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- So the question today is "What is the difference
between tea and herbal tea?"
Well, the short answer is, tea is tea.
It comes from Camellia sinensis plant, i.e. the tea plant.
That's it.
Herbal tea comes from different plants,
such as Peppermint or Camomile or Lavender
or whatever the plant may be,
and those are not true teas.
Now, some people say, therefore,
you should not use the expression herbal tea.
You should instead talk about herbal infusions or tisanes
or whatever, because Herbal Tea is a contradiction in terms.
Well, yes, that's correct,
but it's also tediously pedantic and unnecessary.
It's totally fine, people, to talk about Herbal Tea.
Everybody knows exactly what you mean,
and that's what 99.99% of the population says,
so it's fine, but if you really want to know the difference,
tea is tea, Camellia sinensis.
Herbal tea or tisanes or herbal infusions
come from plants that are not tea.
We sometimes talk about botanicals,
which is plants that are not traditional medicinal herbs,
so Peppermint we know is a herb.
It's been used for many years for medicinal purposes.
Rooibos we might not think is a herb
because it's not a traditional British herb.
That's another expression you may hear.
We talk about Fruit Infusions, when we're talking about
a tea-like product that doesn't come from the tea plant,
it doesn't come from herbs,
but comes from a fruity plant such as Rosehips or Hibiscus,
which is a basis often used for the fruit infusions.
One significant difference between tea and herbs
is that tea has caffeine in it, and herbs do not.
Rooibos, for example, does not have any caffeine in it.
There's one exception, which is Yerba Mate,
the South American holly-like plant
which does have a type of caffeine in it.
Fruit infusions don't.
Confusion arises when we talk about flavoured teas,
so Strawberry Tea, for example,
is tea flavoured with Strawberry.
So we try to be quite clear about that.
Anyway, I hope that clears up the confusion,
what is the difference between tea and herbal tea
or herbal infusions or tisanes.
The answer is one comes from tea,
and the other doesn't.
Thank you very much.