The Journal · Autumn
When the clocks go back: the evening cup
One hour back, five weeks of dark evenings, and what belongs in the pot after six.
At two in the morning on Sunday 25 October, the clocks go back and an hour appears out of nowhere. You get it in bed, which is the best place to be given it.
Then comes the part nobody thanks anybody for. By the following week, in London, the sun is gone before five. The evening stops being the end of the day and becomes most of it.
The short answer
For a cup after six, choose something with no caffeine in it at all. In a 2013 trial at Wayne State University, 400mg of caffeine taken six hours before bed still cut total sleep time by more than an hour, and the people who took it did not notice. Rooibos blends and fruit or herbal infusions have no caffeine to begin with, because rooibos is not tea: it is a South African plant. Brew either for five minutes with water off the boil. The five below are the ones we reach for, from £7 for fifteen cups, or take the evening range together in the Sweet Dreams Box from £25.
Five cups with nothing in them to keep you up
All five caffeine free. £7 for 15g, which is fifteen cups, up to £30 for 100g.
Five weeks of dark, and one decision
Most people do not change what they drink when the clocks change. They carry the same builder's brew or the same green tea into an evening that is now four hours long, and then wonder why the wind-down does not arrive.
The change worth making is small and it is not about giving anything up. The daytime cup stays exactly as it is. The evening one moves to something that has no caffeine in it, so the ritual can stay and the consequence goes.
What the research actually says
This is not a feeling. Three separate lines of research support the evening cup, and it is worth knowing which is strong and which is still emerging.
Caffeine six hours before bed still costs you an hour of sleep
Researchers gave 400mg of caffeine, roughly two to three cups of coffee, at bedtime, three hours before bed and six hours before bed. All three disrupted sleep measurably. Even the six hour dose reduced total sleep time by more than an hour, and, notably, the people taking it did not report noticing any disruption.
Drake, Roehrs, Shambroom and Roth, Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 2013
Keeping the same hours matters more than logging more of them
A study of 60,977 UK Biobank participants found that the most regular sleepers had a 20 to 48 percent lower risk of all-cause mortality than the most irregular, and that regularity predicted outcomes more strongly than sleep duration did. Regularity is built out of repeated cues at the same time each night, which is exactly what a fixed evening drink is.
Windred and colleagues, SLEEP, 2024
Warmth before bed shortens the time it takes to drop off
A review that screened 5,322 studies found that passive body heating, a warm bath or shower one to two hours before bed, shortened the time taken to fall asleep by about ten minutes on average. The mechanism is the drop in core temperature that follows the warming, which is one of the body's own sleep signals. That research is about bathing rather than drinking, so treat a warm cup as the same family of cue rather than the same dose.
Haghayegh and colleagues, Sleep Medicine Reviews, 2019
Chamomile: promising, and still modest
A systematic review of twelve randomised controlled trials, published in Phytotherapy Research, reported improvements in sleep quality with chamomile. Apigenin, one of its compounds, binds to the same receptors in the brain that some prescription sleep medicines act on. The trials are small and the effects are modest, so we will call it promising rather than proven. Kick Back Relax is the blend in this range built on rooibos and chamomile.
Hieu and colleagues, Phytotherapy Research, 2019
Put plainly: the strongest evidence here is about what you do not drink, and about doing the same thing at the same hour. A caffeine free cup at nine o'clock is both of those at once.
What each of the five is actually like
The evening five, in order of plainness
Rooibos, smooth and naturally sweet, with chamomile for a soft floral turn and a subtle caramel note underneath. The plainest of the five and the one most people end on.
Rooibos again, honeyed, with liquorice and fennel for a mellow sweetness, then lemon verbena and peppermint lifting it clean. A light touch of cinnamon at the end.
Pear, soft and almost honeyed, apple for freshness, cinnamon building warmth through the middle and a delicate floral note on the finish.
Almond, mellow and slightly nutty, over a rooibos base, with a marzipan richness that arrives late. The pudding option, without a pudding.
Berry, layered and slightly wild, moving between sweet and tart over a warm rooibos base. The one to make when the evening is not over yet.
