Ditch your coffee and start drinking matcha green tea
Scrap your cup of joe for a better option: matcha tea. There are many benefits to drinking this bright green beverage to satisfy your caffeine addiction.
Unlike other teas, matcha is the entire leaf crushed up in powder then served hot or cold. The origins of matcha come from China and made its way to Japan, where they drank it as a sort of medicine.
As many of us know, there are many health benefits to drinking all varieties of tea. Research has found the antioxidants in green tea can help prevent diseases and cancers.
Not only can matcha benefit you in the long run, but it also has short term perks such as sustained attention, memory and suppression of distraction, according to a study on the effect of green tea phytochemicals on mood and cognition.
Those attributes make matcha the perfect drink to pair with studying.
Coffee’s flavor is typically bitter, while matcha’s are mellow and creamy. Just like coffee, there are many different ways to try the drink.
Have you ever tried an iced matcha green tea latte from Starbucks? You should. It’s delicious.
In addition, there is also an ethical problem with the production of coffee.
An investigative report by The Weather Channel and Telemundo exposed how coffee farms make their workers undergo appalling conditions. These farms have children harvesting beans, which is illegal in Mexico and many other countries. Some are forced to live in literal tin shacks for weeks while they pick coffee beans. Keep that in mind while you’re sipping on a white mocha.
Of course, there are ways to check if the coffee you’re drinking is ethically produced and sourced, like using the ethical consumer website. But it doesn’t help the increasing demand for coffee all around the world, which fuels terrible working conditions seen in the investigative report.
Another reason to drink tea instead is that it doesn’t leave you with a crash that coffee can. Caffeine that’s in tea is absorbed slower, so you don’t get the coffee crash after the caffeine enters and leaves your system quickly.
Drinking matcha will also not give you jitters. This is because it contains the antioxidant L-theanine, which makes you calmer and more relaxed. I can say it definitely makes it easier to take notes when my hands aren’t shaking after I’ve downed a large coffee.
Another negative side effect I get when drinking coffee is sweating. It doesn’t matter if I’m cold, I still sweat when I drink coffee. Why put up with all of these side effects when you could drink matcha?
Matcha is the obvious better choice. You get the caffeine boost without the crash or negative side effects, medicinal properties, and it’s way more visually appealing.