1919 to join the text thread and get weekly invites sent to your phone.
As we change things up, it’s important that you continue to guide the ship. Please let me know which changes are (and aren’t) working for you. This community is here for YOU and YOU are the community. This month, I’m taking feedback calls with you all.
Click here to sign up for a 15-minute call to tell me what you think:
#PhyteWell QUIZ:
Which green tea below is best for heart health & has no added sugars?
(Choose 1)
A) Tazo Green Tea Bags
B) Tazo Green Tea Drink
C) Arizona Ginseng Green Tea
Answer:
A! Of all the options, Tazo Green Tea BAGS are the closest to a whole food. After all, tea is simply brewed herbs or spices. So, the green tea leaves in the bags are plant leaves that have been dried and crushed. That’s minimal processing. Then, it’s up to you to make the drink. You brew the leaves in hot water and decide what else to add to your tea. If you choose not to add sugar, honey, syrup, etc, then you’ve got a naturally sugar-free drink!
However, options B and C are pre-prepared green tea drinks that already include added sugars (and preservatives). They’ve already been processed.
How can you know whether your drink has added sugars?
Check the nutrition facts for the “Added Sugars” line and the ingredients list for the name of a type of sugar.
Why Drink Whole Foods?
Our take-away here is that even when it comes to drinks, choosing *WHOLE FOOD PLANTS* gives us more control over our health than processed items.
Why’s that? If we eat them in excess, sugar and other added ingredients (like fat and sodium) can break us down more than they build us up. It’s easier to limit those potentially harmful ingredients in our food and drink when we start with whole food ingredients and add to them.
But, listen. We can not say this enough. Health and wellbeing depend on more than just AVOIDING HARMFUL THINGS.
To be healthy, to be well, we also have to GET ENOUGH OF THE HELPFUL THINGS. Balancing those two in a way that feels good to us is the practice of wellness.
So, how do we get enough of those helpful things in our drinks? Same answer- choose whole food plants. All plants have, what I like to call, plant magic- scientifically known as phytonutrients. It’s that plant magic, these special nutrients that only plants have, that make plants such an important part of the human diet.
Becoming Plant Magicians
Now, of course, the health benefits of plants aren’t really magic- they just feel like magic. Plants’ health benefits are very much grounded in science. Plants have hundreds of little nutrients that don’t show up on the nutrition labels. Those nutrients drive our bodily processes.
When you study the research exploring what plants do for our bodies and minds, you discover that the impact of plants is both gigantic and mysterious. Plant compounds take part in every chemical reaction in our bodies.
And, yet, scientists don’t fully understand HOW plants play such a huge role in helping us prevent disease.
Green Tea for Heart Health
So when we think about how green tea can lower our risk of heart disease, the obvious answer is: plant magic.
According to researchers, it’s the plant magic (phytonutrients) in green tea that are responsible for lowering the risk of heart disease.
Plant magic is what I call the polyphenols and other plant nutrients that our bodies depend on to be well. The catechins (specific type of polyphenol) in green tea benefit us in at least 2 different ways to promote a healthy heart and healthy blood vessels.
1) They help us prevent chronic inflammation (which is the common cause of heart attack, stroke, type 2 diabetes, obesity and so many other chronic diseases. They do this by handcuffing the main producer of inflammation: the NFkB transcription factor.
2) They prevent the blood vessel scarring that leads to clogged heart vessels and heart attack. That means, they help our blood vessels heal from the damage caused by high blood sugar, high cholesterol and high blood pressure.
Green tea leaves aren’t the only herb that has the power to lower our heart disease risk by cutting inflammation in our bodies. There are so many other herbs and spices have polyphenols and other plant magic compounds that boost our health.
THESE 4 SPICES (AND THE PLANT MAGIC THEY CONTAIN) CAN BE ADDED TO ALMOST ANY SAVORY LUNCH OR DINNER MEAL FOR AN EXTRA RACISM-FIGHTING KICK.
Peppers
Turmeric
Red Onions/Shallots
Garlic
Check in to next week’s quiz and workshop to review how these spices fight inflammation.
Do you drink tea? Do you drink green tea? If so, how often do you have the whole food version (plain tea bags and water)? When’s the last time you grabbed a tea drink from a cafe or a store because you thought it was the healthier option?
Happy Healthy Living,
Dr. Wuse