Tea or Herbal Infusion: What's the Difference?

Tea or Herbal Infusion: What's the Difference?

Tea and herbal infusions may look similar in the cup, but they come from different plants. Here is what sets them apart. 

Tea is an aromatic drink prepared from dried or fermented leaves from a shrub, the tea plant, found at the foot of the eastern mountains.

Depending on cultivation methods, teas can be differentiated by their black, green, yellow, white colours, etc.

Tea is rich in theine and caffeine and is sought after both for its taste and energizing and relaxing properties, like green tea for example. It is drunk lukewarm, hot or cold. 

Herbal tea is obtained from plants. It is composed of dried or fresh flowers, leaves, stems, roots. It is a non-caffeinated drink. It is obtained by maceration, decoction or digestion. These different methods of preparation aim to extract the active ingredients from plants. 

There are a multitude of types of herbal teas, all with different beneficial properties for health such as digestive herbal teas (anise, chamomile, mint, sage, verbena, etc.), diuretic herbal teas (cherry tail, meadowsweet), calming herbal teas (lemon balm, linden, etc.). To combine the effects, several plants are often mixed. It is drunk hot or cold.

Infusion is a method of preparation. For tea, infuse for 3 to 4 minutes depending on individual tastes, while herbal tea infuses for 15 minutes.

As you will have understood, these drinks are very different, whether in terms of composition, preparation and health benefits!