FUNCTIONAL CORN SILK TEA AND METHOD FOR PREPARING THE SAME

Technical Field

[1] The present invention relates to a functional corn silk tea and the method to make it.

Background Art

[2] Corn silk is a thread-like part wrapping corn seeds and is also called corn tassel.

Strands of "silk", actually the stigmas from the flowers, emerge from the terminals of the ears and husks at the same time the pollen from the terminal tassels is shed. Corn silk has characteristic medicine effects and is widely used not only as a medicinal herb but also food or food additive. Corn is annual plant originated from warm weather Americas and is now cultivated in many places. It grows as long as 1-3 meters and are very resistant to disease and harmful insects (Lee, W.C., An Colorful Illustrated Book of the Korean Plants, Academy Book, 1996; Ahn, D.K., An Colorful Illustrated Book of the Korean Herbs, Kyohaksa, 1988; Lee, CB. , An Illustrated Book of the Korean Plants, Hyangmoonsa, 1979).

[3] When corn silk is used as a medicine, it is very effective in excreting urine and bile acid (cholagogue), lowering blood pressure and blood sugar, and arresting of bleeding. Especially, it is also effective in treating of bloat, obesity, menstruation syndrome, and prostate-related disease (Udaya, R., Traditional Food Plants in Sri Lanks, Hector Kobbekaduwa Agrarin Research and Training Institute, 1998; Phyllis, B. and James B., Prescription forb Nutritional Healing 3rd Edition, Avery Publishing, 2000). The main components of corn silk are volatile essential oils, gums, resins, saponins, alkaloids, and sugars, and the extracted cork silk tea has characteristic pleasant taste and sweet flavor. Thus, the cork silk tea draws attention as a functional tea.

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[6] Endorphin is an endocrine morphine spontaneously formed in human body and has no effect of toxicosis, but its activity is 18-50 times as high as that of other morphine. It is reported that endorphin has not only effects on alleviation of pain but also effects on making people look on the bright side. It has also activity of retarding aging and killing cancer cells. Endorphinase present in hunan body deactivates endorphin at easy and the activity of endorphin does not exist for a long time. The older a man is, the lower the secretion of endorphin is.

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[8] As the results of that many researchers have been studied on the functionality of

endorphin, Dr. Seymour Ehrenpreis in Chicago Medicine College, USA, reported through the animal and clinical studies that dl-phenylalanine was effective in protecting endorphin and increasing the level of endorphin in human body without any side effects and toxicological problems.(Ehrenpresis S. et al., Advances in pain research and therapy, Raven Press, New York, 3:479, 1979; Ehrenpresis S. et al., Endogenous and exogenous opiate agonist and antagonists, Pergamon Press, Elsford, New York, P379-382, 1980)

[9] Modern people are living under the severe stress feeling emotional and physical distress. It is well known that human should maintain healthy life absorbing a certain amount of water daily. On the basis of this reports, many companies have been developing and selling oriental medicine herbs which can be used as a stress protector or weak body-recover through dietary water. Instant tea is widely used for the purpose of the healthy dietary water which can be drunk at anywhere and anytime just using hot water extraction.

[10] The inventors of the present invention has already developed an instant corn silk tea which was known to be effective in urination, cholelithiasis, and diabetes (Korean Patent No. 10-0466550). The tea bag tea said, however, had weak points in the aspects of characteristic astringent and stinky taste, low preference of consumers, and low functionalities compared with recent healthy drinks supplemented with many functional ingredients.

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Disclosure of Invention Technical Problem

[13] The inventors of the present invention has completed a functional corn silk tea in which corn flour and amino acids added with corn silk, resulting in increasing the sweetness of the corn silk tea and the preference of consumers. The corn silk tea is effective in inhibiting degradation of endorphine generated in human body. Therefore, the objective of the present invention is to provide a manufacturing method to make a corn silk tea, which has preferable flavor by increasing sweetness and decreasing off- flavor of corn silk and has excellent healthy effects on inhibition of endorphin degradation in human body by the incorporation of amino acids. Technical Solution

[14] To achieve the above objective, the present invention is to provide the processing method of a functional corn silk tea comprising the following steps of (a) washing corn silk and cutting it into an appropriate size; (b) steaming said cut corn silk at 140-160 °C for 30-45 seconds; (c)drying said corn silk at 20~40°C for 1 hour at first and then

freeze-drying secondly; (d) submerging corn under water, steaming, drying, and then crushing into a powder form; (e) mixing of the corn silk prepared by step (c) with amino acid and the corn powder of step (d), at a certain ratio.

