Tea Controversies

Controversies exist whenever two people meet and talk, and they can be about anything. So finding tea controversies should not surprise anyone.

Published 10 January 2020; revised 28 September 2023

Why Discuss This Topic

When working I would daily drink one cup of “no-foam, non-fat, 3 shot latte” Monday through Friday, as a drug to keep my mind focused on tasks. Once I reached menopause, I really seemed to need that extra caffeine boost in the morning, to keep me at peak working condition (mentally) for the day. (I put a link for information on menopause for those folks who are unfamiliar with the term.)

At home, however, my go-to at any time of the day is tea (or cold water). This is even more true as I am now retired. Coffee is occasional, while tea is daily. So you could say I am a very big tea drinker and take my drinking seriously enough to run into these controversies on-line and in conversations.

Controversies People Fight Over

Controversy about tea and drinking tea abound. Here is just a sampling, along with my opinions:

• Milk first or tea first?
  • Milk is last to be added, after tea has brewed a bit, so you can eyeball the color for when you have added enough
    • People in Britain thought milk was put in cups first to cool down the not water in order to prevent the heat cracking fine chin
    • But it has been shown that milk first lowers the temperature of the hot water, preventing a good brew
• Loose leaf or tea bags?
  • Loose tea is better, so the tea can expand and express itself fully in the water, also it allows me to see what I am making my drink from (twigs? actual leaves?)
• Cups or mugs?
  • Mugs are my choice because they hold more (unless you are having tea with royalty, then it is whatever they serve)
• Pour water over tea or pour loose leaf tea into water?
  • Pour water over tea
• Do water temps and brew times matter?
  • Yes, temperature and brew times matter which is why I have details on my My Favorite Chinese Tea is from Verdant Tea post.
• What is it about Earl Gray?
  • As to Earl Gray, it is my favorite flavored black tea
  • Only add lemon and perhaps some sweetness, if you want, but never add milk
  • See my Searching for the Best Earl Grey Tea
  • Captain Picard, Pooh bear, Mad Hatter, Doctor Who, Mary Poppins, and the Dowager Countess of Grantham all appreciate this tea (good for them, good for me)

Controversies We Need to Discuss

Here are some issues that really matter to me:

• Is it true that most tea is not washed before it is put into bags?
  • Yes and that means if the tea was sprayed with cancer-causing pesticides, those pesticides go directly into your cup (1)
  • So I buy organic
• Does tea cause cancer?
  • No, there are no inherent, associated risk from tea to cancer; but WebMed lists many benefits.
  • Risks identified are not with the tea itself but with pesticides, pollution, bad soil, etc., in fact, 2,000+ studies shown little or insufficient consistent evidence to suggest tea consumption increases the risk of any cancer (3)
• Do teas contain artificial flavoring, natural flavors, and are grown from GMO plants?
  • Yes, so be careful on choices you make as to brands
• Do plastic-type tea bags really deposit lots of plastic bits in our tea?
  • Yes, so any tea I now have that have plastic-type bags I have cut open and just use the loose tea (4)
  • However, I do not intentionally buy tea with plastic bags

FoodBabes Chart

A rather large internet controversy about teas was spurred by FoodBabe’s publishing of the follow chart. What it did was raise serious questions about the companies selling teas; all of them responded saying the chart was misleading.

Tea Importers Arguements

Even my favorite Chinese tea importer, Verdant Teas, has experienced the brunt-end of this type of controversy. From what I have read, in 2015, Verdant Teas was selling a tea that claimed to be plucked from a certain aged tree. Competitors, argued that the age had to be wrong given what the tea was selling for(too cheap), that the age of the tea tree could not be proved, and to them, the tea did not taste as good as it should.

I am clear on one thing, if the tea tastes good to me and matches what they say about the tea, I am good. No one appeared to say they were a fraud, or marketed untrue statements in general, so again I am okay. Bottom line, the world of tea is very competitive, and highly emotional for many who have worked in this area of food for a long time.

