Hi BlackSky!
(First, sorry if this gets posted twice... I wasn't logged in and something went haywire in my posting. :[ I'll try and remember what I wrote. )
First: the Lipton Caramel Vanilla Truffle has high fructose corn syrup in it! I was absolutely SHOCKED. I went shopping the other day to look at the new Lipton whole leaf line, and it has a whole bunch of sugar in it! And we know where THAT goes... ;]
Second: Clearly, it does matter what kind of tea you're drinking if something as common as Lipton has sugar in it! "Herbal tea" as some other ladies have been suggesting is fine if you want to stay hydrated, but honestly, it doesn't do much for you. The main reason is that MOST (not all) herbal teas don't actually have TEA in them.
If it doesn't have leaf from Camellia Sinensis (the tea plant) in it, then it's not really tea. The reason this is important is because tea has three fat zapping assassins in it: l-theanine (amino acid), EGCG (antioxidant), and caffeine.
These awesome parts of tea do a whole lot of things for us. They increase caloric burn, even if you're just sitting at your desk, by stimulating thermogenesis. They actually attach themselves to fat in your food and keep them from depositing in your body. Plus, there's a lot of detoxifying properties in them as well.
If you're worried about caffeine, don't be! First, tea is only 3% caffeine, which is like half of coffee. And if you're using whole leaf tea (which is what I do and it works best), after the first time you brew them, the caffeine is gone. So if you drink from the same leaves all day, you'll only get caffeine in that first cup. Nice for the morning pep!
Tea is also great for curbing cravings because it helps regulate your blood sugar (lower blood sugar = less cravings and vice versa, I know, it's a vicious cycle!).
The absolute best tea for weight loss is going to be whole leaf and will have Chinese medicinal herbs in it. Garcinia and gymnena sylvestre are both appetite suppressants (all natural!) that help regulate blood sugar as well. I have only found ONE tea company in the world that has all of this and more in their tea... and they're not even open yet! It's called Physique Tea, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to be obsessed with it as soon as they open. I'm pretty sure they have stuff up on Amazon though... just search Physique Tea. I've been getting mine from their Etsy store.
Anyway! I am a little bit of a tea snob. I have been using it for weight loss for years, and yes, it really DOES work, as long as you have one that doesn't have sugar in it! (Darn it, Lipton!)
Good luck ladies! I knew a lady who lost 40 pounds just by adding tea to her daily regimen, holy cows...
If you have any questions about tea I'd love to help. Like I said, I've been studying it exclusively in relation to weight loss and I get excited to drink my tea all the time.
Love!
Jacqueline
