What is your tea of choice for night time?

I don’t demand health from my tea. I politely request pleasure from my cups. This gives me more room to drink what I like.

In the evening I generally drink either Decaffeinated Black Currant or Decaffeinated Chai Agni, both of which are black teas. Sometimes I drink an herbal tisane, but I’m limited in what I like and I’m very picky about how fresh herbs are. I’ve found that I enjoy a tea from Pearl Fine Teas called Counting Sheep which is really fruity and fresh.

Dessert true teas. Adagio’s Cocomint Green (anyone know of a white tea version?) Botanical Indulgences Black Whiskey Cream (a chocolate flavored tea) and BI’s Creme Caramel Oolong. My local tea shop is now carrying Chocolate Fudge Brownie black tea and Caramel Green (unsure of the brands) that I MUST try. Matcha would be lovely at nite, especially w/ warm milk. My cousin got me ROT’s Get Relaxed! for my birthday. I enjoy steeping it in Black Whiskey Cream. Chocolate and rose make a lovely combo. Chais are also yummy.

After 5:00 pm or so, then it’s gotta be decaf. and I will drink any decaf tea. Of course you all know the old way to decaf your teas don’t you? Just put your tea bag or infuser in boiling water for 30 sec., toss that H2O out and the tea in the bag/infuser has been pretty much decaf.

I don’t think about health at all aside from the fact that I need a decent night’s sleep. Ergo, after about 5 PM it’s decaf for me. I keep a goodly selection and depending on my mood, I’ll go for Numi Desert Lime, or a rooibos or a nice mint tea. I also have some other citrus teas and I do like what Mighty Leaf does with chamomile—(they converted me to realizing that chamomile can be more than a whiff of hay).

Mood dictates my choice of libation; time of day dictate how caff-y I can go.

I’ll take whichever tea I’m in the mood for, regardless of which type it is. I don’t have problems sleeping afterwards usually. At least not in any way that I can find any sort of pattern in.

(I have however learned that coffee in the evening is a no-no as that is almost always a guarantee for seriously weird and vivid dreams. The kind where you feel like you haven’t slept at all when you wake up again)

I don’t drink herbal tisanes and I only buy decaf if the flavour isn’t available as a regular tea, for the same reason that I don’t buy decaf coffee. I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to tell any difference taste-wise, but I don’t really like the idea of the extra processing step. It’s a snob thing.

Angrboda said it best for me as well: " I’ll take whichever tea I’m in the mood for, regardless of which type it is. I don’t have problems sleeping afterwards usually. At least not in any way that I can find any sort of pattern in." I do usually go for the sweeter teas later on in the evening, but not always.

I don’t drink coffee in the evenings or ever. Unless I want to be sick for about 3 days…which I don’t.

I drink both caf and decaf, if I think it tastes good, I’ll drink it!

There are substantial differences in how quickly people metabolize caffeine and I think we are seeing that affect tea choices here. It takes about 6 hours for enough caffeine to leave my system to allow me to sleep. Since I try to go to bed by 10 pm (and wake at 6 am) any fully caffeinated tea steeped after 3:30 pm will probably keep me from falling asleep.

As it turns out, I’m a slow metabolizer. The norm is 3.5 hours and healthy adults vary from 3 to 7 hours in their metabolic speed. Here are the aspects that influence how fast people metabolize caffeine (According to The World of Caffeine):

Factors that Slow Metabolism of Caffeine (and keep you buzzed longer)___
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Theobromine in cocoa reduces the speed of caffeine metabolization so if you eat chocolate every day (as I do) you will metabolize caffeine a bit slower.

Closely related is theophiline used by asthmatics which also slows the metabolism of caffeine.

Drinking Alcohol. Alcohol will slow metabolism of caffeine by as much as half.

Being Asian. Asians metabolize caffeine more slowly than caucasians. Of course, there are individual differences. This is a statistical view.

Being male. On average, men metabolize caffeine more slowly than women.

Being a baby. Babies apparently do not have the enzymes in their livers to metabolize caffeine so it can take up to 85 hours for caffeine to leave their systems. (Take away lesson from this is that you don’t put tea or coffee in their bottles.)

Being a child.

Oral Contraceptives. The birth control pill will slow metabolization of caffeine. Nothing is said about the various other birth control methods that use hormones. I suspect that there has not yet been research on them.

Liver Damage (for obvious reasons) slows metabolization of caffeine

Pregnancy

Factors that Speed Metabolization of Caffeine (and steal your buzz faster)___
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Smoking. Smoking cigarettes doubles the rate that caffeine leaves your body.

Being Female. Women metabolize caffeine about 25 percent faster than men.

Being Caucasian. Again, this is taken from population averages. People will vary within these groups.

Fascinating stuff, right? The World of Caffeine has a lot more information on this topic that I found deeply interesting. Here is the URL for the book: http://www.amazon.com/World-Caffeine-Science-Culture-Popular/dp/0415927234/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1259501957&sr=8-1

I think I’m just too exhausted for caffeine to have any effect on me. But I try to stay away from black at night, so it’s generally oolong, green or white and rooibos. Though I’d have to say mainly oolong and rooibos.

I have a cupboard full of teas….but @ nite its either YOGI brand bedtime tea/calming tea or a Honey Vanilla Chamomile. :)

I love the science info.