Do-it-yourself tea from plants at home - my recipes and tips. Herbal tea - healthy and tasty

Tea in our open spaces is a cult drink that everyone loves without exception. In addition to the great taste and smell, it has a number of health benefits due to its high content of antioxidants. In, which you still need to be able to cook properly, drinking tea does not seem to be too complicated a process. However, even here there are secrets.

1. Pay attention to the freshness of tea

Over time, the essential oils contained in tea can break down, which negatively affects its taste. Tea can last up to two years if stored in a cool, dry place (try an airtight container).

You won't get sick or poisoned if you drink expired tea, but the taste will be much better if you use it for six months.

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2. Freedom for tea leaves!

Tea leaves expand significantly when brewed. Therefore, in order to fully reveal its full potential, take care of the free space.

This means that you should give preference to loose leaf tea. If you still like tea bags, then pay attention to the pyramids, which have more space for tea.

3. Tea is delicious water

In our cup of tea, the main part is water, so it is not an exaggeration to say that the taste of tea depends on the water used, even more than on the type of tea leaves.

Everyone understands that chlorinated tap water is not recommended, but specific recommendations for choosing water depend on your preferences and where you live. Either way, take this matter seriously.

4. Boiling point

Just as important as the quality of the water is its temperature. Since childhood, we know that water must be boiled well, "so that there are no germs." However, brewing good tea does not require bubbling boiling water.

So, black tea is best brewed at a temperature of about 90 degrees, and green and white varieties at 70-80 degrees. Therefore, after boiling water, it is better to let it cool down a little to the required temperature.

And in no case do not boil water again and do not mix boiled and not boiled water - good tea will not work!

5. Not too much, not too little

Aim for 1½ to 2 teaspoons per glass of water for loose leaves and greens and herbs.

For most black teas, which are more compact and have a longer drying time, 1 teaspoon is sufficient. If you want a stronger and more aromatic drink, then add tea, but do not increase the steeping time.

6. Proper utensils

The use of the right utensils is of great importance for making delicious tea. It is best to brew and consume this drink in ceramic dishes, because it is not for nothing that the triumphant march of tea around the planet was accompanied by a fashion for porcelain and faience.

Now on sale there are a wide variety of glass teapots for brewing, which are also quite applicable. The main thing to remember is that making tea in a metal bowl is highly undesirable.

If the drink has stood too long, then it will taste too bitter, because the tea begins to release tannins. It's still not a health hazard (overbrewed tea is sometimes used as a home remedy for diarrhea), but it's hardly tasty.

Black teas will take about three to five minutes to infuse, while green and white teas only need two to three minutes to mature.

8. Not a drop of milk!

In our country, unlike some other countries, tea with milk is not very common. And it's just great! Milk proteins can bind to the beneficial substances of tea and weaken, thus its healing effect. Well, there is no need to talk about the taste of such “tea”.

9. Some lemon

The addition of lemon enhances the antioxidant properties of tea. Vitamin C provides an acidic environment for catechins within our bodies, making them more available for absorption in the highly acidic environment of our intestines. The addition of citrus can also help make the tea taste better, as it cuts through some of the bitterness.

At the same time, you can experiment not only with the canonical lemon, but also try orange, grapefruit, and so on.

10. Drink to your health!

Whether you strictly follow the rules of tea or take them completely lightly, remember that tea is not just a food product, but a real cultural tradition associated with relaxation and communication.

Even the cheapest variety, surrounded by pleasant interlocutors, can seem unusually tasty and vice versa. So the main secret of getting delicious tea is not at all in the field of cooking.

I am sure that many of our readers love tea and have "signature" ways to brew it. We are waiting for them in your comments!

Herbal medicinal teas, tinctures, uzvars and decoctions came to us from ancient times. People have long used the magical power of medicinal plants to prevent and treat ailments, improve immunity and improve health. Each hostess was a bit of a witch and knew how to properly use the generous natural gifts: herbs, berries, flowers, leaves and roots. Ancient recipes of fragrant herbal teas are still used by people with pleasure.

Delicious and healthy herbal teas can be prepared at home. The ability to properly select and combine natural ingredients will help you get the full benefit and pleasure of a fragrant drink.

