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After reading “The Claim: Drinking Tea Reduces Stress” by Anahad O’Connor in the New York Times, I began to question the notion of comfort foods.  The article suggests that adult men who drank black tea four times a day immediately reacted no differently to stress than adult men who were given a caffeinated placebo. When the entire test group was placed in stressful situations to have indicators of their stress levels such as blood pressure and hormone levels measured, all of the participants showed similar reactions.  However, although the tea drinkers’ heart rates and blood pressure did increase in the stressful situations, they calmed down more quickly afterwards.  An hour after being placed in one such situation, the group of men who drank tea had slightly lower levels of cortisol, the stress hormone, than the group of men who were given the placebo.  The tea drinkers returned to a regular, peaceful state more quickly than the non-tea drinkers. I have always understood the power of food.  My Grandmother’s Matzo Ball soup could cure any childhood illness, my Great-Grandmother’s marble-cake could make anyone smile, my Mother’s lasagna tasted like home, and when my Father made pancakes in the morning the sun came out.  However, I had always assumed that it was not the foods themselves that relaxed me, cured me, made me feel loved, or made me smile.  I believed that over my lifetime specific foods took on certain meaning due to the people, the situations, and habit.  I also grew up in a family that drank a lot of tea, and came to believe that tea’s effects were no different than those of my Mother’s lasagna. I still believe that this is true.  Although the caffeine and other various herbs in tea may have positive effects on reducing stress levels more quickly, the association most people make with tea may be its strongest asset. Tea is believed to be a soothing stress tamer.  Therefore, if people believe that it will reduce the stress in their lives, is that enough to make its effects visibly happen?  While there is still little scientific evidence linking tea to stress reduction, perhaps the simple belief in its calming benefits is enough for create a positive outcome for most tea-drinkers.  I am left with the question, can we control our brain with our behavior?