Pine Needle Tea

I discovered, well, for myself that is, something new the other day. My friend who is a gardener had recently cut down a black pine in a client’s garden and had it laying in a chopped up pile on his lot. As we mused together about how it was a waste to have cut down such a beautifully manicured tree, I bent down to pick some up and, as I have a somewhat robotic tendency to do, brought it right to my nose. The nostalgic aroma of xmas washed over me, and that set my mind to running.

Hmm…..maybe I can bring some home to decorate the front door or the front porch for New Year’s! (which is a tradition here: pine, bamboo, holly, nandina with red berries, that kinda thing)….Maybe I can bring some inside for the smell, even putting some near the heater!……..And my friend chimes in ‘and I hear you can drink a tea from the pine needles…..’……Tea?!

That pricked my interest a bunch, so i gathered a few branches for displaying and a few separate ‘sprigs’ from his garbage pile and brought them home.

It being winter now, we always have a kettle at the ready on the heater. At first I tried just a few pine needles in one cup and let it steep for a long while. It barely had any color, a really not much flavor either, but I did detect something, and definitely that pine aroma, although it was light.

So next, i tried it stronger, with about 20 pine needles.

YUM!!!!!

Blown away!! This stuff is great! Not in the slightest way what i imagined it would taste like. To begin with, it has a definite tartness, like a light lemon juice. And then, of course, that aroma hits you. So nice!! Simply delicious!! And although so light, it is surprisingly satisfying.

So, I did a little research and found out, first, that pine needle tea is very rich in vitamin C. A bunch of websites claim it is 5 times the concentration in lemons, but I have also seen a rather good information site saying that they have never seen reliable citations associated with such claims. So, that is debateable. There is record of 16th century French explorer Jacques Cartier and his crew being given pine needle tea by the Iroquois people to treat their scurvy, and that it worked, meaning that although some argue about the concentration of vitamin C in pine tea, there is obviously a significant amount.

Another interesting compound found in low concentrations in pine tea is shikimic acid. This is known predominantly as an antiviral, and is actually the main ingredient in the flu medicine Tamiflu. Perhaps this tea has a slight ability to protect us from covid, which is a virus? Just a thought….

Just by chance, i also knew exactly where the name of that compound was derived from when i saw it. There is a plant on the mountaintop here, seemingly associated with 500 year old castle ruins up there. It is planted all around an old well that was up there, which most definitely serviced the castle. I am always curious about the plants i notice in my environs, and always amazed how plants can teach us about the past history of an area, who was there before. So they stuck out to me one fall, mostly due to the seedpods that formed on it, which looked exactly like star anise, a favorite spice of mine (because it basically smells like black licorice!!). I picked a branch and photographed it and asked around what it was to those who might know, and I found out it was a plant called ‘shikimi’ in japanese. I read more online, and found out that shikimi is a japanese member of the same family of plants as star anise. The star anise which is used as a spice is native to China, and this version of the seedpod is actually considered poisonous, and definitely inedible. I learned that historically in Japan, it was often grown around graves, sometimes even burned and let smolder, in order that the aroma might keep animals away. This must be where the name shikimic acid must come from, though. I looked up the amount of shikimic acid found in both star anise and pine needle tea, and found it was far stronger in the star anise, over 10 times stronger. But I also found research that concludes pine needles are a valid source for refining shikimic acid for use in anti-viral medicine and beyond.

The pine needle tea also contains polyphenols, antioxidants and vitamin A. The tea is known to work on coughs as an expectorant, helping one clear congestion, and also for soothing a sore throat. Many claim it helps with clarity and mental clearness, as well as depression, and even as a pain reliever. It has anti-microbial and anti-inflammatory properties, as well. Oh yeah!! And it is organic. And free!!

So many reasons to try it!

It looks like you can actually used pine needles from many species, although the properties vary from specie to specie will vary. One important thing to keep in mind is to avoid the yew tree. I think these long needle pines are the easiest to identify for use.

oops!! Hard to photograph tea closely. hahahaha

I have been working a bit on my website, the infrastructure of it. Back to work!!!

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