Tea is a healthy drink. Many people like to have a cup of tea after a meal to relieve greasiness.
According to Shennong’s Herbal Classic: “Shennong tasted hundreds of herbs and encountered seventy kinds of poison a day, which he could detoxify with tea.” This shows that it has many therapeutic effects. The unique ingredients and functions contained in it include caffeine (refreshing and heart-strengthening), catechins (antioxidant and cholesterol-lowering), vitamins (including vitamins A, E, B1, B2, and C to supplement vitamins), minerals (rich in potassium to promote blood sodium excretion and prevent high blood pressure), flavonoids (eliminating unbearable bad breath), saponins (anti-inflammatory), and zirconia acid (lowering blood pressure).
However, no matter how healthy the ingredients are, there are taboos, which are the “food incompatibility” we often see at the back of the lunar calendar. If tea is randomly matched with other ingredients, not only will you not be able to absorb nutrients smoothly, but it will also produce pathogenic toxic substances and affect your health.
Do not consume these 4 ingredients with tea
1. Tea and sugar
Tea tastes bitter and is cold. Its bitterness helps stimulate the digestive glands, promoting the secretion of digestive juices and enhancing digestive function. Another benefit of tea is that its cold nature can help clear away heat and detoxify. However, adding sugar inhibits this function, so if you want to order a cup of tea when eating out, try to choose low-sugar or sugar-free tea.
2. Tea and medicine
The tannic acid in tea reacts chemically with certain drugs (such as ferrous sulfate tablets, ammonium ferric citrate, and berberine) to produce precipitation and affect the drugs’ absorption. If sedatives (such as phenobarbital and diazepam) are taken with tea, the stimulants, such as caffeine and theophylline in tea, will offset or weaken the sedative effect of the drugs. There are so many types of medicines that it is impossible to know them all. Therefore, it is recommended that you take all medicines with warm water, which is beneficial and harmless.
3. Tea and alcohol
Many people like to drink tea after drinking to achieve the effects of moistening the dryness caused by alcohol, eliminating food stagnation, and regulating body fluids, but this is not good for the kidneys.
This is because theophylline produces a diuretic effect when tea is consumed after drinking alcohol. The acetaldehyde converted from alcohol has not yet been wholly decomposed, but due to the diuretic effect of theophylline, it enters the kidney. Acetaldehyde is highly irritating to the kidneys and can easily damage kidney function. As a result, symptoms such as kidney cold, impotence, frequent and turbid urination, and testicular pain follow one after another.
4. Tea and lamb or mutton
Although eating some lamb or mutton regularly benefits the body, when eating lamb or mutton and drinking tea simultaneously, the rich protein in the mutton can combine with the tannic acid to produce a substance called tannalbin. This substance has a specific astringent effect on the intestines, which can weaken intestinal peristalsis, reduce the water content in the stool, and increase the likelihood of constipation. Therefore, drinking tea while eating lamb or mutton is not suitable. It is not advisable to drink tea immediately after eating mutton, either. You should wait two to three hours before drinking it.
Tea is our most common beverage. Although it has many benefits for the body, you should also be aware of the taboos surrounding its consumption.
Translated by Cecilia and edited by Amanda
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