The Best Tasting Cup of Tea…Seriously…
What I’ve Discovered That Allows Us to Steep The Best Tasting Cup of Tea…
Ever wonder whether you are getting the best result from your tea?
Are you unsure how to tell if you are steeping in a way to ensure you get the best result from the leaves without getting too much too soon?
If so, you are far from alone…Many tea drinkers don’t realize they are doing an injustice to the tea they are steeping, or they don’t realize that small adjustments in their steeping process could bring more pleasure in the cup…even possibly open the range of teas they would enjoy and benefit from with just a simple tweak or two to their steeping process.
Even those that have considerable experience steeping tea can be surprised what a valuable steeping tip can do for their process yielding the best end result.
We grow up programmed to think there are defined ways to steep different teas. For example, like steeping Black Tea one teaspoon, for 3 minutes, with Boiling Water…right? Not exactly. Just within the category of Black Tea alone, there is a gigantic wide range to teas, that actually benefit by having their steeping conditions tailored to the ingredients within them, the place they were grown, and the process with which they were proceeded into steep-able tea in order to get the best tasting cup.
There are Two Important Types of Ingredients in Tea…
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1) Readily Available & Desirable (More) Water Soluble ingredients...
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2) Less Available & Undesirable (Less) Water Soluble ingredients…
Why it matters is that for each individual tea, the process from which it was created determines the best means of extracting its goodness. As complicated as that sounds, it is actually quite simple…
The key is to extract the Readably Available & Desirable Water-Soluble ingredients you desire…
While allowing the Less Readably Available (Non)-Water-Soluble Ingredients (solid leaf & stem parts) to remain in the water as little time as possible.
So, what is one to do to get the best cup of tea? It is simple actually:
For each tea that is new to you, intentionally under-steep your first infusion. Observe the broth color and taste the tea. Consider how you feel about that first infusion and decide if and how you might prefer to adjust the experience that first infusion gave you to find the best steeping requirements for you.
Using the broth color as a gauge-point, re-steep to your desired color and not on any particular steeping time.
Over the next several infusions of that tea, adjust your steeping period based on the broth color, striving for the Sweet Spot Color you have now determined is the best for you.
Typically what you will find when you follow this process is that while you are enjoying your first cup, the desirable water soluble ingredients you want for your ideal cup character have been becoming more available for extraction into your broth. The instant the hot water hits the leaves, they burst into the broth giving you instant color.
Quickly removing the leaves from broth will avoid too much of the desirable ingredient, and almost any undesirable ingredient from coming into your broth, resulting in the best taste possible.
Using a clear vessel to steep your tealeaves provides the ability for you to easily monitor the ingredient extraction into the broth and to adjust the steeping period based on the strength of the leaves by the shade or tint of the tea broth.
This technique allows one to avoid the less desirable stems and solid leaf pieces from tainting the broth and yields the best results cup after cup.
Whatever tea type is the best in your opinion or if you enjoy them all, extracting the desirable ingredients into the broth and avoiding over-steeping will allow you to exhaust what you want from the leaves and minimize any less desirable tainting ingredient.
Remember, we are all different and like what we like. That means as individuals, we want our tea...something we love, to be just so.
Finding the Sweet Spot that is right for you is something you can do for each and every tea in your tea rotation. You will find that the Sweet Spot color becomes something more. It becomes part of the identity of the tea which is actually part of the tea Character.
If you are interested in getting the most from your money, and in this case the most from the tea you spent you hard-earned money on, buy quality teas and then get every bit of goodness from the leaves by managing your steeping effectively.
Extracting just the right amount of ingredient from the leaves to your preference each infusion, based on the broth color allows us to zero-in on the ideal cup for us, and take a giant step to understanding the character of the tea.
Broth color is one of a number of Characteristics that lead us to understanding & appreciating our tea more...and therefore getting more value for our tea dollar.
Now…on to the best cup of tea…