“Healthy tea” is not healthy, high-calorie, and drinkable.

     In the hot summer, the tea drink featuring “healthy cards” is particularly popular. However, experts said that the tea beverages on the market are basically flavored tea beverages. There are many problems such as low tea polyphenol content, high sugar content, and many food additives. They can only be used as leisure drinks, and they cannot be equated with healthy drinks.

　　 Most of the products on the market are seasoned teas.

Through a visit to a large supermarket, a variety of tea drinks are the "protagonists" on the beverage shelves. In addition to common green tea, black tea, iced green tea, iced black tea, the variety is further subdivided into oolong tea, milk tea, jasmine tea and so on.

On the packaging of these tea beverages, advertisements such as “infusion with real tea”, “100% tea naturally soaked out”, and “returned to the present” were specifically highlighted. In sharp contrast, in the inconspicuous position, the words "composite tea drink", "flavored tea drink", "flavored tea drink", "original tea drink" are marked with small characters. So what is the difference between these different tea drinks?

According to national standards, tea beverages are divided into four categories: tea (tea soup) beverages, flavored tea beverages, complex (mixed) tea beverages, and tea concentrates.

According to the type of tea beverage, there are strict requirements for tea polyphenol content in the standard. The content of polyphenols in beverages (tea soup) should be ≥300mg/kg, among which the polyphenol content of green tea should be ≥500mg/kg, the polyphenol content of oolong tea should be ≥400mg/kg, and the polyphenol content of black tea and scented tea should be ≥300mg/ Kg. If it does not meet the standard, it can only be classified as a flavored tea drink.

Checking more than ten kinds of tea beverages in the market, except for the brands such as Kangshifu, Nongfu Spring and Yuanye, the brands such as Wahaha and Lipton did not indicate the content of tea polyphenols. Among them, the tea polyphenol content of "Oriental Leaves" black tea, jasmine tea and green tea is 180mg/kg, 280mg/kg and 450mg/kg, respectively. On the packaging of Kangshifu green tea, raw leaf green tea and black tea, the tea polyphenol content is not less than 200mg/kg. Comparing the physical and chemical indicators of tea beverages (tea soup), the tea polyphenols of Master Kong, Yuanye and Nongfu Spring are lower than the standard and can only be classified as flavored tea drinks.

At present, tea beverages on the market are basically flavored tea beverages, and a distinctive feature of flavored tea beverages is the low content of tea polyphenols. Although the national standard stipulates the tea polyphenol content corresponding to various tea beverages, it is not mandatory on the label. Therefore, some brands are not to be labeled as the polyphenol content of tea.

　　　 Tea drinks are also big additives

Tea is a healthy drink, so is tea drink as healthy as tea? The tea drink in the domestic market is basically a flavored tea drink. The taste is refreshing and the taste is sweet, but the proportion of active ingredients such as tea polyphenols that are beneficial to health is partial. Low, so the effect of tea drinks on health is minimal.

　　 The list of ingredients in many brands of tea beverages found that tea is a food additive large number of additives ranging from a few to more than a dozen species of reach. For example, in Wahaha's honey lemon tea ingredient list, in addition to basic raw materials such as tea and water, there are food flavors and 8 food additives (malic acid, citric acid, sodium citrate, sodium D-isoascorbate, and hexametaphosphate). Sodium, vitamin C, aspartame, acesulfame). Master Kong Green Tea also contains six food additives.

Why are there so many food additives in tea drinks? These food additives are mainly used for preservation, preservation, seasoning, bright liquid color and sweeter taste. As long as it meets the national standards for the use of food additives, it is basically harmless to the human body. But for children, even the flavored pigments that are licensed should not be consumed. Many studies have pointed out that artificial pigments can affect children's brain development and increase children's risk of ADHD and attention deficits. At the same time, pregnant women and the elderly should also reduce the intake of food additives.

The labeling of "tea" in tea beverages is also varied. Some companies label tea, and some companies label tea powder and tea concentrate. “Currently, the differences in the labeling of tea beverage ingredients in the market are mainly due to two different processing techniques of tea beverages. The first category is the simple blending of the flavoring pigments with tea powder or concentrate, which has less nutritional value. The other is tea. Naturally extracting the process, extracting as much as possible the healthy nutrients such as tea polyphenols, catechins and vitamins in tea by soaking in tea leaves, and the nutrients are relatively abundant.

　　　 High sugar, high calorie, difficult to quench

On the list of ingredients currently on most tea beverage packaging, the top two are almost always “water + white sugar”. In a sense, many tea drinks are actually “white sugar water”. Such "water + white sugar" tea drinks have a high sugar content, and those who regularly drink high-sugar drinks have a sharp rise in the risk of obesity and diabetes. In addition, drinking tea in summer does not really quench your thirst, because the sugar in the drink enters the body to produce a redox reaction, which consumes a certain amount of water in the body. It is often the more you drink, the more thirsty you feel.

Drinking tea in the summer can really achieve the effect of cooling off, but the tea and the industrial tea drink are not the same thing. After industrialized production, tea beverages consume tea polyphenols and vitamins and other nutrients contained in tea, and their nutritional value is far less than that of brewed tea soup. At the same time, tea drinks have added some sugar and various food additives, which are not beneficial, and can only be used as a leisure drink to regulate taste, and can not replace tea. Tea with boiling water can not only cool off the heat, but also has a variety of natural vitamins and minerals in the tea, which is beneficial to the human body after drinking.

The pursuit of natural, healthy and original flavor is the future development trend of tea beverages. Tea beverage merchants should improve their technology, reduce unnecessary food additives and sugar, increase the tea polyphenol content of tea beverages, and restore the “healthy” attributes of tea beverages.