Finish your greens, tea that is

Getting in the greens, like eating loads of yummy broccoli Mom piled on the dinner plate, is an obvious way to good health, but who knew going green didn’t only apply to vegetables. Green tea, hot or cold, offers numerous health benefits.

“I’d probably drink more of it if I knew more about the benefits,” Alyssa Newman, a freshman communications major, said. The attributes green tea has to offer don’t seem to have the monumental buzz it rightfully deserves.

Out of the students interviewed for this piece, only a few were actually aware of how good green tea was for health.

Susie Smith, a sophomore elementary education major, knows green tea is a healthy choice and opts for the diet version.

“I hear it’s better than a lot of other drinks, but don’t know why,” Smith said. Water comes in as the number one healthy drink, but tea ranks number two, according to the author of “The 150 Healthiest Foods on Earth,” Jonny Bowden.

Bowden, Ph.D., C.N.S., hosts a nationwide radio call-in health show and has written a best-selling book, “Living the Low Carb Life: Choosing the Diet That’s Right for You from Atkins to Zone.”

Green tea falls into the non herbal category which is made up of three others: white, black and oolong (red). These teas are unstoppable when it comes to helping out the body.

Green tea has antioxidants. Yes, and that’s the main good quality students being interviewed seemed to know. But what does that big word mean and why are antioxidants desired?

Antioxidants can be found in a number of items such as whole grains, berries, carrots and coffee.

In “The 150 Healthiest Foods on Earth,” Bowden