Tea General

Tea without milk is what uncivilized barbarians drink. Good black does not benefit from sugar either.

>What teas do you guys enjoy?
good ones
not blends of tea and other stuff usually
Milk or no milk?
never ever
>What does it take to make your ideal cup?
good chinese green tea
ideally gunpowder

am drinking Damman Freres orange pekoe at the moment

costco brand green tea was the best budget green tea i've ever had

I wish they still sold it

>>7511894
>General

>>7511894

I've found an organic Earl Grey tea that I really like, Out-fucking-standing. I'll prepare it with a little half and half and about a teaspoon of good quality local honey. Some of the best tea I've ever tasted.

>>7511894
My package of Thai tea mix just arrived this week. Added evaporated milk and sweetened condensed milk. I know the stuff has cancer dye in it, but damn if it isn't delicious. It's going to be a once in a while thing though.

I also regularly drink oolong tea with just sugar, and black and green teas with milk.

>>7511894
This look like coffee

>>7511894
None because I'm not some faggy tea

>>7511907
>milk in your tea

good going lmao
https://www.healthstatus.com/health_blog/diabetes-3/milk-in-your-tea-not-a-good-idea/

>The British custom of drinking tea with milk has its roots not in taste, but in economics. The long journey from the Orient once made tea prohibitively expensive. Milk, on the other hand, was cheap and plentiful among the lower classes. The amount of milk added to tea became a telltale of one's social standing.

Translation: The more milk you put in your tea, the more of a classless rube you and your ancestors are.

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>Yorkshire Tea
>brew for 5 mins
>add organic whole milk
perfect.

I will NOT tolerate in my presence people having;
>shitty weak brands of tea (typhoo, tetleys, pg tips, twinings)
>pussy ass little brewing times (anything beyond 2 mins makes it bitter, wah wah wah!)
>weak pussy ass abominations of low-fat 'milk'
>biscuits or other snack alongside it because snacking is DEGENERATE

I will tolerate;
>sugar IF you're slim AND play sports at least 3 times a week (lazy skinnyfats don't qualify)
>non-organic whole milk IF you can't afford organic regularly

>>7512596
>autist mcgee is an elitist about his mid tier BAGGED tea blend
Laffin

>>7511894
> tea
> picture of coffee

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>>7511894

>>7512596
yer tea taste is 100% like me mums. She has her tea exactly like what you wrote, minus the sugar.

>>7513557
Only Southerners can appreciate this.

>>7513469
BAGGED is master race
no one with a job has time for that fiddly twiddly loose leaf shit

>>7513599
Plot twist: What if I AM your mum?

>>7513557
Milo's is king.

>>7514080
I'm friends with the owners of a local tea shop, and they were discussing bagged tea. They said whenever they visited tea factories, all the leaves would be brought in on big nets. The smallest bits of tea would fall through the nets, and onto the floor, that shit would get swept up and used to make to make bagged tea.

Have fun with your Rwandan factory floor tea retard.

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>>7514080
>no one with a job has time for that fiddly twiddly loose leaf shit
But, its my fucking hobby! I enjoy preparing tea just as much as drkining it.

I bought 700 grams of tea not too long ago. Still tasting. My favorite up to now is something called White Symphony. it's white Pai Mu Tan with elderflower, tastes of pinapple, peach, pomegranate, vanilla, rose leaves and cardamom.

10/10

>>7511894
>tea
>picture of coffee
Consider suicide.

>>7514598
My nigga. Waiting patiently for my gaiwan to arrive from aliexpress

Can't seem to get my gyokuro right. 60 degrees 1 minute was way too short. 60 degrees 2½ minutes as well.

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>>7512214
>no sources
>no name of study or any scientist
>paid content that will undoubtedly provide you with the secret to immortality

>HealthStatus has been operating since 1998 providing the best interactive health tools on the Internet... has continued that commitment to excellence by providing our visitors with easy to understand high quality health content for many years.

>2016
>blatant clickbait is still around

Can't wait for that dystopian corpocratic society to kick in globally.

>>7514755
Solution would be to add more leaves or less water, or even raising the brewing temperature.

I'm having the same problem myself with sencha, can't decide what the best process is.

>>7514865
I'm going to try 70 degrees next time because I did two heaped teaspoons for 500 ml. Shouldn't that be enough? I can't imagine scorching the leaves at such a low temp anyway.

>>7514755
Never had gyokuro but sometimes I like to rinse more bitter teas for 15-20 seconds with boiling water then throw it out. After that resume with normal temps, worked for a early spring green tea I had that I couldnt get right

What kind of faggot actually sits at home making cups of tea?
It's autism not a hobby.

