Why do we have to brew tea or others herbs instead of eating them raw? Why (probably) can’t we get the same health benefits from dry herbs?
In: Biology
Some herbs require heat to be activated. Some herbs have their benefits hidden deep within them, like bone marrow, and you have to boil to get them out. Sometimes, it”s purely because those herbs have been dried and your body can’t digest those vitamins/minerals etc when the source is so dry that you might as well be eating paper.
You can (and many people do) chew fresh herbs, either for their taste or their perceived health benefit.
But fresh herbs only stay fresh for a very short time after being picked. Within a couple of days they’re usually starting to go limp, to lose some of their flavour, and generally to be less desirable.
So the answer to that is to dry the herbs and distribute them in their dried form. But then they’re quite unpalatable: putting a handful of dried herbs into your mouth is not far different from shoving in a handful of sawdust!
However if you steep the dried herbs in hot water for a few minutes, you get a reasonable compromise: a product that can be easily distributed and stored for months, along with an experience for the consumer of something that tastes good and isn’t unpleasant.
In my country we also boil them like pasta and eat them as a type of salad. Certain herbs that aren’t gross to eat raw we also chew them like gum. You can do all kinds if things with them.
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