A mother and her son died of carbon monoxide poisoning while brewing tea around a stove. Here are 5 facts about drinking tea!

This winter, cooking tea around the stove is very popular. Recently, the news #mother and son died of carbon monoxide poisoning while cooking tea around the stove# became a hot search.

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On the first day of the Lunar New Year, a son in his 50s and his mother in her 70s in Yangzhong, Jiangsu Province, boiled tea in a cast iron charcoal stove at home. Due to the cold weather, they closed the doors and windows, which led to carbon monoxide poisoning. When emergency personnel arrived at the scene, the mother and son had already died.

When using a cast iron charcoal stove for heating or grilling, you must pay attention to safety, as carbon monoxide poisoning has occurred from time to time. If you really want to feel the warmth of boiling tea around the stove, it is better to use an electric oven or an electric ceramic stove.

China is the first country in the world to discover and use tea trees. Drinking tea has a long history in our country. In this article, we will talk about some issues that everyone is concerned about when making tea. You must also understand how to drink tea.

1. Can drinking tea help you lose weight?

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People often say that drinking tea can "shave fat and lose weight." In fact, there is no food or drink that can have the effect of removing fat . The so-called "shaving fat" is nothing more than removing greasiness or promoting gastrointestinal motility and promoting fat excretion from the body.

Drinking some tea in moderation can indeed give people a feeling of "removing greasiness", but to promote gastrointestinal motility and fat excretion, you still have to rely more on foods rich in dietary fiber, such as whole grains and fresh fruits and vegetables.

In addition, some people say that drinking tea helps lose weight because of the tea polyphenols it contains. Although tea contains tea polyphenols and caffeine, animal experiments have shown that tea polyphenols may inhibit obesity by affecting the physiological functions of fat cells and pre-adipocytes [1]. However, animal experiments cannot be directly extended to humans.

Caffeine can also promote body metabolism, both of which are helpful for weight loss. However, drinking tea cannot remove oil, degrade fat, or even excrete fat from the body.

Therefore, don't expect to lose weight by drinking tea . It is recommended to drink light tea as a daily drink to replenish water. If someone loses weight by drinking tea, it is probably due to the water. Drinking a lot of water increases the sense of fullness, which reduces the amount of food eaten and increases the number of times you go to the toilet, and slowly loses weight.

2. Can drinking tea prevent cancer?

Drinking tea has many benefits to our health. For example, current studies have shown that drinking tea regularly can reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes and gastric cancer.

A 2019 meta-analysis showed that drinking six cups of green tea per day was associated with a 21% lower risk of stomach cancer.[2]

Therefore, drinking tea regularly can prevent cancer.

3. Can drinking tea help you sober up?

cannot.

It is common to see people drinking a cup of tea after getting drunk, saying that it is to sober up. In fact, there is no food or medicine that can sober up. If you must give an explanation for "sobering up", it is better to understand it as: speeding up the metabolism of alcohol and promoting the excretion of alcohol from the body.

To achieve this effect, you don't need special food or medicine, just drink more water.

Drinking alcohol will damage the liver and increase the liver's detoxification function. Although the tea polyphenols contained in tea have some effect on protecting the liver, if you drink strong tea after being drunk, the caffeine contained in it may cause heart excitement and lead to heart discomfort.

In addition, tea also has a diuretic effect, and drinking a lot of tea after drinking alcohol is not good for kidney health.

4. Drinking hot tea often can really cause cancer

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Many people like to drink hot tea, the temperature of which is generally above 65°C. Hot drinks above 65°C have been listed as Class 2A carcinogens by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) under the World Health Organization (WHO), meaning they may cause cancer to humans.

The most suitable temperature for the fragile esophagus is 10~40℃ . Too high a temperature will burn the esophageal mucosa, but the esophagus is not sensitive to temperature, so you won’t feel much if it is burned.

Eating hot food frequently causes chronic irritation to the esophageal mucosa. Often, the damage has not been repaired yet and it suffers another "severe injury". In the long run, it will increase the risk of cancer.

So, even if you like drinking tea, control the temperature and don’t drink it until it’s too hot.

5. What is the appropriate water temperature for making tea?

If you want to drink tea healthily, it is really not recommended to keep it on a hot stove, otherwise it will affect the yield of tea polyphenols.

A study conducted an experimental analysis on the temperature and time of tea brewing and found that when the water temperature is controlled at 60℃~80℃, the yield of tea polyphenols increases with the increase of brewing temperature, while when the temperature is between 90℃~100℃, the yield of tea polyphenols decreases with the increase of temperature. In general, the yield of tea polyphenols increases with the extension of brewing time. [3]

The study also concluded** that the most suitable brewing temperature for tea is 80℃ and the brewing time is 10min**, under which more tea polyphenols can be obtained.

As for the brewing concentration, although the study mentioned that the yield of tea polyphenols is the highest when the ratio of solid to liquid is 1:20 (g/mL), the taste of tea at this concentration is quite bitter, and many people cannot drink it, which is what we call strong tea. Most people can drink tea with a ratio of solid to liquid of 1:50~75 (g/mL).

Summarize:

Drinking tea has many benefits. A cup of tea after a meal often makes people feel comfortable. Drinking tea more often can also replenish water. But you should also be careful not to drink strong tea, otherwise it will affect the body's absorption and utilization of minerals.

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When you have some free time, make a pot of tea and watch the tea leaves slowly bloom in the water, returning to their original appearance. Is your original intention still there?

References:

[1] Jie Guoliang. Research on the antioxidant and weight loss effects of Pu'er tea[D]. Zhejiang University: Zhejiang University, 2008.

[2] Chinese Nutrition Society. Dietary Guidelines for Chinese Residents[M]. People's Medical Publishing House. 2022

[3] Mi Zhi, Liu Lizhen, Wu Xiaohong, Cheng Meng. Effect of brewing conditions on the yield of tea polyphenols in sunshine green tea[J]. Food Research and Development, 2021, 42(03): 63-67.