How to drink green tea for weight loss

Green tea is one of the healthiest beverages on the planet. It is full of healthy nutrition and antioxidants which have a powerful effect on the brain and body.

Green tea is being used for healing as well as a refreshing human body since ancient times. According to recent studies, it is beneficial for the brain, weight loss, heart diseases, cancer, and many other diseases.

In this guide, we’ll look at how to use green tea for weight loss, how and when to drink it for better results, different methods for making green tea tastier and effective, different types of green tea and some other benefits as well. Which I am sure you’ll love to know about.

Green Tea can help you lose weight

To lose weight, your body must first break the fat cells and move it into your bloodstream. Which then can be used as energy by other cells like muscle cells. Green tea contains caffeine and a type of flavonoid called catechin (antioxidant). This catechin is Epigallocatechin Gallate (EGCG).

The EGCG can help increase the effect of fat-burning hormones, like norepinephrine (noradrenaline). EGCG helps it by preventing an enzyme from breaking down the norepinephrine hormone. Which results in a large amount of norepinephrine and thus more fat burning.

Caffeine is also a known stimulant, which helps speed up the fat burning process in the body and improve exercise performance.

Caffeine and EGCG both speed up your metabolism.

What if you took green tea before exercise

Studies have shown that taking green tea extract or drinking green tea before exercise can increase fat burning by about 17%.

That is why almost every weight loss supplement has green tea extract in its ingredients list.

According to the study of PubMed, the green tea extract consumed by men before exercise, burn fat by 17% more.

Green tea may increase your metabolic rate

Although this effect is dependent on the individuals as some show an increased metabolism rate while others not.

But many studies show that green tea extract or EGCG supplements increase the metabolism rate by 3% - 4% each day.

Is it better for reducing appetite?

Some animal studies have shown the reduction of appetite by consuming green tea extract. However, this is not yet confirmed in humans. Otherwise, drinking green tea will automatically reduce your daily calorie consumption by reducing appetite - desire to eat. Which will make you lose weight without any extra effort.

How much to consume for weight loss?

The optimal amount of drinking green tea depends on a person’s disease. Some will get the effect by consuming one cup a day while others may need to take about 4 or 5 cups a day.

Green tea is also beneficial for lowering your disease but it may also require an optimal amount to drink, and please keep in mind that it also depends on individuals, which may vary.

According to these studies, the optimal amount of green tea for any person will be from 3 to 5 cups a day.

Some of the diseases and the suggested amount of green tea are as under.

• Diabetes: 6+ cups of green tea consumption daily reduce the risk of developing type 2 diabetes by 33% (Source).
• Heart disease: 1 - 3 cups of green tea daily will reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke (Source).
• Prostate cancer: 5+ cups daily may lower the risk of developing prostate cancer (Source).
• Oral cancer: 3 - 4 cups daily may reduce the risk of oral cancer in women (Source).
• Stomach cancer: 5+ cups daily may reduce the risk of stomach cancer in women (Source).
• Breast cancer: 3+ cups daily may reduce the recurrence of breast cancer in women (Source 1, Source 2).
• Pancreatic cancer: 5+ cups daily may decrease the risk of pancreatic cancer (Source).

It should also be kept in mind that those who drink green tea regularly are in better health state than those who don’t drink at all.

Which green tea is best for weight loss?

There are two important components in green tea which help increase fat burning, metabolism and reduce your weight. Those are Caffeine and Catechin (EGCG).

So the best green tea for weight loss is the one having the most amount of these components.

There are a lot of green tea brands in the market, but I am mentioning some of the green tea brands here, which I found better for weight loss. I’ll also update the list if I found anything better.

Please note: I am not affiliated with any of these brands

I’d prefer to go with the loose leaf green tea, as I love to use organic food in its purest form.

But for weight loss, the Lipton Matcha Green Tea seems to be best, as it contains “Matcha” blended into it. This is also extracted from the same green tea plant, but it has a high level of antioxidants and can be used without green tea. If you wish, I can write an article about its uses.

Tetley Green Tea with lemon is also a good choice if you want to go with it. It’ll give you a good taste as well as benefits of lemon with the same tea.

I use local loose leaf green tea, with separate lemon juice. i.e. one cup green tea, with half lemon juice.

How to brew green tea?

Brewing green tea is simple. You just need to choose your green tea, whether it’s tea bags or loose leaf.

While brewing with the tea bags can be very easy, but to get the full experience, I recommend you use the loose-leaf.

How to brew green tea using tea bags

1. Boil water: The water should be boiled to the first boil. I.e. the stage when the water begins to boil but has not begun to simmer. The temperature should be about 160ºF (71ºC).
2. Pour the water into a cup
3. Take out a green tea bag and add it to the boiling water
4. Keep the green tea bag in boiling water for about 2-5 minutes.
5. Enjoy your green tea.

There are some things you need to keep in mind while brewing your green tea.

1. A too high temperature of water over green tea will give you a bitter brew. So steep it on a lower temperature.
2. The longer the green tea bag in your cup, the bitter, the darker and the stronger will it become.
3. Always check the green tea taste and don’t judge by its color. Sometimes, some teas give a darker color but not ready yet while sometimes it becomes ready with a lighter color.