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[17] At said step (e) of the present invention, the mixing ratio is that 100 parts by weight of freeze-dried corn silk is mixed with 100-1000 parts by weight of corn powder and 0.1-50 parts by weight of amino acid, and 100 parts by weight of corn silk is preferably mixed with 200-500 parts by weight of corn powder and 1-10 parts by weight of amino acid. The size of said corn powder is 1-70 mesh. But, general conditions are not to be limited to them.

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[19] If said amino acid is added at less than 0.1 part by weight, the function of inhibiting the degradation of endorphin will be absolutely weak. If the content is more than 10 parts by weight, the overall processing cost will be too high. If the content of corn powder is less than 100 parts by weight, it will be difficult to remove the fishy and astringent taste of the corn silk tea. If the content of corn powder is more than 500 parts by weight, it will be difficult to reveal the cool taste of the corn silk tea itself.

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[21] At the present invention, said amino acids may be one or more selected from the group consisting of leucine, lysine, methionine, valine, serine, cysteine, cystine, arginine, asparagine, alanine, ornithine, isoleucine, threonine, tyrosine, glutamine, glutamic acid, glycine, histidine, proline, taurine, and phenylalanine. Preferably, said amino acid may be dl-phenylalanine.

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[23] At the step (e) of the present invention, one or more selected from the group consisting of fruit extracts, plant extracts, herb extracts, mushroom extracts, and nutrition-enriched agents may be additionally mixed with corn silk, corn powder, and amino acid. A step, in which said corn silk tea is packaged with tea bag containing water-permeable pores, is included after said step (e).

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[25] In addition, the present invention provides a corn silk tea prepared by said method, in which corn silk, corn powder, and amino acid are packaged with tea bag containing pores.

[26] In the present invention, one or more selected from the group consisting of fruit extracts, plant extracts, herb extracts, mushroom extracts, and nutrition-enriched agents may be added to said tea bag packaged with corn silk, corn powder, and amino acid.

[27] The said fruit extracts of the present invention may be one or more selected from

the group consisting of the extracts of banana extract, lemon extract, tangerine extract, pomegranate extract, orange extract, apple extract, melon extract, Japanese apricot extract, water melon extract, coconut extract, pineapple extract, and jujube extract, but are not to be limited to them.

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[29] In addition, said plant extracts of the present invention may be one or more selected from the group consisting of herb extract, green tea extract, Polygonatum odoratum var. pluriflorum extract, Chinese matrimony vine extract, aloe extract, brown rice extract, dandelion extract, white lotus extract, corn extract, Japanese apricot extract, Rubus coreanus extract, Maximowiczia typica extract, mulberry leaves extract, Artemisia asiatica extract, Cornifructus extract, and lotus root extract, but are not to be limited to them.

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[31] The said herb extracts of the present invention may be one or more selected from the group consisting of Acanthopanx sessiliflorum extract, red ginseng extract, ssanghwa extract

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[33] , ginseng extract, arrowroot extract, cinnamon extract, Angelica japonica extract,

Malva verticillata extract, Coix agrestis extract, ginger extract, Codonopsis lanceolata extract, Saururus loureiri extract, Cnidium officinale extract, Hovenia dulcis extract, fatsia extract, kudzu extract, and Eucommia ulmoides extract, but are not to be limited to them.

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[35] In addition, said mushroom extracts of the present invention may be one or more selected from the group consisting of Ganoderma lucidum extract, Coriolus versicolor extract, Phellinus linteus extract, Agaricus subfunereus extract, Flammulina velutipes extract, Armillaria edodes extract, Gyrophora esculenta extract, and Cordyceps extract , but are not to be limited to them.

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[37] The said nutrition-enriched agents of the present invention may be one or more selected from the group consisting of vitamins, irons, calcium agents, and zinks, but are not to be limited to them.

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Brief Description of the Drawings

[40] Figure 1 is illustrating the method to manufacture a functional corn silk tea according to the present invention.

