Green tea has been enjoyed for centuries for a good reason. It has countless health benefits as well as its delicate flavors. I grew up drinking green tea, so I’ve always loved the pure, warm, nice cup of green tea. But I was surprised to find out that not everybody loved green tea! I met some people who would love to start incorporating green tea into their diet, but weren’t able to do it because green tea tasted so “grassy” or they just weren’t used to the flavor. Today’s blog post is for exactly those of you who want to start drinking green tea but don’t know how to enjoy it. We’ll talk about the green tea ingredients.

Introduction to Green Tea Ingredients

I often heard that green tea tasted too “grassy,” so depending on your preferences, here are seven different ingredients to add to your green tea. What are your favorites?

• Umami-flavored add-ons
• Natural sweeteners
• Citrus add-ons
• Fruity add-ons
• Herbal & spicy kicks
• Floral add-ons
• Comforting creamy ingredients

💡 Are you getting your best green tea?

There are many different types of green tea, and I hope you find your favorite! Good green tea could possibly change the way you think about green tea. Read this blog post below to check out the best of each of the most popular kinds of green tea.

Best Green Tea to Buy | Picks for Health, Flavor, and Value

Why Add Ingredients to Green Tea?

• Customize flavors:

Whether you like green tea flavor or not, you can add some of these ingredients to taylor fit your palate.

• Boost health benefits:

Different nutrients and antioxidants in food ingredients make synergies, amplifying the healthe benefits!

There are two primary reasons to add more ingredients to the green tea. I hope these ingredients can make your green tea experience more exciting and unique. Let’s get started!

Green Tea Ingredients | Add-Ons for Flavors & Nutrients

1. Umami-Flavored Add-Ons

While many people, especially in the Western world, know about fruity or floral add-ons to the tea. But as a matter of fact, the umami-flavored ingredients were the traditional add-ons to green tea in East Asia. So I wanted to share these ingredients as the very first thing, as the green tea ingredients.

One of the best examples is Hyunmi-cha in Korean or Genmai-cha in Japanese, which adds roasted brown rice to green tea. It adds a toasty, nutty flavor that warmly hugs the grassy flavor of green tea. It is the most popular way to drink green tea in Korea. Let’s look at other examples.

• Roasted brown rice: A warm, cozy, hearty tea ingredient in East Asia
• Seaweed flakes: A subtle ocean-like scent and flavor
• Ganoderma mushroom: A popular tea in Korea. Steep the green tea with ganoderma mushroom and drink it hot or cold.

💡Tip: You can add roasted brown rice and seaweed flakes together with green tea to make a very savory green tea!

2. Natural Sweeteners for Green Tea

I find the sweetened tea works even better with cold-brewed tea. You can read more about how to cold-brew your tea on my blog to make refreshing cold brew green tea!

To sweeten your green tea, skip the refined sugar and try these healthier and natural alternatives.

• Maple syrup: A vegan-friendly option with a rich, deep flavor
• Stevia: Calorie-free sweetener with no sugar spike
• Date syrup: My favorite! It has fiber and nutrients with a deep flavor. Note that it has a bit of a sour flavor and has a dark color that could change its look and taste quite a bit. It might be a plus for some people.

🌟 100% date syrup is a go-to sweetener for anyone who is looking for a healthier sugar substitute. Check out Date Lady Date Syrup to try!

3. Citrus Add-Ons

There are many lemon green teas you can find. Citrus fruits are a popular addition because they enhance the antioxidant absorption and make the tea flavor more pleasant. You can either squeeze the citrus fruits to only add the juice or brew the tea with the citrus fruits, both hot and cold. Here are some of the citrus fruits you can add to the tea.

• Orange: Orange slices or zest work very well in tea brewing.
• Lemon: Squeeze in some lemon juice to get vitamin C and enhanced antioxidants (catechins) in green tea. You can also make green tea lemonade!
• Lime: An exotic add-on to your green tea, with fresh and zesty brightness

💡 Clean the skin!

If you are using the skin of the citrus, such as brewing tea or using the zest, make sure you get some organic citrus fruits or clean the skin of the citrus with baking soda and vinegar very thoroughly, including the pores.

