New Bedford Guide Your Guide to New Bedford and South Coast, MA
Mate
Yerba Mate is a caffeinated drink made from the Ilex paraguariensis plant that is native to South America to which its name alludes. Traditionally the drink is made by steeping leaves just like you would a tea or using a tea bag, but these days it is also common to use a powder from the leaves after they are dried, chopped, and ground. The leaves or powder are the yerba component and the mate component refers to the Calabash gourd that it was served in.
Colonists, or should I say conquistadoresores, learned about the drink when they arrived in the New World and spotted the indigenous Tupi and Guarani tribes quaffing the drink, which they used for medicinal, health and even spiritual benefits.
Eventually the Guachos or cowboys who worked the many ranches that sprouted up began to adopt the drink as a regular way to start their long day since it was an efficient stimulant containing Xanthines: theophylline, theobromine and caffeine just like tea, coffee and even chocolate. Eventually, this would spread to the general populace and the mate took off and spread all over South America. Today, outside of South America, it enjoys a relatively modest popularity worldwide – with the exceptions being Lebanon and the world’s largest importer, Syria.
The flavor is very earthy, grassy, and sort of like…ground-y. I know that’s not a word but it is what I taste whenever I have sampled it. Using “dirty” or “dirt-like” doesn’t seem fair. It doesn’t taste that bad, but it’s no my, er…cup of tea. I would need to add a few other things like sweetener, dairy, etc. to make it palatable. I do have some friends that swear by it as a stimulant and swear that it tastes delicious, but I’d rather just swear at it.
Health benefits? Like its flavor, it has its feet on the ground, and the health benefits are not as zany or loony as that which comes with Kombucha (and marijuana). It does have the aforementioned polyphenol antioxidants and tea-like antioxidants, as well as Vitamins like A, Bs, C, E and the minerals magnesium, calcium, iron, potassium, zinc, manganese and others. For you Joe Rogan fans, the plant is an MAOI (Monoamine Oxidase Inhibitor), in vitro. That’s all I’ll say about that.
Since the way Yerba Mate works and with its slightly different ratios of components, it is a different quality of stimulant when compared to coffee and tea and is very popular with athletes and “biohackers” looking for the alertness and focus without the crash or caffeine addiction. There is even a Yerba Mate Kombucha which I have never encountered in the wild and is sort of a Bigfoot. “Some day we’ll catch him!”
Interested in trying it? The first place that comes to mind that serves it is Mirasol’s Cafe. If you drink “Yerba: in a way that you think I or others may find tasty, let us/me know so I can give it another shot.
