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Do you "Mate"?

I'm curious if anyone else here drinks Yerba Mate (mah-tay)? Sometimes called "Paraguayan tea" (though it's said to be Argentina's national drink) made from the Ilex paraguariensis tree. I received 4 bags of various brands today, one brand is shown below but it's not my pic. I've tried two of the brands and they both taste similar - like green tea but not bitter at all (you don't use boiling water with it only 150*F water or so). The main difference of brands is supposedly in the curing style and time of the leaves & stems. There are flavored Mate brands - the shipper sent me a brand that is supposed to have mint added but I don't taste much difference, like all those "flavored" coffees they sell, I can tell a diff in scent but not really taste.

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I like the style of this brands package, makes me imagine it was bagged by an order of Monks or Rosicrucians or something. Inside it looks like a bag of dried hedge clippings - yum!

Here is the traditional way to drink Mate, from a gourd with a filtered metal straw called a Bombilla
My black & silver decorated gourd and bombilla set haven't arrived yet so this isn't my pic either. :)

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for anyone interested it works to bag it yourself in a disposable tea bag or run it like coffee as I did in each of the trials today but I wanna try the traditional way too!
 
wow, wasnt sure what I was getting myself into by clicking on this thread title... :0o:
 
That's why I put it thatta way! :-D
 
Actually, I have a friend who went to Argentina for a full year as part of some school programme, and he drinks the stuff nonstop (as they did in Argentina.) I tried some and was rather fond of it, but I don't know how people can perpetually suck it down, I don't want to be drinking constantly (although with a week like this one... but that's another story. ;) )
 
I'm not a constant tea-coffee drinker myself. I generally only have one cup of tea or coffee every day or two otherwise I only drink ice water. I bought so much cos I was paying postage. There's rumor that it's not good long-term to drink more than 1 liter of mate a day but since I plan to drink it only once a week or so it should be ok. I kinda made myself queasy by having two mates during the day and a strong cup of coffee this evening. Mate is said to be a minor MAO inhibitor so maybe that potentiated the already strong coffee - I always make mine double strength w/ no cream. Two cups of tea, coffee or mate is all the caffeine I can take in 24 hours I guess. :)
 
I drink it. Course what I get is probably a little removed from the original style you seem to use given I get mine at a chain tea shop. Drinking a bit now, mixed with lemongrass.
 
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