Substitutes for tea

Hello, I’m Amanda McNulty with Clemson Extension and Making It Grow. Hort agent Stephanie Turner was on the show recently and talked about substitutes for tea after the colonists dumped the imported tea on ships into the Boston Harbor. Tea, like coffee, has caffeine, but none of the plant leaves Stephanie talked about contain that stimulant; they would have given people something to put in their tea pot and to have the rituals of tea at meals and for social events, but no boost from caffeine – maybe that made the colonist more irritable. They used herbs growing in gardens, just like we have mint tea, also sage and oregano. Leaves of some native plants were dried and ground into powder, I was surprised to learn that goldenrod flowers were one, and another Ceanothus americanus, now has the common name New Jersey tea.