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>>7514906
Educate yourself

>>7514903
I never rinse green teas. No need for it really. I don't have a problem with bitterness, I have a problem with too little taste and just a weak drink in general.

>>7514916
I usually dont either but for that specific tea it improved the taste greatly, it wasnt that it was too bitter but the bitterness was covering up some of the floral notes

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>>7514906
2nd most popular drink on the entire planet, 1st being plain water of course. Faggots have you outnumbered anon.

>>7514080
>no one with a job has time for that fiddly twiddly loose leaf shit
/diy/ here. I was going to build a little robot to make my loose leaf tea for me. I want it to be able create custom blends from several teas so I can experiment every day with minimal effort. Currently working on other projects so this one is on the back burner for now but I kinda wanna pick it up again.

>>7514080
>no one with a job has time for that fiddly twiddly loose leaf shit

It takes the exact same amount of time.
The only difference is you need to pour it into a cup afterwards.

If you're truly, incorrigibly lazy, there are mug sized infusers so you can make tea right in your favourite mug, and compartmented travel mugs so you can make tea right in your car as you leave it in your cupholder.

>>7514900
70 is quite safe but I use as much as 4 tsp for even 300ml. Did that with Sencha at 60 celsius for about a minute just now and the first cup was gold.

>>7514903
>rinse for 20 seconds
Jesus, how can you call that a rinse? Even black teas I see rinsed no longer than 3 seconds, the first exposure has the most flavour so you want to retain as much as possible whilst getting rid of whatever little dust or unreadiness there will be.

>>7514906
Plebeian.

>>7514934
Of course you're right but we should be firm on the more pressing point that working should be a private shame, not something to glorify. Only someone with plebeian values would glorify rushing through life to make their bourgeoise bosses rich over leisure.

>>7514980
Wow, 4 heaped teaspoons for 300ml? How many infusions can you squeeze out of it if you do so?

>>7514980
I know its unorthodox to rinse it that way but through trial and error I got the best results for that specific tea that way, not done experimenting with it yet, will try other stuff. It had a very rich aroma and the flavour was underwelming, with hotter water I feel like I was able to remove some of the notes that were covering the 'true' flavour (closer to how it smelled)

>>7512217
>tea is expensive so poor people put milk in it to hide the taste
Yeah that's bullshit. If they were poor and wanted more out of their tea they'd just thin it out with more water.

>>7515049
Water just waters it down, the point is low quality tea tastes bad, you dont want to make the shit flavour less intense, you want to mask it/change it

>>7514994
No less than 3. Sometimes 5-7. Really depends, often I don't even go for an even decline, I just fully boil at 3-5 for a last strong attempt.

>>7515049
But the exact same idea is present in genmaicha. Why would you necessarily want to water it down when you could just make the taste slightly more pleasant with an harmonious addition?

>lapsang souchong, gong fu style
Ever had a tea try to kill you before?

.fg ym pu gnikohc si amora ehT

>>7515211
That's a lot of infusions for green tea. In other words gyokuro is for free days relaxing at home.

>>7515276
In my experience it's mostly tisanes and indian teas that don't re-steep well, even with much leaf.

Never tried gyokuro myself but from googling it looks to be a different brewing method compared to other greens.

>>7515299
Can't really do more than 3 steepings with greens imo. I can throw it out with a good conscience after 2.

>>7515310
What if you compared your 3rd and 4th cups to a plain cup of hot water? Full boil and long steep should be decisive.

>>7515328
I usually do 75-80 degrees on all steepings just adding 1 minute each time.

Tie gun yin
Pu Er
Earl grey

But boba milk tea is my vice

I drink cheap sencha I get in 1/3 kilos. It's from Japan and has a batch/tracking number. That's important because I sometimes consume the whole leaves. Chinese tea can have too much lead to be doing that regularly due to leaded gas remaining in use there until 2003.

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High mountain wild silver needles in my pot today. Gives me a pleasant qi feeling after about 3 pots, and is good for cooling down if you feel overheated or feverish. Has quite a fruity pear and lychee flavour.

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Somebody recommend me a tea press?

I've been using a tea cup infuser, but looking to upgrade since I'm sick of floaty bits in my cup,

Preferably something I can use to brew just a single cup and have no trouble with it.

Which brand of matcha tea is the best.
Last time I asked people told me that brand doesn't matter, but ultimately some brand is going to be more "trustworthy" and more consistently have higher quality tea than others.

