JP2002272372A - Tea drink using marine deep water and method for producing the same - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a method for producing a mild tea drink suppressed in astringency using marine deep water. SOLUTION: This method for producing a tea drink comprises such processes that drinking water and marine deep water are formulated with each other at a given formulation ratio previously set followed by being put in a mixing tank and fully mixed by stirring, the resultant diluted marine deep water (for instance, at a dilution ratio of 0.4%) is heated to a given temperature appropriate to tea extraction, for instance, at about 90 deg.C, tea is extracted through pouring a given amount of the diluted marine deep water into a given amount of tea leaves, and if necessary, a side raw material such as vitamin C is added to the resultant product followed by again stirring to make the tea drink homogenized; on the other hand, a bottle is prepared as a cleaned container through a washing/warming bottle process (the container, which is a plastic bottle, a metallic can or the like, is of any shape provided that it is made of a material suitable for the drink therein), the bottle is filled with the homogenized tea drink using a filling instrument followed by being degassed and sterilized at about 80 deg.C for 30 min, the bottle is capped and turned over followed by being soaked in a cooling water to be cooled, and then an inspection of the damage and the appearance of the bottle and existence or nonexistence of intermixture of foreign matter therein is done and an accepted product by the inspection is subjected to a labeling process by a labeler followed by being bottled.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to tea or coffee beverages such as green tea, black tea, and oolong tea, and more particularly to a method for producing a tea beverage capable of obtaining a mild taste.

2. Description of the Related Art In general, taste components (astringency components) of tea beverages
Is said to be derived mainly from polyphenol compounds such as tannins, flavonoids and catechins. Polyphenol compounds are representative substances that exhibit antioxidant activity.
It is said to act in vivo as a superoxide and hydroxyl radical scavenger classified as active oxygen and free radicals, and to help prevent lifestyle-related diseases, aging, and cancer. In the study of green tea, it is known that catechins are oxidized in the process of reducing and elimination of superoxide and hydroxyl radicals, generate quinone radical intermediates, and then generate polymers (dimers or more). The taste component (astringency) of the tea beverage changes due to the polymerization reaction of the catechins. On the other hand, it is said that drinking tea from natural water or groundwater or spring water, which is called natural water, is delicious, and it has been reported to many areas with high cleanliness and good natural environment. It is generally said that water that can taste delicious tea contains many mineral components.

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] However, regarding what kind of minerals and how much minerals can be served in a delicious tea, etc., the taste is strong and the empirical approach is mainly used. Has not been verified. If the taste is scientifically verified and the theory is established, it will be possible to produce various beverages including tea beverages. The present invention has been made in view of the above points, and has as its object to provide a method for producing a mild and delicious tea beverage.

