Yerba mate beverage

The yerba mate plant (Ilex paraguariensis) is a small tree native to southern South America, whose leaves are used to make a type of tea known as ‘mate’.

This tea traditionally is used as both a medicinal and social beverage and often is passed around a group in a dried gourd and consumed through a filtered metal straw.

The flavor of yerba mate can be described as sweet, bitter, withered leaf-like, and alfalfa-like. The herb contains vitamin A, C, E, B1, B2, carotene, riboflavin, panthothenic acid and biotin.

Moreover, it has 15 different amino acids, plus significant amount of magnesium, calcium, iron, sodium, potassium, manganese, silicon, phosphate, zinc, niacin, sulphur and chlorophyll, choline and inositol. Yerba mate might be considered one of the main antioxidant-rich beverages consumed in various South American countries.

The leaves contain many bioactive compounds such as chlorogenic acid and phenolic acid, which appear to be responsible for the antioxidant activity.

Drinking yerba mate is considered more than just good for the body; it is also good for the soul. In folk medicine, yerba mate infusions have been used for the treatment of arthritis, rheumatism, and other inflammatory disease, headache, obesity, hypertension and hepatic and digestive disorders.

The Indians known as the Guaraní began drinking yerba mate in the region that now includes Paraguay, southern Brazil, southeastern Bolivia, northeastern Argentina and Uruguay.  To the Guarani, yerba mate is known as the ‘drink of the gods’.
Yerba mate beverage