What’s The Best Herbal Tea For Anxiety?
Coming off the back of a global pandemic perhaps a cup of tea & a sit down is just what you need. Although old routines soon reestablished themselves, this century-defining event made room for new insights & ways of living. Professor Antony Klotz saw the “Great Resignation”¹ on the horizon; you may have dived into the world of kimchi; & the Office of National Statistics found that nearly half of the UK population reported high levels of anxiety² in March 2020.
With anxiety being the most common mental health disorder in the UK, just what is it really & is herbal tea the answer?
Anxiety Symptoms According to the NHS
If you’re feeling tense, afraid and/or worried then you are feeling anxious, and it is a natural human response that affects both mind & body. The NHS cite³ the following as some of the symptoms of anxiety:
Restlessness
Sense of dread or fear
Feeling constantly on edge
Dizziness
Dry Mouth
Muscle tension
N.B. You should see your GP if anxiety is affecting your daily life or is causing you distress.
Does Tea Reduce Stress?
Anecdotally, tea is known to reduce stress but does it really? Well, don’t mess with nature. Science has proved that a cup of tea or tisane can reduce stress. In 2006⁴, researchers used a double blind trial & found that 6 weeks of tea consumption reduced cortisol levels. At the Institute of Traditional Chinese Medicine & Natural Products, researchers used Guangdong herbal tea & measured the reduction of stress in mice⁵. That might be all well & good in the lab, but what tea can we drink at home to reduce levels of anxiety & stress?
Top 3 Herbal Teas for Anxiety
We’ve got so many herbal teas in stock they’ve got their own shelf! Here’s our top 3 herbal teas for reducing anxiety & stress:
Chamomile
If it was good enough for the Greeks & Romans then it’s good enough for us. Chamomile (Matricaria recutita) can be found growing at knee height right around the world. Its distinctive yellow & white head is both pretty & potent, with over a 100⁶ chemical components making up its biology, one of which is the helpful Apigenin, the natural muscle relaxant & mild sedative.
German Chamomile (M. recutita) is the most used chamomile in herbal teas today⁷. When brewed, a cup of chamomile tea does reduce anxiety⁸. It was observed that the use of chamomile extract significantly reduced symptoms of General Anxiety Disorder over an 8 week period.
How To Brew Chamomile
Our chamomile tea is 100% gorgeous! It’s cultivated in Egypt from the Nile delta & we sell it as full heads only as it gives the most bang for your buck. To brew properly, we recommend to brew using boiling water (100*) & let it infuse for 5 minutes. This will ensure maximum flavour & health benefits.
Green Tea
Anxiety can present itself as a reaction to stress. In 2011, the World Health Organization predicted that by 2030 unipolar major depression will be ‘the leading cause of disease burden’⁹. As one of its main bioactive compound, green tea’s chock full of L-theanine & EGCG (epigallocatechin gallate), which both have been shown to improve depressive moods & counteract the key factors that contribute to depression.
Matcha green tea, made from the ground leaves of tea leaves, has been proven to reduce both stress & anxiety. In 2018, with over 13,000 participants, Chinese researchers found a correlation between drinking green tea & a reduction in depressive symptoms¹⁰.
How To Brew Green Tea
As green tea is cultivated from new growth, brew temperature should remain under boiling. New growth is higher in amino acids which need a cooler 85* celsius water to draw out all those important antioxidants & not destroy their delicate cell walls. Our Sencha Samurai, Gunpowder green & Jasmine pearls love to be brewed for 2-3 minutes at 85*, while our Jasmine green, which is a mix of black tea, can be brewed at 100*c.
Our Gunpowder green tea is the most caffeinated green tea we sell as it is hand rolled. You can read more about that over at this blog post!
Lemon Balm
Described by Paracelsus, Swiss alchemist, as a herb to cure “all complaints supposed to proceed from a disordered state of the nervous system”¹¹, lemon balm is a potent herbal tea with many benefits. The European Medicines Agency approved lemon balm as a relief of mild symptoms of mental stress¹².
Sadly, Porter Hill does not stock lemon balm tea just yet, but clinical trials look promising. An article from last year in the International Journal of Advanced Research in Science, Communication and Technology showed lemon balm extract acted as a GABA-inhibitor - known to play a major role in controlling anxiety & stress!
Conclusion
Paired with a healthy lifestyle, herbal teas have been shown to help reduce anxiety & stress in humans. Whether it’s the muscle relaxing compounds in chamomile tea to green tea’s antioxidant cleaners, herbal teas are host to bio-compounds that can reduce symptoms of stress & anxiety.
T x
*
https://www.ons.gov.uk/releases/personalandeconomicwellbeingintheukapril2020
https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/conditions/generalised-anxiety-disorder/symptoms/
Steptoe, Andrew & Gibson, Edward & Vuononvirta, Raisa & Williams, Emily & Hamer, Mark & Rycroft, Jane & Erusalimsky, Jorge & Wardle, Jane. (2007). The effects of tea on psychophysiological stress responsivity and post-stress recovery: A randomised double-blind trial. Psychopharmacology. 190. 81-9. 10.1007/s00213-006-0573-2.
He, Rong-Rong & Tsoi, Bun & Li, Yi-Fang & Yao, Xin-Sheng & Kurihara, Hiroshi. (2011). The Anti-stress Effects of Guangdong Herbal Tea on Immunocompromise in Mice Loaded with Restraint Stress. Journal of Health Science. 57. 255-263. 10.1248/jhs.57.255.
El Mihyaoui A, Esteves da Silva JCG, Charfi S, Candela Castillo ME, Lamarti A, Arnao MB. Chamomile (Matricaria chamomilla L.): A Review of Ethnomedicinal Use, Phytochemistry and Pharmacological Uses. Life (Basel). 2022 Mar 25;12(4):479. doi: 10.3390/life12040479. PMID: 35454969; PMCID: PMC9032859.
Blumenthal M, Busse WR, Goldberg A, et al., editors. The Complete Commission E Monographs: Therapeutic Guide to Herbal Medicines. Boston, MA: Integrative Medicine Communications; 1998.
Amsterdam JD, Li Y, Soeller I, Rockwell K, Mao JJ, Shults J. A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of oral Matricaria recutita (chamomile) extract therapy for generalized anxiety disorder. J Clin Psychopharmacol. 2009 Aug;29(4):378-82. doi: 10.1097/JCP.0b013e3181ac935c. PMID: 19593179; PMCID: PMC3600416.
: http://www.xn--teinture-mre-6db.fr/files/ boutique/produits/doc/186603-3-melissa-officinalis.pdf
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/543c/bacdc2949e91de3f38999c9787ec81ea6ff1.pdf?_gl=1*ffx35s*_ga*MzA3NzE1MTc1LjE2NTkzOTE0NTQ.*_ga_H7P4ZT52H5*MTY3ODgwNDE3NC4xMy4xLjE2Nzg4MDQ4ODMuMC4wLjA