A selection of the best herbal teas according to old recipes:

1. Healing chamomile tea. Sunny chamomile flowers contain salicylic, nicotinic acid, vitamin C, essential oils, pectins, carotene, gum, proteins and flavonoids. Chamomile tea has a calming, diaphoretic, anti-inflammatory, analgesic and sedative effect. Warm chamomile infusion will help to cope with insomnia, stress, overwork and depression. Mix two tablespoons of dried crushed chamomile flowers with a teaspoon of mint and lemon balm. Pour in boiling water and cover tightly. Add a teaspoon of honey to the finished drink.

2. Vitamin herbal tea. Grind a handful of dried wild rose hips. Add a teaspoon of thyme and strawberry leaves, 1-2 leaves of black or red currant. Pour the healing collection with boiled water.

3. Winter warming herbal tea. It will help cure a cold, increase immunity, ease breathing and coughing. To prepare it, mix equal parts sage, chamomile, linden, thyme, coltsfoot, oregano and rosemary. Add raspberry leaves, currants, lemon or orange zest. Brew medicinal herbal collection in a thermos.

4. Herbal tonic drink. Mix equal amounts of rosemary, Chinese magnolia vine, lingonberry and blackcurrant leaves, wild rose flowers, and red clover in a glass bowl. Pour 500 ml of hot boiled water into a spoon with a slide of the mixture and leave for a third of an hour.

5. Unique eucalyptus tea has strong antibacterial properties. Helps with diseases of the oral cavity, bronchitis and asthma. This is an excellent lifesaver drink for diabetics. Pour a cup of boiling water over a teaspoon of eucalyptus leaves. You can add flower honey to taste.

6. Anti-inflammatory herbal tea. Combine a dessert spoon each of dry sage, lime blossom, chamomile and nettle. Brew in a ceramic or glass teapot. Strain after 15 minutes. Add honey and a pinch of cinnamon to the finished drink.

7. Exquisite rose petal tea. Dry fresh rose petals on a thick paper sheet. Then grind them and mix with green or black tea. Brew in the usual way. The drink will acquire an original taste and a divinely delicate aroma.

8. Herbal tea with thyme invigorate, increase efficiency, give strength and energy, relieve pain. Pour boiling water over a glass or porcelain teapot. Then pour a spoonful of dry or fresh thyme, a currant leaf and raspberries. The time for brewing tea should not exceed 20 minutes.

9. Ginger tea for weight loss. Finely grate a piece of ginger root. Add half a fresh lemon and a spoonful of coltsfoot. Fill with filtered boiled water. Strain after a quarter of an hour.

10. Calming herbal tea Helps with insomnia, depression and nervous tension. Mix and brew in a thermos a teaspoon of mint, fennel, chamomile, lemon balm, hops, strawberry leaves and valerian.

Prepare and drink fragrant herbal teas with pleasure and be healthy!

In those days when it was not easy to get real Chinese tea, herbal teas gained popularity in Rus', which, being collected with soul, with their own hands, not only gave amazing combinations of taste, but also contributed to the healing of various ailments. Fragrant and vitamin collections included young leaves and berries of garden and wild shrubs, a variety of forest herbs. Tonic and soothing, warming and vitamin - in recent years, herbal teas have again come into focus due to the growing confidence in the healing power of natural products and herbs.

Most Popular Components

Herbal teas are not subject to any standards - there are countless of them. But if you analyze their composition, it will reveal a list of the most popular plants, the benefits of which are universal. In herbal tea, you can most often find strawberries, raspberries, currants, rose hips, hawthorn and juniper (young leaves, flowers and fruits), stems of St. , pieces of dried fruit and citrus peel. The best properties of tea are achieved by mixing several plants, and in this sense, herbal tea is an art that gives real room for experimentation.

However, herbal teas should not be thoughtlessly composed, because the benefits of one component can be leveled by the spectrum of action of another, and with such a cocktail, herbal tea can be harmful to health. In a properly selected composition of tea, all plants should enhance the beneficial properties of each other or not interfere with their manifestation.

Types of herbal teas

If you carefully study the range, useful herbal teas can be divided into several main groups depending on their effect on the body. Because of this, you should not use herbal tea just for the sake of your favorite taste: it can “play a joke”, depriving you of sleep at night or having a calming effect when the body needs to cheer up.

