Yerba Mate Tincture & Alcohol-Free Extract

Yerba Mate (Ilex paraguariensis) is an evergreen tree of the holly family, Aquifoliaceae, native to the subtropical forests of Paraguay, northern Argentina, southern Brazil and Uruguay, where it is grown on plantations and pruned to shrub height for harvest. Left alone it reaches 15 meters, with smooth grey bark, leathery, oval, toothed dark green leaves 7 to 12 cm long, and small greenish-white flowers in the leaf axils followed by red berries. The leaves are dried over fire, aged and coarsely ground for the caffeine-rich beverage mate, sipped through a metal straw from a gourd. We extract the dried leaf.