[41] Figure 2 is illustrating tea bag packaging used in the present invention.

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Mode for the Invention

[43] More detailed explanation can be obtained through the following examples which are set forth to illustrate the present invention, but it is natural that the scope of the present invention be not to be construed as the limit of the examples.

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[46] EXAMPLE 1 : Harvesting of corn silk

[47] To make a functional corn silk tea using corn silk, the step of picking corn silk is important. Corn silk is the part of stamen of corn female (pistillate) flower. It is white and slightly wet at the early stage, becomes red after pollination, and then withers when corn comes to maturity. Therefore, it is desirable to pick corn silk on July before it withers.

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[49] EXAMPLE 2: Pre-treatment of corn silk

[50] The corn silk harvested according to said EXAMPLE 1 was dried in the shade and washed to remove foreign matter. The excessively thin or dried corn silk, which is floating on the surface of water, was removed, and small amount of salt was added to washing water to eliminate the fishy flavor of corn itself. The washed corn silk was cut into a proper size. If the size is too small, corn silk might be passed through the tea bag when it extracts in water. If the size is too big, it will be difficult to put it into the tea bag. Therefore, the preferable cutting size is about 1.0-1.5 mm.

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[52] EXAMPLE 3: Steaming and drying of corn silk

[53] To inactivate the activity of enzymes present in corn silk, the cut corn silk was steam-heated. Steam-heated corn silk became soft and water-soluble components was extracted in even cold water because of the ruined cell walls. The condition of steam- heating was at 140~160°C for about 30-45 seconds. Because the steam-treated corn silk was hot and contained high moisture content, it was dried using heat-dryer resulting in the final moisture content of 10-15%. The once dried corn silk was further dried using freeze-dryer to maintain the taste, flavor, and freshness. The condition of freeze drying was done at -35°C or less and sublimated at 0.1-1.0 bar.

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[56] EXAMPLE 4: Preparation of corn powder

[57] To make corn powder, corn was washed, cut into a appropriate size, and submerged

in water bath for 24 hours. The submerged corn was steam-heated, dried through a heat dryer, and then crushed into 12-50 mesh.

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[59] EXAMPLE 5: Addition of corn powder and phenylalanine

[60] The corn silk treated with the above examples had characteristic astringent and stinky taste. To eliminate the negative taste and increase the sweetness of the corn silk tea, a functional corn silk tea was prepared by adding corn powder prepared according to the EXAMPLE 4 and phenylalanine inhibiting the degradation of endorphin to said corn silk (TABLE 1).

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[62] Table 1

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[64] EXAMPLE 6: Tea bag packaging

[65] The functional corn silk tea composition prepared by EXAMPLE 5 was packaged with tea bag. As shown in Figure 2, general type of instant tea bag was used and the material of the tea bag was cotton cloth or nonwoven fabric which has pores to extract the tea components easily to water and prevent the flowing out of solid material. Tea bag was consisting of water-submerged bag (10) of cotton cloth or nonwoven fabric and a label(30) connected to the bag by a string(20). Users add water to a container, make said water-submerged bag (10) submerged under water for a certain time, and remove the bag using the label(30) as extraction completes. Alternatively, said tea bag manufactured by only cotton cloth or nonwoven fabric can be boiled at water and extracted like a barley tea drink.

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[67] The method to drink the functional corn silk tea prepared by said method is to put some hot water to a container and to make the water-submerged bag (10) submerged under the hot water. In a few minutes, water extract begin to flow out of the composition of the functional corn silk in the tea bag and the water color changes into yellow brown. As the water color changes, accelerate the extraction reaction by shaking the water-soluble bag or remove it and drink.

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[69] As the characteristic content of the present invention has been described, for the

person equipped with common general knowledge in the field, the above embodiments shown in examples are presented as a preferred mode to enforce and it is clear that the limit of the present invention be not limited to the above examples. Therefore, the real scope of the present invention should be defined on the following claims and their equivalents.

Industrial Applicability

[70] As explained in detail so far, the effect of present invention is to increase the consumers preference by removing characteristic astringent and stinky taste of corn silk and increasing sweetness of the cork silk tea, and to provide a functional corn silk tea fortified with amino acid which functions in inhibiting degradation of endorphin generated in human body.

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