[Function] The present inventor uses deep seawater collected in Muroto City, Kochi Prefecture to produce tea and coffee, and the taste changes from that of ordinary drinking water, and the taste is mild and easy to drink. Had been confirmed. However, it was completely unclear why taste changes, what mechanism of action is involved, and why. If we can identify the cause of the change in the taste of tea beverages when using deep water, we can open up new ways to use deep water.
The taste components of tea beverages are tea polyphenols, and it is known that the taste changes due to the antioxidant reaction of the tea polyphenol. In addition, the present inventor has confirmed that when tea is extracted using deep seawater raw water, the color change of tea catechin occurs, and that the degree of color change is dependent on the concentration of deep water. From these events, if we can clarify the relationship between the structural change of polyphenols and the change in taste, we believe that it will help scientific verification related to the taste of tea beverages,
The inventor has made intensive efforts. The present inventor has obtained the following knowledge on the effect of deep water on the taste component from the study of the antioxidant ability of catechins as a tea component. That is, the content was found to be 1) that the main minerals (Na, K, Ca, Mg) contained in the deep water are factors that cause a change in taste in tea. Furthermore, 2) it was also found that a tea beverage with a mild taste can be produced by diluting deep water raw water having high cleanliness at a certain ratio and using it. As a method for producing a delicious tea beverage, 3) it is preferable to use deep water by diluting raw water, but it is also possible to use deep seawater subjected to desalination treatment using a reverse osmosis membrane (RO). is there. Deep seawater desalinated using a reverse osmosis membrane (RO) contains 0.1% to 1.0% of the main minerals compared to the raw water, and is more distinctive when mixed with the raw water (the mixing ratio is important). It was also found that it was possible to produce tea beverages with Green tea, black tea,
When tea leaves such as oolong tea are extracted with hot water under certain conditions (amount of tea leaves, temperature and time), the tannin eluted is 40-60.
It becomes a tea beverage containing mg%. The taste component of a tea beverage is brewed by tannin compounds having different structures. The present inventor has discovered that the interaction between the tannin and the mineral component contained in the deep water causes a change in the taste component, and has conducted experiments and scientific verification. As a result, a correlation was found between the amount of tannin and the amount of specific mineral ions contained in the deep water, and it was found that a tea beverage with a mild taste can be produced using the deep water.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the drawings. The drinking water refers to drinking water that conforms to the water quality standard of the Water Supply Law or water equivalent thereto. In this embodiment, the water is desalinated and demineralized into tap water, surface seawater, or deep ocean water. Use the purified drinking water obtained. Such desalting and demineralizing treatments can be performed using, for example, an apparatus that appropriately combines three of an ultrafiltration membrane, a reverse osmosis membrane, and an electrolyzer. The deep ocean water is prepared by filtering with a strainer, put into a blending tank together with the drinking water according to a preset mixing ratio, and stirred and mixed to obtain diluted deep ocean water. The above-mentioned deep sea water is clean seawater taken from deep sea 200 meters or more below the sea surface. FIG. 1 is a flowchart showing a process example of a method for producing a tea beverage to which the present invention is applied.
For example, tap water is prepared, and in step 2, purified drinking water is obtained by filtration, desalination, demineralization, or the like. In addition, if necessary, ultraviolet irradiation or ultrasonic irradiation, it is preferable to add sterilization or disinfection treatment by the application of a weak current.
In step 4, filtration by a strainer is performed. Next, in step 5, the drinking water and the deep sea water are blended in a predetermined blending ratio which is set in advance, and is put into a blending tank and sufficiently stirred and mixed. In step 6, the diluted deep water is heated to a predetermined temperature suitable for tea extraction, for example, about 90 ° C., and in step 7, a predetermined amount of diluted deep water is poured into a predetermined amount of tea leaves to extract tea. . If necessary, in step 8, an auxiliary material such as vitamin C is added, and in step 9, the mixture is stirred again to obtain a homogenized tea beverage. On the other hand, the bottles are prepared as containers cleaned by the washing bottle and hot bottle processes of steps 10 and 11 (the containers are not limited as long as they are materials suitable for beverages such as PET bottles and metal cans). Filling the bottle with the homogenized tea beverage using a filler at 12;
In step 13, deaeration and sterilization are performed at about 80 ° C. for 30 minutes.
In 5 immerse in cooling water and cool. Next, at step 16, the bottle is inspected for the presence or absence of foreign matter and the appearance and appearance of the foreign matter. At step 17, the labeling process is performed by a labeler, and then the packaging operation is performed at step 18 to complete a tea beverage product. . Although the dilution ratio of deep sea water with drinking water varies depending on the type of tea, it is usually preferable to dilute the deep sea water so as to contain 0.1 to 0.9% by weight. The deep sea water employed in this embodiment will be described below. In other words, this deep sea water is seawater in an environment where there is no wind wave or convection and mixing caused by changes in surface temperature that are usually found on the surface of the ocean, and various oils, chemical substances, pesticides, etc. used on the ground It is not affected by marine pollution caused by harmful substances. In addition, it has the characteristic that dissolved organic matter in seawater is very small and that it is extremely clean from a microbial point of view. Water temperature is 10 on average annually
It has a low temperature of below ℃ and contains many natural elements required by the human body, and this deep ocean water is now withdrawn throughout the world. When the amount of tannin contained in the tea beverage extracted by the ordinary method is converted into 1 L,
It was about 400-600 mg / L. Since tannin is a complex of catechin, flavonoid, etc., it is 0.66-1.0 mM in terms of molar concentration, assuming that the average molecular weight of tea tannin is 600. When the average molecular weight of tannin is doubled by the polymerization reaction of catechins, the concentration becomes 0.33-0.5 mM. On the other hand, the deep water contains Ca, Mg, K, and Na as main metals and Fe, Cu, Mn, Se, Zn, Cr, and Mo as trace metals shown in Table 1. As an experiment, as a result of mixing the tea beverage produced under the above conditions and the deep water in equal amounts, the brown color of the tea beverage was darkened, and the formation of uncertainties was confirmed. Is shown. In experiments where the deep water was diluted in several steps, the phenomenon caused a change in color and taste in the direction in which it diminished, and those phenomena depended on the concentration of the deep water. In order to study the interaction between the components contained in the deep water and the color components, the relationship between the metal ions in the deep water and the tannin content in the tea beverage was analyzed. Previous studies on the antioxidant action of tea catechins have demonstrated experimentally that Fe and Cu interact with tannins. Then, as a result of comparing the concentrations of Fe and Cu contained in the deep water and the tannin concentration, it was found that the concentrations of Fe and Cu were about 0.1% of the tannin concentration and did not correlate. As a result, it was suggested that main metal ions contained in deep water may interact with taste components. Therefore, the tannin concentration was calculated assuming that tannin contained in the tea beverage formed a complex with the metal ion, and the results are shown in Table 2. Assuming that deep-water mineral ions interact with catechins in tea beverages, we determined their concentrations. Previous studies have shown that binding of metal ions to catechins occurs at a 1: 1 or 1: 2 ratio. Therefore, which metal ions are interacting was examined from the concentration relationship. An ultrapure aqueous solution containing 0.1% of the deep water was prepared as a dilution rate for making the concentration of the main metal ions contained in the deep water equal to the concentration of the tannin. Table 3 shows the concentrations of the main metal ions contained in the solution. Various verifications were made based on the comparison between Table 2 and Table 3. Taking into account that the taste (astringency, bitterness, sourness) may be lost if all of the tannin binds to the metal ion, it is assumed that about 50% of the tannin amount binds to the metal ion. Assuming that the ratio of tannins involved in binding is 1: 1
M, 0.165-0.25 mM. From Table 3, 1
In the deep water diluted 000-fold, Mg is 0.062 mM,
Ca contains 0.010 mM, K contains 0.014 mM, and Na contains 0.47 mM. By this calculation, it was found that the metal ion bound to the tannin was either Na or Mg. However, Na was excluded because it is a salty component. On the other hand, it is also known that Mg itself shows bitterness. As a result of these examinations, Mg was specified as a component that changes the taste (astringency, bitterness). When the deep water is diluted according to the amount of tannin, when the average molecular weight of tannin is 600, the dilution rate of the deep water is about 0.6%, and similarly, the average molecular weight is 1200.
In the case of, it was derived from the calculation that about 0.3% was optimal. Actually, as a result of a trial production of a tea beverage using diluted deep water and a sensory test, about 0.2-0.4% was optimal. Considering that the astringency due to tannin is suppressed by metal ions and the taste becomes mild, it is preferable to set the amount of Mg to about 50-80% of the amount of tannin. It may be more than the amount of tannin. Taking these factors into account, it has become clear that it is optimal to use deep water diluted to 0.1-0.9% for the production of tea beverages using deep water. As a method for producing a mild-tasting tea beverage with reduced astringency, the concentration of Mg, a mineral ion contained in deep water, and the concentration of tannin, which is a taste component (astringency, bitterness), is a fixed ratio, 1: 1 or 1: It is desirably 2. If the dilution rate of the deep water is set to 1% or more, the saltiness due to Na becomes remarkable. Therefore, the dilution rate of the deep water is desirably 0.1 to 0.9%. The amount of tannin eluted in tea beverages (green tea, black tea, oolong tea) differs depending on the raw tea leaves used and the extraction conditions (temperature, time). .