4. Fruity Add-Ons

Beyond citrus, fruits work very well as additional ingredients to the green tea. My favorites are berries! Any kind of dried fruit could work, and even fine berry powders. I love using freeze-dried blueberries or strawberry powder, as they just melt into the tea effortlessly. But remember to use very fine powder if you want to use the powder in the tea.

• Fresh or frozen berries: E.g., strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries
• Finely powdered freeze-dried berries: To mix in the tea
• Dried fruits: E.g., pineapple or mango

🌟 Try freeze-dried strawberry pieces for the tea! These are the ones that are used in fruity teas.

5. Spice or Herbal Add-Ons

Many kinds of spices or herbs go great with some tea, but I find green tea to have somewhat limited choices of spice or herbal add-ons that go well together. We all know masala chai, which is black tea mixed with many different kinds of spices such as cardamom, cinnamon, star anise, and even peppercorns. That’s because the black tea has a deeper and stronger flavor.

Green tea, on the other hand, has a delicate flavor that can easily be overpowered by other ingredients, especially if they are strong-flavored spices or herbs. But fear not, there are still a handful of herbs and spices that go well with the green tea. Here are some of my recommendations.

• Mint: Fresh or dried
• Ginger: Warm and lightly spicy
• Lemongrass: A bit like adding citrus fruits
• Turmeric: I find fresh turmeric works better, but you can use a very small amount of dried turmeric
• Rosemary: Fresh or dried, a very fragrant choice

6. Floral Add-Ons

I love flower tea, and I find most flowers work quite well as add-ons with the green tea. Flowers are perfect ingredients to add delicate scents to make your green tea elegant. They are also quite subtle and don’t overpower the green tea; rather, they harmonize the taste very well.

As I said, you could add most flowers, but here are some of my favorites.

• Jasmine Green Tea: Instead of adding jasmine flowers to the green tea, try jasmine green tea! Jasmine green tea is made by infusing jasmine into the green tea when it’s being made and is one of the most fragrant green teas. You can also add jasmine flowers, but they have very different scents and flavors from jasmine green tea.
• Lavender: Lavender has quite a strong scent, so a little goes a long way unless you want to drink lavender tea.
• Chamomile: Chamomile is known for soothing effects, so I like to add just a bit to my green tea.
• Rose: Add whole rosebuds or petals to your tea to bring a romantic rose scent.
• Hibiscus: Adds a tart cranberry flavor and ruby-red colors. It also adds vitamin C, which boosts the antioxidant absorption of the green tea.
• Butterfly Pea Flower: The striking blue hue of the butterfly pea flower, combined with the yellowish-green color of green tea, is enough to make the tea enchanting!

7. Comforting Creamy Ingredients

Adding some plant-based milks can remove some of the bitter taste of the green tea. I personally love the green tea with its slight bitter aftertaste, but I can understand that it’s not for everyone. Adding dairy milk has been popular, but there has been research that dairy milk lowers the antioxidant absorption into our bodies. But there are many excellent choices of plant-based milk you can choose from! And they taste even better, too!

• Oat milk: A naturally sweet choice
• Almond milk: Light, subtle nuttiness that resembles the taste of dairy milk the most
• Soy milk: A classic choice of milk in East Asia

Tips for Balancing Flavors

For those of you who love green tea and want to explore other ways to enjoy green tea, remember that less is more often. Green tea has delicate flavors that can easily be overpowered by other ingredients, so start this process by adding a little bit of other ingredients and then gradually adding more as you balance the flavors.

For those of you who don’t like green tea and want to find other ways to drink green tea, this might be less of a problem. But still, you might like the green tea flavor combined with other flavors! Harmony can make a taste a whole lot different. Also, I want you to gradually start liking the green tea flavor by taking out some of the other ingredients as you progress in your green tea-drinking journey.

Whichever method you choose, I hope you can find your perfect balance of flavors! Also, note that you can mix several of these ingredients together. Here are some of my favorites.

• Lemon slices and ginger or turmeric
• Hibiscus and date syrup
• Maple syrup and oat milk

Try it and let me know if you enjoyed a new variation of green tea!

3 Best Green Tea Recipes

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