Is tea acidic? People are interetsted in this problem. Tea is a plant that has been processed into a beverage, which is a kind of food. People often divide the food into acidic food and alkaline food. Tea is an alkaline food. But it’s strange that tea broth is tested by pH test paper which often shows acidic.
So is tea acidic or alkaline? How does the acidity and alkalinity of tea affect the human body?
Is tea alkaline food?
What is acidic food? What is alkaline food? It is not divided by the taste of people. For example, we often drink lemon juice, the taste is sweet and sour, but it is essentially alkaline food.
Food is acidity or alkalinity, mainly according to the body's final metabolites. The food which contains the calcium, magnesium, potassium and sodium cations generally belongs to the alkaline food.and acidic food contains sulfur and phosphorus and other anions.
Tea contains calcium, magnesium, potassium, sodium and other mineral elements. After hydrolysis, these elements form the alkaline solution. Then it is identified the alkaline food.
Why does the tea broth show acidity?
Although tea is alkaline food, testing with pH test paper, it often shows weak acidity. Why is this?
For most teas, after testing with pH paper, the pH range is roughly between 5.5 and 7.0, especially like black tea and oolong tea, which are the most acidic among all teas.
The reason for this is mainly related to the beneficial substances in tea, including but not limited to tea polyphenols and ellagic acids. After the tea is brewed, these two substances are rapidly precipitated, resulting in an acidic tea broth.
If the brewing time is too long, the precipitation of ellagic acid will be more and the possibility of the tea broth being acidic will increase. If the dry tea is more coarse, the polyphenol of tea will be higher, and it will also show more obvious acidity after brewing. What’s more, the higher the water temperature is, the more obvious the weak acidity of the tea broth is.
Therefore,according to above situations, high quality green tea with tender raw materials, no fermentation and low tea polyphenol content may not be weakly acidic when brewed with 80 to 85 degree hot water, but rather weakly alkaline.
However, many coarse green teas will still show a more obvious weak acidity after brewing with high temperature. It is said that black tea and dark tea, as well as oolong tea, all present acidity because of the longer fermentation time and higher content of tannic acid and tea polyphenols.
What is the effect of the acidity or alkalinity of tea on the human body?
It is obviously alkaline food, but the tea broth presents a weak acidity, which seems to disrupt the acid-base balance of the human body. But in fact, it is not.
As a healthy beverage, tea contains a variety of nutritional elements. It not only will not disrupt the body's acid-alkaline balance, but also can effectively improve the physique.
Under normal circumstances, the body's pH level is maintained between 7.35 and 7.45. In dynamic balance, it is not affected by the cations and anions in food.
We often talk about green tea presenting a weak alkalinity with strong irritation, while black tea and dark tea present a distinct acidity after fermentation, which is less irritating and does not aggravate the burden of the stomach and intestines.
But in fact, from the scientific point of view, the human body has a strong regulatory ability. Whether it is tea or other foods, it is difficult to produce a huge impact on the acidity and alkalinity of the human body. Because humans have been through long enough adaptive training, the body has had a relatively complete buffer and adjustment system. Their own acid-alkaline balance is also in dynamic adjustment, so it will not directly affect the body’s pH balance after eating acidic food or alkaline food.
In other words, whether the tea is acidic or alkaline, it does not matter much. The role of tea is to quench thirst. Of course, tea for anxiety has a better merit. Drinking tea can help people keep healthy. It seems to be magic tea, but it isn't omnipotent.