Yerba Mate

YERBA MATE IS TERRIFIC!

   I adore the Argentine yerba mate tradition. Every day everyone everywhere was drinking yerba mate in Buenos Aires. I would walk anywhere in the city and spot people clustered around a mate (gourd)and bombilla (straw). 

   I was dazzled by the "ceremony" around yerba mate. When a group shares mate, a host fills the gourd with the tea, hot water, and the bombilla and passes it to the first drinker. When the drinker empties the gourd of its liquid, he passes it back to the host, who refills it with water and passes it to the next drinker. Yes. Everyone sips from the same straw. Sick, healthy, you don't ask. You also may not know everyone you are sipping after, which I find the most endearing element of the tradition. It immediately establishes connections between individuals and can bond a group in such a simple and beautiful way. I appreciated this most when joining the Arte Para Todos volunteers for meetings. Rarely did everyone in the room know each other. 

In the States yerba mate bears these strange dreadlocked hippy connotations but in Argentina it's definitely the drink of all people. In my first meeting with the members of the city government social service branch, we all shared mate as we discussed installing Arte Para Todos in the trailer for the homeless kids. 

Make sure you say it with the Argentine accent, where "y" and "ll" are said as "j" (jerba). Otherwise, a request for "yerba" will lead you to marijuana. 

Because I'm a nerd and this is my new hurray, I pasted some exciting, probably exaggerated tidbits about it, if it is of interest: 

http://www.taooftea.com/shop11-Yerba_Mate.html

The leaves of the rainforest mate tree naturally contain 24 vitamins and minerals, 15 amino acids, abundant antioxidants. In fact, The Pasteur Institute and the Paris Scientific society in 1964 concluded "it is difficult to find a plant in any area of the world equal to mate in nutritional value" and that yerba mate contains "practically all of the vitamins necessary to sustain life."

There are many legends surrounding yerba mate, and it's known to the Argentine Gauchos (cowboys) as their "liquid vegetable", and to the native forest peoples who have survived periods of drought and famine by drinking yerba mate as the “Drink of the Gods”.

Yerba mate contains caffeine, theophylline, and theobromine, well-known stimulants also found in tea, coffee and chocolate.  The caffeine content varies between that of green tea and coffee.  Unlike tea, yerba mate has a low tannin content so it can be strong like coffee with out becoming extremely bitter.  Unlike coffee, yerba mate is not oily and acid forming, so it is less likely to cause stomach acid and jitters.

Yerba mate leaves and stems contain 196 active compounds compared to the 144 are found in Asian green tea (Camellia sinensis)

Yerba mate has significant antioxidant activity. In a study published in 1995 by Biochemicaland Molecular Biology International, researchers concluded that water extracts of yerba mate “were more potent antioxidants than either ascorbic acid (vitamin C) or butylated hydroxytoluene.” A few years later, a group of researchers embarked on a study to again investigate the antioxidant properties of Ilex paraguariensis infusions. Those findings were published in March of 2000 in the journal Biochemical and Biophysica Research Communications. Their results suggest “that ingestion of extracts of Ilex paraguariensis could contribute to increase the antioxidant defense of an organism against free radicals attack.” In a more recent study, published in the November 2001 issue of Fitoterapia, researchers took a look at seven different plant species in South America. They found that yerba mate “contained a higher content of flavonoids and caffeoyl derivatives than any other assayed species.”

The indigenous of South America traditionally use yerba mate to treat gastrointestinal disorders as eupeptic and choleretic agent. Research conducted by a team at Catedra de Farmacologia in Buenos Aires, Argentina found that yerba mate does in fact induce an increase in bile flow and enhance intestinal transit.