Does rooibos have caffeine?
No, and not because anything has been taken out of it. Rooibos is not tea at all. It is a South African shrub, and it has never contained caffeine, so there is no decaffeination process and nothing lost in one. That is the difference between a rooibos blend and a decaf black tea, which starts as tea and has the caffeine stripped out.
Fruit and herbal infusions work the same way, as long as there is no tea leaf in the blend. It is worth reading the ingredients rather than the front of the pack, because plenty of things called fruit tea are built on a black tea base. Ours say which they are.
How to brew them
- One gram per 200ml cup, the same as everything else.
- Water off the boil is fine. There is no leaf to scald and no tannin to pull.
- Five minutes. Ten if the conversation runs on, and it will not turn bitter, which is the quiet advantage of a caffeine free cup.
- Rooibos will take milk if you want it that way. Fruit blends will not.
- Use the infuser in your own mug, or the teapot if there are two of you and the evening is long.
The Sweet Dreams Box, if you would rather not choose five things one at a time.
Or take the whole box
If you would rather make one decision than five, the Sweet Dreams Box is the evening range in a single order: Kick Back Relax, Peace of Mind Passion Flower, Blue Sky Thinking, Rescue Refuge, and Moroccan Cinnamon Spiced Oranges. Five blends, 15g each, about fifteen cups apiece, so roughly seventy five cups in the box.
From £25 for the tea alone, £35 with the glass infuser, £49 with the teapot. If you are buying it for somebody else, that middle option is the one that gets used, because they can brew it the evening it arrives.
The hour is the point
Five weeks from now it will be dark by four in the afternoon and the evenings will have run together. The research says the thing that holds them apart is repetition: the same cue, at the same time, often enough that your body starts reading it.
Ours is a kettle at nine. Yours might be earlier. What matters is that it is the same one tomorrow.
Questions we get
What tea can you drink in the evening?
Anything with no caffeine in it: a rooibos blend, or a fruit or herbal infusion with no tea leaf in the ingredients. Brew for five minutes with water off the boil.
Does rooibos have caffeine?
No. Rooibos is a South African plant rather than a tea leaf, and it has never contained caffeine, so nothing has to be removed from it.
Does drinking tea in the evening help you sleep?
The evidence is strongest for the two things around the cup rather than the cup itself. Caffeine six hours before bed cut total sleep time by over an hour in a 2013 trial, so a caffeine free choice removes that. And a 2024 study of 60,977 people found sleep regularity predicted outcomes more strongly than sleep duration, and regularity is built from repeated cues at the same hour. Chamomile itself has trial evidence for sleep quality, though the studies are small.
How late can you drink caffeine?
In the 2013 Wayne State trial, 400mg six hours before bed still disrupted sleep measurably. The researchers suggested avoiding caffeine after five in the afternoon.
When do the clocks go back in 2026?
At two in the morning on Sunday 25 October, when British Summer Time ends and the clocks go back one hour.
Is fruit tea caffeine free?
Only if there is no tea leaf in it. Plenty of fruit blends are built on a black tea base, so read the ingredients rather than the name.
How long do you brew rooibos tea?
Five minutes, and longer does no harm. There is no tannin to pull, so it will not turn bitter if you forget it.
Can you have rooibos with milk?
Yes. Rooibos takes milk comfortably. Fruit and hibiscus blends do not.
Sources
Drake C, Roehrs T, Shambroom J, Roth T. Caffeine effects on sleep taken 0, 3, or 6 hours before going to bed. Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 2013.
Windred DP et al. Sleep regularity is a stronger predictor of mortality risk than sleep duration. SLEEP, 2024.
Haghayegh S et al. Before-bedtime passive body heating by warm shower or bath to improve sleep. Sleep Medicine Reviews, 2019.
Hieu TH et al. Therapeutic efficacy and safety of chamomile for anxiety, insomnia and sleep quality. Phytotherapy Research, 2019.
The daytime cup stays. The evening one changes. That is the whole job.
See the Sweet Dreams BoxOr pick your own from the tea shop.
The daytime half of this is in the October reset. If you are still brewing from a bag, start here.
JoJo