Can you die if you eat Green Tea Leaves?

Question

Instead of having tea... the leaves are more potent than the tea so will I still get the nutritional benefits if I gulp down the leaves with room-temperature water or something... That way, it would be like drinking 10 portions of Tea instead of 1. I am serious about this, serious answers only!

Answer 1

No you can't,but you would get sick to your stomach.

Answer 2

Well, before the Chinese began brewing tea and straining it they ground the tea leaves (from pressed bricks) and boiled it, drinking every bit of it. Before that it was popular to chew tea leaves as medicine, when it earned it's nickname "bitter leaf."

One can then infer that eating tea leaves won't kill you, but eating more than a few dozen small leaves at a sitting would likely give you a heck of a stomach ache, depending on the type of tea.

If you try this experiment, try to find a source of fresh leaves! Do not buy tea bags or loose-leaf from a supermarket. Tea leaves loose their freshness rapidly and you'll notice a huge difference if you use teas from a quality tea import shop -- most of those shops will even notify their customers when the Spring or Winter crops are being delivered for ultimate freshness. I can attest personally that tea brewed from fresh leaves is vastly different than 6-month leaves and a world apart from supermarket teas -- I can only assume that the freshness of leaves if eaten would also make as much difference.

Answer 3

You can't eat tea leaves. They are not healthy. When you brew tea, stuff like catechins, caffeine and theanine dissolve. The other stuff, like tannins and chlorophyll stay put. Some of these other stuff are harmful to human body. Don't eat them. Don't even over brew your tea.

The healthiest green tea are loose-leaf harvested from tea flush, or very young tea shoots picked in early spring. The article below covers it in details.

Hope it helps.

Julian

Answer 4

That is one way to get some fibre, and some caffeine, and antioxidants, to boot!