Abstract

Functional food is believed to possess extra health benefits beyond basic nutrition. Green tea is rich in wide array of phytochemicals that plays vital role in body defense system. The wild olive leaves are rich in phytochemicals but their use as green tea is not explored. The research was aimed to use olive leaves to make green tea that may provide health benefits to consumers and reduce financial burden of our country. It was aimed to process and convert olive leaves into prototype tea as well as to evaluate its physico-sensory attributes. In this study, olive leaves were collected from Capital city, Islamabad Pakistan. The fresh leaves were grinded, and dried in microwave oven. Fresh olive leaves (15gm) divide it into 3 equal weight/parts (5 g each) and labelled as S1, S2 and S3. Treatment group S1 was grinded for 2 minutes, S2 grinded for 5 minutes and S3 grinded for 10 minutes using mortar and pestle mixer. Grinding is supposed to break the cell wall and will eventually liberate tannin as colorant. All samples were subjected to microwave treatment for 90 seconds. Tea bags were made and added in to hot water to see the color and taste. The taste of sample S2 (5minutes grinding; 1 minute heating) was acceptable and color was moderate yellow. Overall acceptability was satisfactory (11.28±3.05) and so sample S2 (5 minutes grinding and 1.0 min heating) are acceptable. Further research needs to be conducted to see the effectiveness of this tea in different type of disease.