What Are The Health Benefits Of Mango Tea?

Mangoes are related to pistachios and cashews, say "Vegetarians in Paradise" website owners Zel and Reuben Allen. The health benefits of drinking mango tea will vary according to the ratio of mango fruit, juice or pulp used when making your tea, and whether the tea is cold-brewed or steeped using boiling water or juice. It will also vary depending on the type of tea used.

Clear Vision, Bone Growth, Immune Functions

Chamomile tea provides the greatest health benefit when mixed with mango juice. A 100g serving of chamomile tea provides 20 IU vitamin A, according to the USDA Nutrient Database for Standard Reference. If it is cold-brewed in 100 percent mango juice made from 100g raw mango, pulp included, this increases to 1,102 IU of vitamin A. It also provides 13mg calcium, 177mg potassium, 36mg vitamin C, 43mcg folate, 640mcg beta carotene and 23mcg combined lutein and zeaxanthan. This assumes that you use a juice machine and do not strain the resulting liquid.

Vitamin A aids clear vision, promotes healthy bone growth, assists cell division and differentiation, controls immune functions, assists formation of lymph cells and promotes healthy linings of the eyes, stomach, lungs, urinary tract and intestines, states the National Institutes of Health Office of Dietary Supplements.

To cold-brew mango tea, fill a clear glass or plastic tea jug with 100 percent mango juice made from fresh, ripe, unpeeled, raw fruit. Add eight to 10 chamomile teabags or eight to 10 tsp. chamomile tea in a tea ball. If you do use teabags, drape the tags over the mouth of the jug to prevent leaching the taste of the paper into your drink. Allow your mango tea to sit for at least four hours, refrigerated, before removing the teabags.

Red Blood Cells, Wound Healing and Protein Synthesis

Tea purists often prefer to steep their leaves in boiling liquid. Boiling your mango juice will destroy its vitamin C and folate content, according to the chart, "Effects of Cooking on Vitamins," from the textbook, "Nutrition in Perspective, 2nd edition," by P.A. Kreutler and D.M. Czajka-Narins.

Vitamin C helps the body create collagen, which aids wound healing, according to the National Institutes of Health Office of Dietary Supplements. Vitamin C also helps the body break down protein and limit free-radical damage. Folate helps the body make normal red blood cells and prevents anemia.

Diluted Benefits

Reduce all vitamin content by the ratio of water to juice to determine the remaining nutritional content. If you use 2 liters mango juice to 2 liters water, you will have half the nutrients. Use 1 liter of juice to 3 liters of water, and you have one-fourth the nutrients. Since most tea drinkers tend to use more water rather than more juice, beneficial nutrients are lost with each dilution in the strength.

Hydration

Black tea does not have the extra 20 IU vitamin A that chamomile provides, no calcium and no vitamin C and only 5mcg folate. When combined with 100 percent juice made from fresh, raw, unpeeled mangoes, black tea made from mango juice retains the majority of its healthful effects, but when made with boiled juice or as a dilution, it rapidly loses them. Diluted to 3 parts water and 1 part mango juice, it approaches plain tea or water in healthy effects, especially since black tea has a diuretic effect, increasing the speed with which the body sheds water via sweating and urination.

Unless the manufacturer uses 100 percent juice or adds nutrients to the tea, commercial mango teas are little more than flavored water. If the flavor encourages you to drink more fluids, the primary health benefit of mango tea is full hydration. If you are paying higher prices for mango tea because you think you are gaining health benefits, you may be cheating both your body and your wallet.