Fat loss in a tiny bag: if your belly runneth over, fill your cup with green tea to shrink it - Nutrition Science

By all indications, the fat-loss benefit of tea isn't huge, but it is significant. And the drink's potential uses go far beyond controlling your weight--green tea is being researched as a cancer preventative, an anti-aging remedy, an immune-system booster, even a cavity fighter. Its fat-burning capability is just the cherry on top of a healthy beverage you should be drinking anyway.

RELATED ARTICLE: If you can't stomach green tea.

Dislike the flavor of green tea? You can get some of the same fat-burning benefits from oolong tea, made of partially fermented leaves and containing about 23 percent metabolism-boosting catechins, but with a slightly different chemical composition than that of its green cousin. According to a recent study, oolong raises energy expenditure almost as much as green tea does, a metabolic increase that researchers attributed to the tea's caffeine. When given to volunteers, five cups of tea or the equivalent of caffeine each raised metabolism by about 70 calories per day, says researcher James Seale, Ph,D., a biomedical engineer at the Beltsville Human Nutrition Research Center in Maryland. But caffeine may not be the only potent substance in oolong, as the tea drinkers had a greater increase in fat oxidation as well.

Senior Writer Ben Kallen mixes his green tea with herbal orange and spice.

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