Talk:Rooibos

Anticarcinogenic?
I know of no actual science saying any component of Rooibos is anticarcinogenic. If that's to remain in the article, we need to come up with some kind of reference for it. As far as I can see, all of the common herb tea chemicals thought to be anticarcinogenic are absent in Rooibos. It does have some antioxidants, but if that's the only sign, it should be cited directly, without drawing the anticarcinogen conclusion. Kaz 18:45, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

A PubMed search for Aspalathus linearis finds about 20 articles, the first of which seems (based on the abstract) to describe a study on tumorigenesis suppression effects of herbal extracts in mouse tissue, including rooibos. This might be a good starting point for a literature search, if someone is interested. Jks July 6, 2005 18:51 (UTC)

reference links
I replaced the commercial reference links at the bottom of the page with links to noncommercial sources. This seems to be the trend for several of the tea-related pages, many of which had links to greentealovers.com that have now been removed because the site is primarily a commercial sales vehicle.

Feb. 18 2007 - Two more links to africanredtea,com (commercial site) were added to "external links" - I think people from africanredtea,com and grentealovers,com are spammers. Should they be blacklisted ??

Khoisan name
What do the khoi and the san call the Rooibos?

source for grading
under "grading" a line says:

The high-grade rooibos is exported and does not reach local markets, with major consumers being the EU, particularly Germany, where it is used in creating flavoured blends for loose-leaf tea markets.

The source is a copy from an online published book that does not to seem have any other reference. In fact it appears that this is not the case and Rooibos is popular in its local markets. I would like to delete it

Marisajo (talk) 20:03, 18 April 2022 (UTC)Marisajo

Vitamin C in fresh leaves vs. dried leaves to make tea
This statement is easy to understand and is supported by a reliable source: "As a fresh leaf, rooibos contains a high content of ascorbic acid (vitamin C), which is lost when made into tea." The article is about a bush and its leaves used to make tea. As the source says, fresh (green, as shown in the images) leaves contain high amounts of vitamin C (any fresh green leaf would). As vitamin C is highly heat-sensitive, it is lost when hot tea is made from the leaves. There's no problem with this content and source, yet an IP editor insists it is wrong, with no source to dispute it. Zefr (talk) 04:40, 3 May 2022 (UTC)

See above reference. Quotes expert. Stop screwing around. You didn't even read the original reference. Signed by IP.
 * There are numerous examples one can find in the literature showing that fresh green tea leaves contain high vitamin C, but the drying process and then brewing to make hot tea substantially diminishes vitamin C, such as this one example here. The article images show rooibos bush fresh leaves are green, then the leaves are processed by "oxidation" or fermentation to produce the typical red color of dried rooibos tea leaves - see description and sources under "Production and processing". This drying process would reduce and possibly eliminate ascorbic acid (vitamin C) from the final, dried leaves used to make tea. Zefr (talk) 14:43, 3 May 2022 (UTC)

Add info on green vs. red rooibos, please
Information about benefits and side effects of green rooibos would be appreciated. It's unfermented, more fiddly to bring to market, and costs more. Ocdncntx (talk) 01:19, 3 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Why is it of interest? WP:UNDUE. If you have a proposed statement plus a WP:RS source, then post it here. Zefr (talk) 01:33, 3 June 2023 (UTC)