Vitamin fees

Such herbal tea will necessarily contain berries and fruits of plants, in which a rich vitamin composition is accumulated, which can support in the cold seasons and with a decrease in immunity: wild rose, hawthorn, raspberries, currants, red mountain ash, elderberry, apple. Such fees can be steamed in a thermos so that the dense structure of the dried fruits has time to give away useful components. It is not difficult to fortify tea with your own hands, enriching the traditional tea with available types of dried berries and fruits.

Calming fees

After the day's stresses, a tea made from herbs that demonstrate their soothing properties: mint, hops, lavender and motherwort will be useful. Often the collection also includes fennel seeds, linden flowers and chamomile. The sedative effect of these components is due to a mild antispasmodic effect and a relaxing effect on the nervous system. A cup of such a drink will help get rid of insomnia, relieve headache and neurotic heart pain, eliminate tachycardia and even out the pulse. As practice shows, soothing herbal teas are not inferior in effectiveness to pharmaceutical sedatives, while not having pronounced side effects.

Tonic fees

It is not at all necessary to drink coffee, wearing out the heart muscle, in order to bring your body into full combat readiness in the morning. You can only brew the “correct” herbal collection, including lemongrass, strawberry leaves, angelica, St. John's wort, rose hips or rosemary. To cheer up, sometimes it is enough just to add a clove bud, used as a spice, to your favorite fruit tea. The benefits of the active substances of these plants are to accelerate blood circulation and certain functions of the body, stimulate the cardiovascular and nervous systems and release energy.

Teas for weight loss

Herbal tea designed for weight loss is the first thing that those who want to lose weight turn to due to the relative cheapness of the product and ease of use.

Of course, not everyone realizes that if you continue to abuse calories, then herbal tea will get rid of edema and stool disorders as much as possible due to its diuretic and laxative effect.

The main component of such tea is often the herb senna or alexandrian leaf. The benefits of senna are due to the anthraglycosides in its composition, which endow it with a delicate laxative effect. Senna grass does not have a pronounced effect on fat burning, but it helps to cleanse the body of accumulated toxins and improves intestinal motor functions. It is not recommended to abuse senna-based teas in order to avoid the body getting used to external peristalsis stimulants.

By itself, the plant in the form of a tea cannot boast of a special taste, but the senna leaf goes well with the mint loved by many, providing both a cleansing and soothing effect, which is important for diets. Senna-based tea can be harmful during bowel disorders, aggravating diarrhea, and in overdose causing stomach cramps. In addition to senna, herbal tea for weight loss may include diuretic plants such as sage, nettle, lemon balm, rose hips, lingonberries and strawberries.

If exotic herbs like senna can only be bought, then plants of the domestic range, if possible, it is better to prepare them yourself. Experimenting with the proportions and flavors of homemade herbal teas is a lot of fun. The main thing is not to take lightly the properties of herbs and combine them correctly so as not to harm yourself and your loved ones. When collecting plants, you should follow the basic rules:

you should not indiscriminately cut branches or pull out whole plants: only young blossoming leaves can be cut off from a shrub, two or three from each shoot, and inflorescences must be left on flowering plants so as not to interrupt the natural process of their reproduction;
flowers intended for tea should be blooming, and berries and fruits should be ripe;
for most plants, the best time for harvesting is the beginning of flowering;
grasses are not collected during rain, as well as during periods of heavy dew.

It is best to collect plants for tea in ecologically clean areas. The mountains are especially rich in medicinal herbs. That is why Crimean, Altai teas and teas from the Caucasus are considered the most valuable.

Only properly dried plants are suitable for tea, without a hint of mold and the presence of moisture - spoiled grass can harm the stomach and even cause poisoning. Therefore, it is necessary to dry them in a well-ventilated area, spreading them in a thin layer on a horizontal surface covered with paper, or hanging them in small bunches in the shade.

The collection is stored for no more than 2 years in tight paper bags, cardboard boxes, wooden, ceramic or glass vessels with a sealed lid. Roots, such as valerian, a soothing component of tea, do not lose their properties for 3 years. It is believed that the crushed grass loses more useful substances during storage, therefore, if the collection is not mixed immediately, it is better to leave the harvested parts of the plants whole.