Earl grey green tea is the only way to go. I'm not anal about the brand or anything. But it has to be earl grey green.

>>7519424
That sounds absolutely horrible.

I'm Iranian and grew up on Ceylon tea. Every family I've visited brews it daily. Sugar cubes are the norm and milk is considered childish

>>7519430
It is amazing. The astringent green is complimented lovely by the citrousy earl grey. I highly recommend it. No tea compares for casual drinking in my book.

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>>7519097
These are pretty much as simple and easy as it gets, I haven't had any experience with stray leaves floating in my cup either.

>>7519097
the ingenuitea

>>7519635
I find that those always end up warped or something so they don't close 100% at the rim. I have one kind of like that, but it's much smaller and uses a spring to hold closed. Haven't had problems with warping.

I think screwtop is probably the way to go.

>>7514980
>>7514994

Even that sounds awful little to me.

The whole point of gyokuro is that it doesn't
get bitter easily like sencha, so it can and should be brewed extra fucking strong to release max flavour.

2-3 tsp for 60ml 1st infusion 90s 2nd 30s 3nd 60s and so on.

>>7521769
So you start with a long steep then continue with short steeps and then add length to the following steeps?

>>7521777

Yes. During the 1st infusion leaves take time to absorb water and expand, after that they'll release flavour much faster so infusions should be shorter.

>>7521814
Thanks. Will try your brewing method tomorrow. Probably 5-6 heaped teaspoons for 300-400 ml (pot is 500 but since it's so much leaf...) 60 degrees celsius. How would you brew a normal sencha? I got it as well but I haven't opened it yet.

>>7521820

I would start with 1-2 tsp for 100ml, first infusion
30-60s (depending on the type of tea. smaller the leaf particles, shorter the time). 2nd infusion should be poured almost instantly, then add 5-10 seconds for each further infusions. If the tea tastes bitter (it shouldn't at all when done correctly) reduce the steeping time or amount of leaf for next time.

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>>7511894
Black tea mainly. English Breakfast, Earl Grey, Darjeeling, Assam etc. With milk and sweetener rather than sugar.

Fruit teas are ok sometimes I guess.

No green tea. No flower teas.

>>7512596
Skimmed milk and sweetener here. I know it's kinda sad, but it does it for me!

But yes... Yorkshire Tea!

Tieguanyin ("Iron Goddess of Mercy")

It's a premium Chinese Oolong tea. I was given some straight from China and I love it. No milk or sugar added.

A few months ago I was on here asking about Chifir. Are any of the anons who gave me advice still about? I finally managed to do it and never got back to you all.

>Drinking fruity tea

>>7511907
>>7514785
www dot ncbi dot nlm dot nih dot gov slash pubmed slash 24001682
"the antioxidant activity of all polyphenols was lowered by 11-27% in the presence of caseins"

Milk lovers btfo.

Hey senpai, trying to get into loose leaf and proper tea brewing so I can enjoy it more. Bought a little cheap tea pot and some samplers from an online shop. Gonna try Ginseng Oolong, english breakfast and gunpowder green.

Anything else you guys can recommend? Also, tips for someone who's always had a love hate relationship with tea, never had loose leaf and didn't know that boiling water and 4min steeps weren't the norm till a month ago.

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>drinking western style "tea"

absolute disgusting.

So I'm currently doing my gyokuro. I went for 6 heaped teaspoons for my 500 ml pot. 60 degrees 90 seconds first steep and now 65-70 degrees for my second steep for 30 seconds. I must be doing something wrong. It tastes ok but nothing special, and the colour of the tea water is more like the traditional chinese green tea with that yellow/golden colour and not the typical lime green/forest green I've seen in pictures/videos of gyokuro. Also the strainer is clogged up like hell from all the leaf.

>>7523988
Have you ever had ginseng before? It's got a weird flavour, I would have just gone with plain oolong first.

>>7524635
I've tried an energy drink that's main ingredient was Ginseng, so yes and no. Since the site does small taster amounts (4 cupsish), i'll add some normal oolong onto my next order.

>>7524046
Fucking weeb

>>7519635
Other anon here
Can I use it twice without changing tea in it?
Sometimes I used it again to make tea next day and it was okay. I heard I should use it only once so I'm not sure about it

>>7524688
Quality tea can be resteeped several times. Green tea is about 3 times and black/oolongs are like 5+. They say it should be resteeped within an hour though.

