Guayusa

Guayusa is a caffeinated herbal tea brewed from the dried leaves of Ilex guayusa, an Amazonian holly tree native to the eastern foothills of the Ecuadorian Andes and a close relative of the yerba mate plant. Not a "true" tea from Camellia sinensis, it is a tisane that nonetheless carries a genuine caffeine kick, which has made it the traditional pre-dawn drink of Kichwa and other Indigenous peoples of the upper Amazon. Brewed in hot water the dried leaves give a clear golden to amber liquor that smells of hay, damp forest and green tea, with a soft toasty sweetness. On the palate it is smooth and earthy — markedly less bitter and astringent than yerba mate — with a mild grassy-herbal body and only a whisper of the drying tannic edge you expect from a holly leaf. It is naturally rich in caffeine, theobromine and antioxidant polyphenols.