Proper brewing of herbs

Many, not knowing how to brew herbs, prepare herbal tea like a regular traditional one. However, herbal preparations have their own brewing rules. For a glass of water, use 1 tbsp. l. raw materials, and the boiling water itself must certainly be fresh, since repeated boiling deprives the water of oxygen and actually makes it dead.

Brewing time depends on the components of the collection. Tea from flowers and tender young leaves can be kept for only 3 minutes, during which they will give the main beneficial substances to the infusion. If the collection contains coarser leaves and twigs, the brewing time is extended to 5 minutes. And when tea contains seeds, bark, roots and pieces of fruit, it must be kept for at least 10 minutes, optimally in a water bath.

The longer the tea is steeped, the more concentrated it will come out, but it is better not to be zealous, because some plants, such as chamomile, lose their beneficial properties after an hour or two.

Herbal teas are a real green first aid kit. This is a complex spa procedure - hydration of the body, saturation of it with beneficial substances of tea and aromatherapy. Often people, having found the perfect recipe, to which the body reacts with a grateful response, keep it and pass it on to loved ones as a relic. The main thing is not to treat such tea recklessly, conducting experiments on yourself or abusing another “panacea” to the detriment of health. It is worth listening to the inaudible conversations of the organism and nature in order to extract only the quintessence of benefit from its riches.

How to treat hypertension at home

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How to make tea with your own hands?

There are many different recipes for making delicious fruit tea, and we will try to cover as many options as possible, starting with cranberry tea.

To prepare cranberry tea, we will use:

Orange, 60g.
. Lemon, 50g.
. Orange juice, 40 ml.
. Sugar syrup, 50 ml.
. Cranberries, 50g
. Cinnamon stick, 1 pc.
. Boiling water, 400 ml.

How to cook?

1. First, you need to prepare sugar syrup, for this we mix 50g. sugar and 50 ml. water, the mass should be heated until the sugar is completely dissolved.

2. Cut orange and lemon into slices.

3. Put orange and lemon slices into the teapot, then add cranberries, sugar syrup, orange juice and cinnamon stick.

4. Pour boiling water over all the ingredients, let the tea brew for 15 minutes.

Tea "Hot citrus".

Preparing the ingredients:

Hibiscus tea, 6g.
. Citrus fruits (grapefruit, orange, lemon) 1 slice.
. Honey, 40g
. Boiling water, 400 ml.

How to cook?

1 . Take a small saucepan and put hibiscus tea, fruit and honey in it.
2. Pour boiling water over all the ingredients.
3. We put the pan on the fire and bring the mass to a boil.
4. After boiling, pour the mass into the kettle and let the tea brew for 2 minutes, after which you can start drinking tea.

Tea "Transsiberian Express".

This tea is prepared on the legendary train that links Europe and Asia. It is the longest railway in the world, which passes through many countries, and therefore our tea combines the aromas of different places on earth. Let's prepare all the ingredients:

Frozen sea buckthorn, 100g.
. Orange juice, 200 ml.
. Ginger juice, 40 ml.
. Lemon juice, 40 ml.
. Honey, 40 ml.

The preparation is very simple - mix all the ingredients and heat the whole mass to 60 degrees.

Tea is ready!

Ginger tea.

Everyone knows firsthand about the usefulness of this tea. Let's prepare all the ingredients:

Orange, 200g.
. Lime, 60g.
. Ginger juice, 80 ml.
. Boiling water, 400 ml.
. Honey, 100 ml.
. Mint, 1 branch.

How to cook?

1 . Mash orange and lime, then add honey and ginger juice.
2. Pour in boiling water and stir well.
3. Add mint, and let the tea brew for 5-7 minutes.

Apple vanilla tea.

Another way to make tea drinking a little varied and unusual. Let's prepare the ingredients:

Apples, 100g
. Pears, 100g.
. Oranges, 60g.
. Lemons, 50g.
. Cinnamon stick, 1 pc.
. Vanilla syrup, 50 ml.
. Boiling water, 400 ml.

How to cook?