How to Buy the Best Teas

First: Know your provider

China grows the most tea of any country. However, I do not drink just any tea imported from China, as there is an astonishing history of unlimited pesticide use in that country. China rightfully argues that the pesticide use has positively helped expand the availability of foods to their peoples; it also (IMHO) negatively, and unnecessarily compromised people’s health.

The American Specialty Tea Alliance reports: lots of Chinese tea has been found to have traces of lead, arsenic, and aluminum caused by air pollution and then there are pesticides which have been found on cheaper teas from China and India. But when you buy tea from a third party you may not know where the tea actually came from. HeartAndSoul stated that investigators found that more than half of all the teas tested had pesticide residues.

• In my case I always buy my main black, white, oolong, and green teas from Verdant Tea (see my post My Favorite Chinese Tea is From Verdant Teas
• My interest is in organic, pesticide free, well planted and harvested leaves that actually support family farms, and ethical treatment of the land and its wild inhabitants
• Important too is that the tea is grown high up in the mountains to avoid the well known Chinese air pollution

Second: How to know quality

I prefer more orthodox-prepared teas because they are hand rolled, preserving the leaves’ aroma and retaining its more complex flavors. Since I mainly use loose leaf teas, I want to see and feel smooth, whole and sturdy dried leaves. I want some heft that indicates it is not too old or over dried. Also, like spice, when I have the tea in my hands and take a big whiff, I want to smell some of the aroma. If there is nothing, or a chemical smell, I will not use that tea. Like wine, tea should have an aroma, as well as a mouth-feel, and a complexity of appreciated flavor.

• Thus I do not use Lipton’s Black Tea bags or generic bagged tea
• However, during my struggling College days I did have a pot of black Lipton tea each day (with some milk) in order to wake me up and get me going (cheap tea)

Third: Get closer to nature

When tea indicates it is organic, it does not mean it is pesticide free, as there are organic pesticides. Be careful about the term natural flavors; to quote something I read: oil is natural but I do not want to drink it. Good labels are pesticide free, certified organic, or Rainforest Alliance Certified™.

Select loose leaf since these tend to be the higher cost and better quality teas. Look for information on how the teas are grown, harvested, and processed. Finally, you want to drink tea that people have staked their personal and business reputations on. But better is if the tea has been tested and certified.

• I consider tea served in any restaurants a “no name” brand, and will not drink it, if I cannot see its packaging
• In any restaurant, I want to see the label of the tea to decide if I want it or not, otherwise I may order something else to drink, generally just water

Fourth: Tea recommendations

Some bloggers and websites have indicated teas they considered safe to consume. I have linked to their web pages discussing their certifications and approach to their teas:

• Verdant Teas (my choice of a variety of Chinese teas)
• Red Rose Pekoe
• Buddha Tea
• Eden Organic
• Organic Numi Tea
• Mountain Rose Herbs
• Tao of Tea
• Mighty Tea

–Patty

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Tea News: June 2019 Dandelion Tea kills cancer cells but is not a cancer cure (3). The US tariffs on China includes Tea, so expect to pay more (4)

Article: My in-depth article on favorite tea, and one on herbal teas.

Tea Bag News: Increasingly popular ‘silk’ mesh tea bags and sachets are made of GMO corn-based plastic (polylactic acid) and can leach harmful chemicals like BPA. Some paper tea bags contain the pesticide Epichlorohydrin, a compound used to keep the bags from breaking (5). So pay attention to the tea and packaging.

Good Tea News: BusinessLine reports (12/2019) that Modern tea consumers pay attention to health and well-being but that is not all; they seek and pay for environmental, social, economic and ethnic attributes in selecting their tea varieties,” a position paper of the IGG observed.They continue, This has led to greater importance of sustainability issues in the food and beverage industry, in general, and the tea sector, in particular,

Newsweek (1/9/2020) reports on a study of 100,902 people from 15 provinces in China and found that drinking tea at least 3x/week appeared to extend a person’s life by average of 1.26 years, and these tea drinkers live heart disease and stroke free for additional 1.41 years more (than those who never or rarely drank tea.)