How Green Tea Helps Intermittent Fasting
Written by: Ioannis Nikitidis, MD, MSc
Intermittent fasting is an eating pattern that alternates eating hours with hours when you either do not eat or take small calories. This stresses what you eat instead of what you consume. Although it has recently become popular, intermittent fasting is not a new concept. People have practiced fasting throughout history for reasons of social, fitness, or survival.
Fasts will not last forever, and you can return to your normal food routine between fasting times – breaking down easily. Although, food choice, especially the drinks ( tea) choice is critical during and after fasting because some foods are better than others. In addition, some foods, drinks, and even supplements can interrupt your fast accidentally, and others have no impact.
This article is specially designed to address which drink is less likely to affect fasting, and green tea is one of them.
So let’s read it more in-depth about Green tea and its health benefits for fasting.
Fasting Green Tea
Were you aware that green tea is known as the most nutritious drink in the world after water? It’s true!
It is reported that catechins in green tea have been shown to help control weight healthily. And since green tea not only contains these amazing catechins, it also contains caffeine, these two components function together to improve strength and increase body energy.
The green tea catechins are also the source of important antioxidants that maintain the cell health and immunity of your body. And the most important point is a green tea that affects your ghrelin levels, so you certainly want to take a cup whenever you’re hungry during the fasting window.
Green Tea helps Fasting
Control hunger pangs
In the first few days or weeks of intermittent fasting, many people struggle with hunger pangs. This is because the body is used to having healthy food all day long. Although the intake of green tea may help relieve these issues as the body adapts to the fasting time.
It is found that catechins in green tea suppress ghrelin secretion — the hormone that signals hunger. Such green tea catechins include EGCG or epigallocatechin gallate, an antioxidant that is responsible for many benefits of green tea.
Helps in weight loss
It has been reported that drinking green tea can help promote weight loss and also lead to long term control of weight. Green tea is a calorie-free drink that makes it a better alternative for sodas and juices if you track your caloric intake.
In addition, tea catechins help to improve the loss of fat. Caffeine also acts to enhance energy and oxidation, helping you lose pounds more easily.
Calm and source of body energy
The green tea contains a synergistic combination of caffeine and l-theanine. Caffeine gives you a healthy energy boost to help you with the exhaustion many beginners experience faster.
This tea caffeine is different from what you would expect from coffee – mostly due to l-theanine. An amino acid, which fosters a relaxed and concentrated mind, l-theanine avoids the jolt, jitters, and eventual crash that you often feel with coffee.
Detox Aids
Drinking green tea with intermittent fasting enables the normal cycle of detoxification of the body called autophagy. The cycle is activated by a protein activation that allows the body to flush out harmed cells and facilitates the regeneration of new cells.
This process is important for the preservation of muscle mass and for preventing age-related diseases. Green Tea catechins promote autophagy during the fasting cycle, helping the body detox and regenerate cells.
Does a Green Tea Break a Fast?
It’s best to ease it when you’re ready to break your fast. By the end of your fast day, you may wish to add small sections of food that are easier to digest so that your digestive system is not overloaded.
Breaking your fast with foods that especially contain high amount of fats, sugar, or low calories can be hard for your body to digest and cause bloating and discomfort.
We can best understand it as Intermittent fasting is a nutritional technique that you pursue during the day or the week and follow some easting and fasting cycles.
During this process, your tissues experience autophagy, which is responsible for some powerful benefits of fasting (such as fat and weight loss).
So at the end of the fasting period, when your body is already undergoing this process, it is not the best approach to break your fast with no calorie green tea.
Sometime when you drink it at the time of breaking your fast, it will suppress your appetite as you adjust to this process by consuming green tea and some other zero-calorie beverages during your fasting window.
Best green tea for intermittent fasting
Matcha green tea
Matcha green tea contains a high amount of antioxidants and protective compounds for plants that are more than ordinary green tea and provide several health benefits. Many people will now use Matcha drinks for fasting.
However, Matcha does not suggest to break fast because the calorie content is low enough to be negligible, and thus the metabolism does not re-invigorate. Furthermore, the efficacy of all the benefits of intermittent fasting has been shown to be increased.
Thanks to the low levels of caffeine and the high concentration of theanine that helps provide a sustainable energy blow, Matcha is an excellent option during intermittent fasting. It effectively keeps the body and mind alert throughout the hungry hours.
Matcha Tea Fasting Benefits
Matcha tea is an excellent option and can help to provide the body with nutrients, even in fasting time. Nevertheless, in addition to all the proven health benefits (fighting diseases, increasing immunity, etc.), it also has more direct benefits for dietarians.
- The biggest benefit is that it will help to stop hunger. This makes it popular with dietitians, not just for intermittent fasters.
- This can also help to increase the metabolic rate and consume calories more rapidly, something everyone needs.
- Matcha tea is all in all great for intermittent fasting!
How to boost Intermittent fasting results with Green Tea
Experts suggest drinking 3 to 4 cups of green tea a day to maximize the advantages of fasting for the best results.
Try to brew your tea cold for full effect. Cold-brewed tea has more antioxidants than warm tea. It’s because certain catechins and antioxidants can be burned by hot water. The cold brewing process involves steeping the tea leaves for a longer time in cold water. Usually, the leaves can steep for 8 to 12 hours in cool water.
If you want to reap all benefits of green tea and boost your intermittent fasting results, then you can try our special Fasting Tea. It contains green tea leaf extract and other superfoods that will help you to cut hunger and get top-speed fat-burning, all with a satisfying taste.
