Beautiful Blooms: Drink Flower Tea for Natural Health Benefits

Are you interested in adopting a more natural approach to health? If so, you may want to consider drinking flower tea daily. This concoction can help improve your cardiovascular, digestive, psychological and immune health. It’s also an overlooked beauty tool. In addition to being delicious and refreshing to sip on, flower tea is one of the best and most accessible forms of natural medicine available. 

In this guide, we’ll explain the health benefits of flower tea pertaining to Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). Plus, we’ll introduce you to lots of interesting ways to use it that you’ve not thought of. 

Flower Tea vs Regular Tea

Although it has the word “tea” in it, flower tea is not technically tea at all. This is because it does not contain the buds or leaves of tea plants. 

Instead, flower tea is made from blends or infusions of dried flowers, fruits, spices, or herbs in water. It’s also referred to as herbal tea or tisane. 

Unlike teas that come from tea plants, tisanes do not contain caffeine, making them ideal for promoting calmness and reducing anxiety. TCM practitioners often prescribe flower tea with different ingredients, depending on the patient’s patterns of disharmony. TCM believes that drinking herbal or flower tea helps balance the body.

According to Physician Lim Sock Ling, “Flowers are added to boost the sensory delights of the tea and enhance its therapeutic effect. However, the medicinal concentration is usually low.”

If you want to boost the health benefits of your flower tea, you can do so by adding it in larger concentrations. “For example, chrysanthemum clears Wind-Heat and helps you detox,” Physician Lim says. 

Alternative Ways to Use Herbal or Flower Tea

Herbal or flower teas are an excellent way to strengthen your wellbeing. Each herb has its own specific properties, so there are numerous ways to help aid the body to protect itself from specific ailments.

To make your own flower tea at home, you can bind tea leaves and flowers together. Physician Lim recommends globe amaranth (qian ri hong, 千日红), chrysanthemum (ju hua, 菊花), jasmine (mo li hua, 茉莉花), lily (bai he, 百合), hibiscus (zhu jin, 朱槿), and osmanthus (gui hua, 桂花) flowers. Set the bulbs aside and let them dry. As you steep the flowers in hot water, they will expand and unfurl to emulate blooming flowers. 

These are some alternative ways to use flower tea daily. 

1. Sleep aid 

Flower tisanes are naturally caffeine free, making them relaxing to drink before bed. Flower teas possess stress-relieving properties that can help calm your nervous system and give a sense of relaxation.

Regular consumption of flower tea before bed encourages a healthy REM cycle, which means better sleep and more energy throughout the day. A few of the most popular flowers that promote sleep are lavender, lemon balm, chamomile, and rose. Add a little honey if you prefer your tea sweeter. 

Physician Lim says, “Apigenin – a compound found in chamomile – helps relax the muscles and offers a sedative effect to extend your sleep duration when taken before bedtime.”

2. Skin care 

The antioxidants and vitamins in flower tea aid in quick cell recovery, improving blemishes and protecting skin from scarring. If you have blemish-prone skin, try a herbal steam bath to keep pores clean and clear.

3. Facial mask 

Making a facial mask using flower tea and herbs is incredibly easy — all you have to do is check what’s in your pantry. You can also add flower tea to a pre-made face mask. Try rosewater, which balances the skin’s pH, soothes inflammation, and is anti-ageing. 

Create your own nourishing facial masks with fruits or vegetables, or even yoghurt. You can also add in a herb or two. It’s easy to customise and create a mask that tends to your face’s individual needs. 

4. Hair rinse 

A herbal hair rinse is a great way to finish off a shower and helps the scalp remove build-up. The same antioxidants found in flowers work as a hair tonic too, helping soften hair and giving it a healthy shine. Flower teas such as butterfly pea can promote hair growth, reduce the growth of grey hairs and darken hair colour naturally. 

5. Poultices, salves, and balms 

For a poultice, herbs are crushed or bruised to release the potency of the herb before being applied topically as a paste or pressed down on the skin through light fabric.

Salves and balms usually combine herbal oils with beeswax or moisturising agent such as shea butter. They can help soothe or disinfect skin to speed up the healing properties 

6. Baths 

Herbal baths are not new but did you know you can do this in the comfort of your own bathroom by adding herbs and flowers to your tub? Physician Lim mentions herbal baths can be used as an external wash to help reduce symptoms of eczema, infantile jaundice, and other skin conditions. 

Customise your herbal bath to support and boost its effectiveness. It can nourish skin, ease soreness, and aching muscles and relax you mentally. 

7. Oils 

You can infuse different herbs in cooking oil or salad dressing to create herb-infused oils that are easy to make and inexpensive. They add a natural flavour and aroma to any dish you’re making. Simply soak dried or fresh herbs such as rosemary, in high-quality olive oil.

Infusing flowers such as lavender in coconut oil also works to create your own massage oils. 

8. Oral health 

Flower tea also promotes good oral health, helping prevent tooth decay, gum disease, and cavities. Most people who suffer from bad breath usually have poor gut health. Flower tea encourages a healthy gut by working to remove unwanted bacteria from your organs, encouraging your body to detox, leading to healthier oral functioning and fresher breath.

Flower tea is popular in the search for healthy herbal solutions for some common ailments — not to mention how beautiful these teas look in a glass container. Speak to a registered TCM physician or medical doctor before consuming flower tea if you are currently taking any medications.

This is an adaptation of an article, “Interesting Ways To Use Herbal Tea You Never Thought Of”, which first appeared on the All Things Health US website.