1. We cut all the fruits into small cubes and place them in a teapot.
2 . Add vanilla syrup (can be replaced with vanilla sugar) and a cinnamon stick.
3. Pour boiling water over all the ingredients, and let the tea brew for 10-15 minutes.

Tea "Berry mix".

A very easy and inexpensive way to make delicious fruit tea. In the summer season, making such tea is absolutely no problem.

Ingredients:

Fresh or frozen berries, 3-4 types of 10-15 grams.
. Honey, 40g
. Boiling water, 400 ml.

How to cook?

1. We knead all the prepared berries and place them in a small saucepan.
2 . Pour the whole mass with boiling water, add honey and mix well.
3. We put the pan on the fire and bring the mass to a boil, then pour it into the kettle.
4 . Let the tea brew for 2 minutes, after which we can start drinking tea.

Autumn has come, which means the time for soulful tea drinking with family and friends, or just in the morning and in the evening, to meet or spend another gloomy day with pleasure. Of course, I want to prolong the summer, its warmth and the aroma of meadows and forests. Aromas of summer herbs, flowers and berries are the best guides to summer. After all, it is smells that give us the brightest and longest memories. And the best way to awaken the aroma of dried herbs is to make tea with your own hands. If you haven’t stocked up on fragrant herbs in the summer, you have to drink flavored tea from the store, and this, unfortunately, is not as tasty and healthy as it is commonly believed.

Tea itself is tasty and fragrant, but only if it is fresh and of high enough quality. The tradition of adding aromatic substances to tea has a long history. These additives, of course, natural, have always played the role of a second violin, complementing, but not interrupting the rich taste and aroma of tea. In China, these are traditional flower petals - jasmine, lotus, osmanthus, rose, chrysanthemum and others. In England, tea with bergamot oil is popular, according to legend, obtained by accident. Tea with mint, thyme and St. John's wort has always been popular in Russia. And also an exclusively Russian invention - tea with lemon.

In modern retail chains, there is a separate class of teas with additives or flavors. As a rule, this is not quite fresh tea (a year or two from the moment of collection) and of low quality, which takes on a second life thanks to artificial flavors. Modern tea manufacturers flavor it in four main ways:
- synthetic fragrances,
- natural oils or essences,
- flavors with the addition of natural berries and flowers,
- natural ingredients (fragrant herbs, berries, and flowers). With the first two methods, everything is clear: all manufacturers write the composition of the product on the packaging. It is up to the buyer to drink tea with "natural identical flavors" or look for more expensive but truly natural flavored teas. Unfortunately, the demand for tea flavored with oils is very small, so it is unprofitable to produce it.

The third method of flavoring tea is the most insidious. Typically, these teas are sold by weight, and there is no information about the ingredients on their packaging. The buyer sees that the tea contains pieces of berries, fruits, petals and herbs, and does not even think that this is just a good marketing ploy. Natural ingredients mask the use of artificial flavors. To verify this, buy by weight some tea flavored with, for example, orange or strawberry. Prepare your own similar mixture, brew and compare the taste and aroma. A natural blend will be far from the richness of a flavored tea. Draw your own conclusions.

Many flavored teas can be made independently and, most importantly, without harm to health, because for ourselves, of course, we will use only the best and natural ingredients.

In ancient China, they began to flavor tea with their own hands not at all because they had to sell last year's tea, which had lost its aroma. The Chinese are an inquisitive people and love to experiment with everything edible. They added various herbs and flowers to tea to diversify the usual tea sensations and add a few more flavors to already familiar and fragrant teas. This is how jasmine green tea was born, and it is still the most popular flavored tea in China today. In order to achieve a delicate aroma and unstable taste of jasmine that does not interfere with the tea itself, the jasmine flower petals were dried along with the tea leaves, placing the tea on trellised shelves on top of the jasmine, the vapors of which soaked the aroma of the tea lying at the top. This is the best, but also the most time-consuming way to flavor tea. Another way is to mix tea leaves and jasmine flowers in layers, and then carefully extract the jasmine. This method is faster and easier, the aroma impregnates the tea leaves more strongly, but the aroma is not as gentle as in the first case. The third way is to simply mix dry tea with dry jasmine petals. Thus, jasmine is brewed together with tea - this is the simplest and crudest way to give tea the aroma of jasmine. This is done with any aromatic additives - they are either dried with tea, or mixed already in dried form.