How to brew green tea using loose leaf

1. Preheat the teapot then add the brewing water
2. Boil water but it should be boiled to the first boil. I.e. the stage when the water begins to boil but has not begun to simmer. The temperature should be about 160ºF (71ºC).
3. Add one teaspoon of loose leaf green tea per cup into your teapot
4. Steep it for about 2 - 5 minutes. The longer it steeps, the darker and stronger it’ll become.
5. Enjoy your green tea.

Some tips along the way

1. Steeping time may vary based on the green tea type you use. I.e. for gunpowder tea type, the steeping time may be as little as 10 seconds for the first brew.
2. You can reuse the same leaves but should be steep it longer than previous.
3. Always taste the tea instead of judging on its color.

Green tea with lemon

Green tea is healthier, and to use it for weight loss, it contains the mighty catechin. But even if you drink the larger amount of catechins tea, it’ll hardly be digested in your stomach.

Studies have shown that about less than 20% of the total catechins are being digested by humans.

The lemons (or vitamin C or other citrus juice) on the other end has a strong digestive behavior. So if you add lemon to your green teacup, it’ll make it more tasty and healthier. Although the color of your tea might lighten a little bit.

A study by Purdue University found that adding lemon juice, vitamin C or other citrus juice helps humans absorb the catechins by 13 times more than without it. (source)

Another study shows that the presence of sucrose and citrus juices like lemons, grapes, and orange, etc. increases the catechin's absorption. (source)

Adding citrus juices to your green tea might lower the risk of cancer as well. (source)

So to absorb 80+% of catechins, squeeze half a lemon (or 1 lemon) into one cup of green tea. It’ll give you very pleasant taste as well as will help digest the catechins a lot better.

Keep in mind to add the lemon juice after the tea is ready and not before brewing the tea. Otherwise, it might give you an unpleasant taste. You can also drink citrus juices separately after drinking your tea in pure form.

I don’t like green tea without sugar. So you can also add a little bit of sugar or honey to it before brewing, to enhance the digestion more. But it is just my opinion.

Green tea with honey

As you may know, green tea has a slightly bitter taste. But it does not mean that it can not be made sweeter enough to enjoy it many times a day.

Honey is good for burning calories while mixing with green tea gives you about 17% more fat oxidation.

Honey contains many important antioxidants, including flavonoids and organic acids. Its antioxidants can reduce blood pressure which is a major factor for heart diseases. (source)

Honey is good for the reduction of bad LDL cholesterol and increases good HDL cholesterol. It is also good for wound healing, skincare, heart attacks, strokes, eye health and some types of cancers. (source 1, source 2).

So combining honey with green tea will give you the best of both. It’ll give your tea a pleasant taste with all the above benefits. You can also squeeze some lemon juice for even more healthy and tasty beverages.

When to drink green tea for weight loss?

While you can drink green tea whenever you want and it’ll give you benefits, but there are some situations you want to avoid. Like...

Drinking green tea on empty stomach may raise the acidity in your stomach causing stomach pain, constipation, nausea, and maybe, vomiting as well. This is because green tea is packed with tannins which can increase acidity. But this is not the case with every person. So you may try it yourself. Just stop it, when you feel something bad.

If you need to drink green tea in the morning, then first drink about 2 glasses of warm water, and after about 30 minutes, you can drink a cup of green tea.

The best time for taking green tea might be before or after meals. You can give 2 hours gap between meals and green tea.

If you are doing exercises, then take the green tea, 30 minutes before exercise. It’ll give you maximum benefits for weight loss.

You should also drink green tea, 2 hours before bedtime.

Benefits of green tea weight loss

Green tea contains a lot of different compounds, including:

• Flavonoids like catechins (EGCG) and Tannins
• Vitamins B
• Folate
• Magnesium
• Antioxidants

It is associated with many health benefits, some of these are:

• Weight loss
• Increasing metabolism
• Decreasing bad LDL Cholesterol, and increasing good HDL Cholesterol
• Reducing Alzheimer's disease risk
• Improving brain functioning
• Decreasing the risk of heart attacks, stroke, and other heart diseases
• Managing type 2 diabetes
• Reducing the risk of many types of cancers

Summary

Green tea is one of the best beverages. It is healthier. It is better for the brain, heart, stomach, blood and lymphatic system as well as good for weight loss.

Although green tea helps you lose weight, it is recommended that you also do exercises with it, and use it in conjunction with lemon and honey to strengthen the effect. Otherwise, the effect will be so modest that you may not even realize it.

The best way to lose weight is to eat the least possible calories (better once a day), keep your stomach as empty as possible and do exercises to burn fat in your body. I.e. burn more calories than you eat. Green tea does not have many calories, so it’ll benefit you a lot in the process.

There are some situations which may harm you, especially if you drink too much of it. As an old saying “excess of everything is bad”. So keep this in your mind as well. I’ll write these situations and many other factors which you must want to avoid in the coming weak.

Please let me know in the comments, what you think, OR if I forgot something OR you have something more special in your mind. So it’ll make this article the ultimate guide for others.