Hemp tea is prepared with the dry leaves or ground flower buds of hemp, a plant from the cannabis family. However, it should not be confused with its psychotropic family members.
Its richness in cannabidiol (CBD) grants it benefits of its own, some of which can even help with chronic problems, but don’t expect any funny effect to come out of it.
3 scientifically proven reasons to drink hemp tea
Despite being from the same family as marijuana, you can drink hemp tea to get all the benefits associated with these botanical group without any of the famous side-effects. This tea is rich in cannabidiol (CBD) and more widely available and legal than its psychoactive family member.
Better sleep and relaxation
Due to their CBD content, both cannabis oil and hemp tea have a soothing effect that helps to relax the mind and the body.
According to a 2017 research, this cannabinoid has the potential to become a treatment for insomnia, but also to reduce the nightmares associated with PTSD, to improve the sleep quality of patients with chronic pain, and to treat REM sleep behavior disorders.
Since it improves sleep quality because of its soothing properties, the intake of hemp tea can also help reduce the stress levels and even reduce or prevent the symptoms of depression and anxiety.
Reduces nausea and vomiting
According to researchers, it’s the cannabidiol content in this plant that grants it this benefit.
This effect has proved particularly powerful in the case of chemotherapy patients, for whom is harder to find nausea drugs that can help control chemotherapy-induced sickness.
Reduces chronic pain, inflammations and allergies
A thorough 2015 scientific review has analyzed several studies with the intent of evaluating the potential use of cannabinoids to treat inflammations and ailments related to this.
The researchers’ conclusion was that, even with the psychoactive components removed, the cannabidiol content of these plants, in which the hemp is included, is strong enough to suppress inflammatory responses.
Although many other benefits were evaluated too during this review, most still required further studies to assess their effects and risks. The only confirmed ones are the anti-inflammatory effect in the cases of chronic pain, allergies, and its potential in soothing the symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis (MS) patients.
How to make hemp tea
Hemp tea is made just like any other tea.
You use 1 spoon of dry leaves per cup, and cover them with boiling water. Before drinking it, wait 2 or 5 minutes, depending on how intense you want the flavor to be.
This tea has a very mild and pleasant herbal taste but you can add milk, a bit of honey or any other sweetener you want to make its flavor more to your liking.
Note: CBD is not soluble in water. If you want to enjoy the benefits of this compound you should add a source of fat to your tea, such as coconut milk, regular milk or butter.
Does hemp tea get you high?
Hemp belongs to the Cannabis sativa plant species, which explains why so many people fear (or hope) it will have the same effects as marijuana. The truth is: it hasn’t.
This botanical family contains two components that set them apart, tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), which is psychoactive, and cannabidiol (CBD), the substance responsible for the therapeutic effects of cannabis.
Hemp is rich in the latter, but it contains such a minimal amount of THC, that it doesn’t matter how you prepare the plant, you won’t get high from it. As a comparison, the marijuana sold on the streets has on average 42x more THC than hemp.
Can you smoke hemp tea?
Yes, you can. You would normally use the flowers or their buds for this, and the tea is nothing more than ground, seedless buds.
Again, it is impossible for a joint using hemp alone to make you high. However, its therapeutic properties can be felt faster as it is absorbed by the lungs into the blood flow from where it can reach the brain quicker.
In the video below you can see an experiment, where hemp tea was smoked to assess if it could leave the person mildly high at least. A little spoiler: it can’t.