Separately, we can say about the history of black tea with bergamot (Earl Grey). The fact is that this variety of tea turned out quite by accident and resembles the story of the origin of the famous Madeira wine. Once a ship with a cargo of tea and bergamot oil, caught in a severe storm, miraculously survived and arrived at the port of destination in England. During a storm, the ship rocked so violently that bergamot oil got on the tea boxes and soaked it well. The tea customer, seeing that the tea was spoiled, in desperation wanted to throw away the entire batch of very expensive goods at that time, but, nevertheless, having opened one of the boxes, he tried to brew a drink. The result seemed interesting to him, and he decided to put the tea on sale. In a short time, the tea was sold out, and the risky entrepreneur made a significant profit and a new variety of tea. However, this is just one of the versions of the origin of the popular tea variety. Anyway, tea with bergamot oil is popular all over the world and is the second most popular after jasmine. In the modern tea industry, the following term is found on the packages of bergamot tea: “flavor identical to natural”, which means that the aroma of bergamot was obtained synthetically and has nothing to do with bergamot. Usually such teas are cheap, the aroma of bergamot overlaps the tea one, leaving it no chance. If you overdo it with tea leaves, such tea is bitter. In contrast, teas flavored with natural bergamot oil, with the obligatory indication of this on the packaging, have a delicate, balanced taste.

In Russia, there is a traditional tea flavor from southern countries - lemon. Oddly enough, it appeared thanks to Russian roads. Such tea was served in taverns to tired travelers traveling in carriages along Russian roads, so that they would come to their senses after a long shaking. The sour taste and aroma of lemon refreshed the traveler, helped to get rid of lightheadedness and motion sickness, and also warmed and protected from colds. Subsequently, tea with lemon began to be drunk not only at stations and taverns, but also at home. It has spread all over the world so much that it is called only “Russian tea”.

Additives to tea have always existed in Rus', long before the advent of tea itself. Our ancestors brewed fragrant herbs to keep warm, improve health or cheer up. Consider only the most common of them.

. Fragrant mint leaves brewed with black Indian tea create a truly homely mood. If the tea is not strong, such a drink can soothe and relax in the evening. Mint is a very interesting addition. And it will be interesting not only for its aroma, but also for its useful properties. For example, for people who are unrestrained during a feast, mint tea will help with a hangover in the morning. Mint also helps with indigestion, with a temperature or critical heat during a cold or flu. Mint will relieve irritation and reduce coughing even with bronchitis. Turkish researchers found that daily mint tea reduced unwanted hair growth in women, but no basic research has been done on this topic. And of course, mint calms, pacifies and gives a healthy sleep - it was not for nothing that in the old days girls put mint under their pillows to see their future spouse in a dream. Tea with mint is loved not only in Russia, but also far beyond its borders. For example, in Algeria they make very strong and very sweet tea with mint. In this drink, the concentration of all components is so strong that it resembles a thick syrup.

. It is known that rose hips contain 50 times more vitamin C than fresh lemons. A huge amount of antioxidants in rose hips prevents the aging of the body, and potassium salts make the heart strong and prolong an active life. In addition, the rosehip contains a huge amount of microelements, vitamins, tannins and essential oils necessary for a person. All together makes a very useful drink. The aroma and taste of wild rose brewed with black tea is very interesting.

Leaves and berries of currant. Everyone knows that currant leaves are traditionally added to homemade salting. They give the pickles a fresh summer morning flavor. The same currant leaves can be added to tea. Dried berries can also be brewed, allowing them to swell and release their aroma. The taste of currant is tart, with a slight sourness, it will delight and invigorate you on a rainy autumn evening.