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>>7524701
Thank you
That's very helpful

>>7524705
This might be useful
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puldqGnW9P0

>>7524701
for black tea it really depends though, I have a few that I love but they can only be resteeped two or three times, five would be majorly pushing it for them

>>7524688
I've been using mine for multiple resteepings, if you don't do it right away though, I recommend spreading the leaf out on a plate and letting it dry.

>>7524672
where do you think you are twat.

>>7525537
i dont see that anywhere on ali.

>>7524701
Sure, the tea can be resteeped. That is how decaffeinated tea is made. Caffeine is very soluble and so once you've made tea with the leaf, subsequent cups will not have the same caffeine content.

No big deal, but I like a little kick start with my tea.

>>7525579
>Sure, the tea can be resteeped. That is how decaffeinated tea is made
Kek, no. Decaffination is made with chemicals.

>>7525579
>>7525597
>Decafe tea
>Ever

>>7525597
Maybe 30 years ago. These days it's mostly done with steam (water).

>>7524569
No gyokuro expert, but if your filling a 500 ml pot that might be the problem. When I made it I was told to aim for a small tea bowl 100ml maybe with each steep. Idea was to get an intense flavour shot rather than a mug full .

>>7525623
Seems like you can't brew gyokuro without the kyusu. Anyway I've given up on the idea. I've brewed it twice now differently and it turned out shit both times. I will brew it once more time, after that it will either be nothing left or I'll throw out the rest I'm so annoyed with it.

>>7525609
It's actually mostly done with carbon dioxide.

>>7511894
You can see then fucking coffee beans in the pic.

I've been making shitty powder tea mix on my way out in the mornings in lieu of breakfast. Matcha latte from Trader Joe's and a rooibos-ginger mix from Muji. Tasty stuff.

What's a good brand for Thai tea mix?

>>7519424
That sounds dreamy.

>>7525639
Dude gyokuro steeps at 55 Celsius for two minutes.

>>7525825
Read the thread dumbass

>>7511894
>black
earl grey with lavender or fuijan baroque, boiling water 3 min
>green
hunan gold or jasmine, 180 degree water 2:30

no fucking milk unless you're eurotrash. dump sugar into it and add ice if you're a nigger wanting that authentic "dolla sweet tee" experience.

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/2015-Hot-Sale-TieGuanYin-Superior-Oolong-Tea-1275-Organic-Green-Tie-Guan-Yin-Tea-To-Loose/32339304714.html

What is the worst that can happen?

>>7527137
If its shit you at least get a cool box. Bought a loose leaf puehr in a local asian store and it tastes solely like coals and burnt wood, was 3 euro for half kilo, i shouldve known

>>7527137
China burned leaded gasoline until 2003, so don't put the whole leaves in smoothies.

I am the maximum pleb when it comes to tea, probably

>English Breakfast with brow sugar and milk
>Earl Grey with brown sugar and milk
>Chai with honey and a lot of milk
>Green Matè and Liquorice Root with honey

I bought this "High Kenyan" black tea when I was on vacation because it smelled real good, almost like apricots, but when I tried it it was unbearably bitter ;_;

I want to get into green tea so that I can drink several cups a day without feeling like shit

>>7528389
Earl grey and chai are sweet man...try steeping them longer and putting half the sugar next time. Trust me on this. Milk is ok

>>7527137
>worst
Heavy metal poisoning
>best
Satisfaction of drinking unusual tea

>>7528392
Yeah, currently I'm cutting down to half a teaspoon of sugar per cup, my goal would be to avoid putting sugar in it altogether

>>7528272
Not Taiwan, right?

>>7528389
>I want to get into green tea so that I can drink several cups a day without feeling like shit
What do you mean? If you're talking about the caffeine content then you are wrong. Green tea usually have more caffeine than black tea, contrary to popular belief.

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Trigger warning

I drink this all the time and don't like hot tea

>>7528659
Ok Shelia

>>7528655
Wow, really? I always thought the opposite... I guess they call it popular belief for a reason.

You know, people always tell you to go easy with black tea, and that green tea is good for this and that and you should drink several cups a day and everything.
I mean, I'm not usually someone who's into super-healthy stuff, but I figured that maybe drinking too much black tea wasn't all that great, but now I'll look into it

>>7528675
What do you mean? No tea is unhealthy. Are you having health problems because of the amount of tea you drink?

>>7528679
Well, no... but I guess that having people tell you not to drink too much get to your head after a while

[spoiler]I am pissing a lot more tho[/spoiler]

>>7528694
How much do you drink each day?

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>>7528697
One-two of these a day

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sup cucks

>>7528805
Keep drinking your tea man, you're ok

>>7528694
A suggestion. If 2 of those small cups is causing you to piss noticeably more then you might wanna up how much water you drink on the daily.

