Chaga Tea ~ A Healer Throughout the Ages

July 21, 2021

Visually it’s hard to tell the difference between a long black coffee and a Chaga tea. With its deep, robust flavour and energy-enhancing potential, Chaga can be a great coffee substitute if you’re looking to take a break from caffeine and the crash that often comes with it.

Chaga is a medicinal mushroom that boasts immense immunomodulating potential. Brimming with adaptogenic beta-d-glucans, antioxidants, skin protecting melanin, betulinic acid and an array of proteins, sterols and enzymes, Chaga is revered as an anti-ageing, energy potentiating and immune-supporting powerhouse.

With its impressive variety of active compounds Chaga has been used to support:

Energy, stamina and endurance
Longevity and healthy ageing
Skin health and the visible signs of ageing
Inflammation
Oxidative stress
Digestive health
Stress and fatigue
Immune resilience

To deep dive into Chaga’s benefits and why we call it the King of Medicinal Mushrooms head to our recent journal entry Chaga Mushroom and its Benefits.

Enjoying your Chaga extract straight up as a Chaga tea is one of the best ways to enjoy its health-supporting properties.

How to Make the Perfect Cup of Chaga Tea

This is going to be one of the easiest recipes you’ve ever encountered.

Pop the kettle on and add ¼ to ½ tsp of your Inner Atlas Chaga extract powder to a cup of boiled water, stir 2 to 3 times, and enjoy.

Our Chaga extract is 100% water soluble so your Chaga tea will be ready in a flash with no residue left in the bottom of the cup.

Inner Atlas Chaga Medicinal Mushroom Tea

What Does Chaga Tea Taste Like?

Chaga has a rich, dark and somewhat earthy flavour with a hint of floral-like notes. Its slightly bitter profile comes from its triterpenes, and the subtle presence of vanilla comes from Chaga’s naturally occurring vanillin content.

Chaga’s robust qualities make it a perfect morning brew.

Chaga Tea Throughout History

Chaga’s history of use dates back several millennia with Chaga remnants being found in Ötzi the Iceman’s pouch [1]. Ötzi, a well-preserved mummy was discovered in 1991 in the Austrian Alps and was believed to have lived on the Italian side of the Alps from 3400 to 3100 BCE. While other medicinal mushrooms were also found in Ötzi’s pouch it is suspected he was using Chaga for fire-lighting purposes rather than consuming it for his health.

Across history inhabitants of the northernmost parts of the world were able to use Chaga medicinally as it requires extremely cold temperatures in order to grow and absorb the nutrients from the trees which give it life.

The Khanty people indigenous to north-western Siberia are thought to be the first to discover that Chaga could be used as food, grinding it down to include in soups and tea. As a medicinal mushroom, it was used in a variety of ways for digestive health and to protect against their harsh climate, boost physical stamina and attain long life [2]. They also used Chaga as a natural soap due to its anti-inflammatory properties to help soothe the skin.

The medicinal use of Chaga gradually spread to other parts of what is now Russia, consumed by hunter-gatherers to support their energy levels and resilience. By the time the 12^th century came around Chaga tea was widespread and regularly enjoyed by nobility. Vladimir II Monamakh, Grand Prince of Kievan Rus’ (preceding modern Russia), claimed that Chaga helped him recover from serious ailments.

In more recent history, Chaga tea was used as a coffee substitute by the Finnish in World War 2 [3]. Coffee, as a casualty of war, was hard to come by, but there was an abundance of Chaga growing in Finland's forests, and so the Finnish swapped one energising brew for another.

So next time you’re enjoying a Chaga tea, remember there’s a whole lot of history behind that cup.

If you’re yet to experience Chaga, now might be the time to do so. Check out our potent Chaga extract sourced from Siberia with greater than 30% beta-d-glucans ( the active compounds ) here.