St. John's wort tea- a truly popular drink. Thrifty housewives harvest this herb in the summer and brew it in autumn, winter and early spring to prevent colds or to please themselves with fragrant and fragrant tea that smells of fresh meadow and summer daytime heat. The beneficial properties of St. John's wort go far beyond the usual addition to tea. St. John's wort contains a large amount of tannins and essential oils, which help to avoid gum disease and inflammation in colitis. Decoctions of St. John's wort treat burns and skin diseases. St. John's wort helps relieve depression, bounce back with nervous anxiety. St. John's wort will be useful for schoolchildren and students, because it has the ability to concentrate. Elderly people with weak hearts can reduce the risk of seizures with the calming effects of St. John's wort. The only contraindication of this wonderful fragrant herb is that St. John's wort increases sensitivity to ultraviolet rays, especially in fair-skinned people who are intolerant to sunburn. Therefore, tea with St. John's wort is best drunk in the cool season.

- a very tasty and healthy addition to tea, like many fruits of our land. You can brew both leaves and cranberries. Freshly picked cranberries are especially rich in vitamins and useful active substances. The content of vitamin C in cranberries is similar to that of oranges, lemons, grapefruits and garden strawberries. In addition to vitamin C, cranberries contain vitamins B1, B2, B5, B6, PP. And vitamin K1 (phylloquinone), found only in cabbage and cranberries, is simply necessary for the regulation of blood clotting and the absorption of calcium, such a necessary element for building bone tissue. Calcium is found in many foods, but it is extremely difficult for the human body to absorb. Cranberry in this process plays the role of a transporter. Making your own tea with cranberries is very easy - just grind it into a mush and brew it with your favorite tea.

There are several basic ways to make tea. with any additive in the form of dried herbs or berries. In these cases, you can take any tea, but the most common medium- or large-leaf black Indian, Ceylon or Chinese is preferable. Coarse Kenyan black tea may well be suitable for these purposes. You can try with pressed Chinese green teas. For example, Yunnanese - their light smoky aroma and rather thick and cloudy color of the infusion are perfect for brewing with herbs.

Method one.

Mix herbs and tea in a teapot, brew, pour into cups and drink. The disadvantage of this method is that with long brewing, which is necessary for many herbs and berries, the taste of tea deteriorates. If you focus on the time of brewing tea, the taste and aroma of additives will not be fully revealed.

Method two.

Brew the herb in a separate teapot, letting it brew for a little longer. Then mix together in a teapot where tea is brewed. With this method, it is possible to vary the content of additives in the drink from a few drops to equal parts.

Method three.

Make an intense decoction in a water bath. To do this, we place the necessary components in a separate heat-resistant container, which we put in a pot of boiling water. Thus, herbs are infused in hot, but not boiling water, which is important for preserving beneficial properties. In no case should tea be brewed in this way - with prolonged heating, tea becomes more harmful than useful. Therefore, tea is brewed separately - as usual.

Method four.

Pour the herbs into warm water, bring to a boil and let it brew for an hour. Mix the resulting infusion with separately brewed tea.

Method five.

It consists in steaming all the components in a thermos at a sufficiently high temperature. To do this, you need to take any suitable thermos with a glass (not metal!) Flask, place all the desired components there and pour hot, but not boiling water.

In conclusion, a few words should be said about the water with which tea is brewed. Water for herbal teas or tea with herbs and berries should be of the best quality (ideally from a spring), have no taste or smell, leave no lump in the throat and scale in the teapot. If such water is not available, you can use bottled water from artesian wells. Pay attention to the degree of hardness of the water. In spring water, the hardness indicator is a dropping white precipitate. There is nothing wrong with it, but in such water, tea gives off less aroma and taste. In bottled water, the hardness of water is defined as moles per cubic meter (mol / m 3), a good indicator is 1-5 mol / m 3, an acceptable one is 5-7 mol / m 3. More than 7 mol / m 3 has hard water, unsuitable for brewing tea. It is best to warm water in an ordinary enameled kettle over an open fire. The fire should be of medium intensity, in order to make it easier to understand when it needs to be turned off. The fact is that water for tea cannot be allowed to boil, otherwise all the salts and useful elements contained in the water will precipitate. The criterion for the readiness of water is a continuous chain of bubbles from the bottom of the teapot - this is the boiling stage, at which the fire should be turned off, the water should be allowed to calm down a bit (literally a minute) and then tea should be brewed. Do not be afraid that the water will cool down during this time. Try to avoid heating water in plastic electric kettles. The water in them boils unexpectedly, warms up unevenly, and a completely non-tea smell can stand out from the plastic walls.

Stay healthy and drink tea!