Herbal Tea Preparation: Learn About Decoctions and Infusions!
Herbal tea preparation is basically really simple and it is one of the keys to herbal tea alchemy! You want to make herbal tea recipes that provide you with the most nutrient value possible. So there are several techniques in doing so that will give you the most out of your medicine. The medicine that is also your food!
Basically, it depends on the herbs used. The general rule is this: 1) Roots - need to be slowly simmered with lid on for a period of time from 20-40 minutes to unlock the therapeutic ingredients. 2) Leaves - need to be infused in hot or close to boiling water in a jar with the lid on for 20 minutes or longer. 3) Barks - it varies depending on the bark, most are decocted, but a few are infused. 4) Seeds - most seeds also need to be infused but ground up first. There are, of course exceptions to these rules, but in general they hold true. Decoctions:
Decoctions are made from hardy and woody roots that open up there active ingredients when simmered in water.
For this reason you can often smell the rooty aromas of tonic herbs drifting through our living space. The other alternative is to decoct these tonics for 30 minutes and then reuse them again the next day for another 30 minutes to get additional benefits. You can use this hot root decoctions to pour over your favorite nutritive herbal tea or herbs and spices. This is called an infusion! Infusions:
Infusions are way easy! They are primarily used for leafy herbs with their medicine extracts readily available. They just need a little hot water and much less time.
Have fun with these herbal tea preparation techniques with herbal stimulants, cleansing herbs, and tonics that you can get in the ritual of making everyday.
It is a new way of making your food.......powerful rich, liquid nutrition that is!! You can add many of our herbal tea recipes to almost any other healthy recipes that requires water......like kombucha and our kombucha recipe!
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