>>7529261
Caffeine is a diuretic you dingus

>>7529341
Hence me saying that he should drink more water.

Finally understand the hype around oolong. Got some from Tenren's Flushing store, and brewed it correctly, I think.

How do you guys brew oolong? I rinse the tea under hot water for a few seconds as the first "steeping" then brew it for the length the package says.

Got a mid-grade regular oolong from them, which is really good, and a more expensive ti kuan yin, which I haven't tried yet.

Also got some "superior" bai lin gong fu from Canton that I'm really excited about, as well as some oolong and keemun. You guys tried bai lin gong fu?

>>7519430
It's pretty decent actually. never had strictly earl grey green, but I've had other green tea that had citrus oil in it. was good.

>>7523988
try the major types of tea first, which is what you're already doing by getting the Eng BFast and gunpowder green.

Next, I'd get another 1-2 samples of other major types of black and green, such as earl grey, assam or keemun, and for green sencha, jasmine green or gyokuro, and maybe a plain oolong as well.

Other than that, just watch your water temp and brew times carefully. Buy from a solid vendor too--one with good rep.

>>7529379
These guys have good online rep from what I can tell, not too many options for any sort of local vendor where I am.

I'm basically gonna stick with the samples for a little bit, and try new samples whenever I buy larger amounts of the tea's I like.

How does everyone go about measuring water temp? Also I have a small crap tea pot without an infuser, is one necessary?

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>>7511894
Lapsang souchong with a tiny bit of milk.
No sugar. I'm English so tea is in our veins. I honestly can't remember the last time I drank coffee.
Coffee is for French, Americans and queers.

>>7529386
Western brewing, yeah? I usually make lapsang in gongfu style, and brew Indian teas western.

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What is /ck/'s favorite type of tea?

>>7529392
I make it in a warmed pot. Warming the pot is essential. It gets rid of the problem of heat transfer.
Tea is the most delicious drink, but it must be carefully attended.

>>7529411
Warming the pot isn't essential. It's just an over complication of a tea making process.

>>7529362
I rinse it with hot water and just steep it in freshly boiled water for two minutes and then add 30 seconds each following steep. Mine are ball rolled tho.

>>7529385
It's not necesarry with an infuser if the pot is small enough for it to be empty when you pour it. If you pour it and there's still water in the pot so the leaves continue to get steeped then you have to buy a new one. For temp I just use a €10 kitchen thermometer. Easy, cheap and accurate.

What are some good teas that help you study? I heard Assam teas wake you the fuck up. Also is it better to get an Assam blend rather than a English breakfast or an Irish breakfast?

>>7529411
>>7529386
I love it how the British think they know anything about tea and always boust about how it's in their veins when they're actually mostly clueless idiots like you. You should be ashamed of yourselves. You drink tea but you don't know anything about it. Italians drink coffee and they've atleast mastered it. Also, thanks for the warmed pot tip sensei. Do you have any more wisdom from your great tea country?

>>7530158
Matcha.

>>7530166
Make sure it's grown in Japan and not the Chinese stuff. Since you're ingesting the whole leaf, you absorb quite a bit more of whatever lead happens to be in it. China burned leaded gasoline until 2003, so tea from dome areas can have enough lead that your intake would exceed the recommended limit if you're having a serving of matcha daily.

>>7530186
Who buys Chinese Matcha? You buy Japanese, you buy ceremonial grade, you buy ecological and you buy radiation tested.

>>7530194
Culinary grade is what you get if you're tasteless enough to order a matcha latte, and it's usednin colored mochi and cupcakes and such.

>>7530201
Culinary grade is often Japanese as well unless it's some real shady store. I would say stay away from "green tea powder" because that shit is NOT Matcha and probably some Chinese garbage. Often occuring in dietary supplements.

>>7530153
So measuring out a cup or so of water (or working out how much that is in the pot), and its all good? Allright I'll give it a go.

>>7530248
Yeah, figure out the measurements and make sure it's empty after each steep. If it's more than one cup you can just pour it all in a container. The thing is you don't want to oversteep your leaves, that's how tea becomes bitter. Figure out the measurements and the steeping time and degrees for each tea and you're all set really.

I want to be a teafag, but with tea you basically have choose between it tasting weak, bitter, or good but only after drowning it with sugar and other additives.

>>7530162
and they alway burn they tea, dont forget it.

>>7530289
>good but only after drowning it with sugar and other additives.
Fucking americans.

>>7530289
Consider suicide Carla