EFFECT OF THE INVENTION Deep water with high cleanliness does not require an operation to remove organic matter and various bacteria contained in surface water.
Since the balance between the main metal ions and the mineral ions of the trace metal ions can be kept constant, it can be used as a stable and safe raw material for producing drinking water. Mineral ions (Mg) contained in deep water interact with taste components such as tannin to provide a tea beverage with a mild taste and easy to drink. It was found that when the concentration of Na ions contained in the deep water and the concentration of tannin in the tea beverage were at a fixed ratio of 1: 1 or 2: 1, the balance between salty taste, astringency, bitterness, and acidity was improved. By diluting deep water at a certain rate, it becomes possible to replenish the six main metal ions and trace metals essential for living organisms.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a flowchart showing an example of steps of a method for producing a tea beverage to which the present invention is applied.

Claims (6)

[Claims] 1. A method for producing a tea beverage, wherein the method is extracted using deep ocean water diluted to 0.1 to 0.9% with drinking water. 2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the dilution ratio of the deep sea water is selected so that the concentration of Mg in the deep sea water is substantially equal to or less than the concentration of the extracted tannin. Production method of tea beverage. 3. The method for producing a tea beverage according to claim 1, wherein the dilution rate of the deep sea water is 0.2 to 0.4%. 4. A method for producing a tea beverage, comprising adding deep-sea water to a tea beverage extracted with drinking water so as to have a dilution ratio of 0.1-0.9%. 5. The method according to claim 4, wherein the dilution rate of the deep sea water is selected so that the concentration of Mg in the deep sea water is substantially equal to or less than the concentration of the tannin to be extracted. Production method of tea beverage. 6. A method for producing a tea or coffee beverage, comprising adding a natural salt to a tea beverage extracted with drinking water such that the concentration of Mg is substantially equal to the concentration of tannin to be extracted.