By Oge Okafor

Yuck! A facial expression of dissatisfaction/disapproval is the likely response you will get from a lot of people when offered a cup of tea without sugar. How do people drink tea (whether green, black, oolong and white) without sugar? It doesn’t taste good without sugar, they say. Which one is good for health if it is?

The reason is not far-fetched; most of us are sweet tooth. If we are to have our way in the real sense of it, we’d be having sugary treats on a daily basis.

Sugar (in any form) is enticing; when consumed in excess, the health implications have been linked to weight gain, premature aging and type 2 diabetes.

From when it started, the best way to drink tea going back to history is to drink it without sugar. This is so as it is believed that the total health benefit of tea is derived when taken without sugar. Drinking tea plain (without sugar or milk) is the best way to optimize the health benefit.

One known such benefit gotten from drinking tea without sugar is that it can help one lose weight; research suggests. In fact, drinking tea without sugar is one way Nigerians have come to know as the way of losing weight. It is not uncommon to find pregnant women taking tea (Lipton without sugar) so that they can deliver babies with small birth weight.

You will find that the vast majority of British (and Irish) people put milk in their tea because that is the traditional way to drink tea round there. Drinking tea without sugar or milk is not civilize.

Although water is generally considered the best way to satisfy your thirst — tea, particularly unsweetened green tea — is also a healthy choice. 

Tea is not bitter at all. It might have a faint astringency to it, but it is far less astringent than, say, grape juice. Even if you brew it strong and a little bitter, it contrasts nicely with any sweet food. So you do not need to add sugar to the tea itself. One common tea that is encouraged not to be taken with sugar is green tea.

There is some research showing green tea can help reduce blood sugars (some say it can prevent diabetes, but this may be taking it overboard). Of course this would be no-sugar-added green tea, and the natural alkaline nature of green tea helps reduce blood sugars naturally. Moreover, the antioxidant and astringent nature of green tea allows the pancreas to function better. This in turn, leads to better secretion of insulin and more efficient absorption of blood sugar.

Green tea, on the other hand, is a healthy drink because it is a decent source of antioxidant polyphenols. A refreshing and calorie-safe beverage, green tea works as a good substitute for unhealthy beverages regularly consumed in today’s lifestyles.

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Sugar adds empty calories

Tea, when nothing is added to it, has negligible, but not zero calories. According to the USDA Nutrient Database (where all the figures here come from), a typical 8oz. cup of brewed black tea has 2.4 calories, which is almost nothing compared to the Recommended Daily Intake(RDI) of 2000 calories for a typical adult. The calories come mostly from trace amounts of carbohydrates in the tea leaf. The same is true for most herbal teas. However, milk and sweeteners can add significant amounts of calories to tea.

A typical teaspoon of refined (white) sugar amounts to about 4 grams of sugar, which has 15 calories. A typical sugar cube is about 2 grams, which has about 9 calories, and a typical sugar packet, like those served with tea or coffee in some restaurants, has about 3 grams, or 11 calories. These calories are empty, meaning that they impart no other nutritional value: no vitamins, minerals, or protein.

Bottled teas, or so-called ready-to-drink teas, which have been brewed and packaged ahead of time, are often sweetened, sometimes heavily so. A study by the consumer watchdog Choice found a number of bottled teas that had over 10 teaspoons of sugar per bottle…that’s over 150 empty calories, more than a 12 oz. can or bottle of Coca-Cola. Although we recommend brewing your own tea from loose-leaf or tea bags, if you do seek bottled teas we recommend looking for unsweetened ones.

If you feel the desire or need to sweeten your tea, you may wish to consider looking at naturally sweet teas. Higher grades of tea often are naturally sweeter, although also more expensive. If you are only used to drinking black tea, you may wish to consider exploring green, white, or oolong teas, many of which can have naturally sweeter, smoother, and less bitter flavors.
Many of the strong black breakfast teas that dominate the tea-drinking cultures in Western countries have been selected for their ability to pair well with milk, cream, or sugar. Asian cultures generally drink their tea pure and unsweetened, and the teas from this culture may taste better to you in this format.

You can also train yourself to appreciate the more bitter, subdued flavor of unsweetened tea. Humans naturally have aversions to bitter flavors, because many poisons are bitter. Bitterness thus serves as a natural cue to help protect people against poisoning themselves.

Even if your initial reaction to a bitter drink like unsweetened tea is negative, as you become more familiar with a particular food that tastes bitter, your aversion to it will diminish and you can even come to enjoy the bitterness. To experience this sort of transition with tea, try sipping your tea unsweetened each time you prepare it, before sweetening it. You may find that you come to use less sweetener over time, or that you even come to enjoy drinking your tea straight.

The tea itself contributes a negligible amount of calories, and if you’re adding only a single cube or teaspoon of sugar, the amount of calories from the sugar is not worth worrying about.

The practice of counting calories and obsessing over the nutritional details of each food can itself become more destructive than the calories themselves. Remember that calories are a measure of the body’s natural energy source in the diet. Tea is healthy and even sweetened tea can be part of a healthy diet and lifestyle.

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