Tea-lovers:
Okay, I’ve had lots of black and green and herbal teas…but what’s with these new (to me) red and white teas? Are they better than the others? Have you tried them?
Please share your tea tales.
I have limited experience with white tea, but what I have tasted has been way too mild for me. They have a delicate flavor that fails to thrill me, but I like lapsang souchong and Earl Grey, which packs a big flavor.
As for red tea, I’ve had it at Thai restaurants and it’s delicious. Also, rooibos is a “red” tea, though herbal and caffeine free, it’s also very tasty.
If you want to try teas for a reasonable price, check out www.adagio.com. They have very cheap sample containers of all manner of teas, very much worth checking out.
My parents went to China a few years ago and I asked them to bring me back some tea. Nothing fancy, just some nice loose tea. Well, my parents only use Lipton teabags to make sweet tea so they had no idea. So they defaulted to buying the most expensive. Longjing or Dragon Well. Beautiful loose green tea that was almost silver. They bought me about a half pound in this intricately painted sealed canister. Gorgeous.
It tasted like hay. Proving again that expensive things are just wasted on me. I had never had green tea. It took a while but I had to teach myself to drink it. And like it.
Well, for starters, ‘red tea’ is a word with a couple of different meanings (that I know of). First of all, what we call ‘black tea’, the Chinese call ‘red tea’ (hong cha in Mandarin). So if you’re talking about Chinese red tea, it might be the same as good black tea. Then there’s rooibos, which is often sold as ‘red tea’, though it’s actually the needles of a a South African bush. It’s not technically tea, but I’ve been known to drink it from time to time, and I enjoy the taste. It’s almost syrupy in the mouth and tastes a little like clay and vanilla.
I never got into green tea. Too grassy-tasting, and if you overinfuse it, it comes out like stale cigarette butts. White tea, however, is exquisite. It’s mild and a little tangy like green tea, but without the vegetable undertones. It’s a little more expensive than black and green teas, but I’d still highly recommend it.
I love white tea. It’s very subtle. It needs to be babied even more than a green. Brew it with water between 160 and 180 degrees Fahrenheit. (And yes, it’s a good idea to check it with a thermometer. A meat or candy thermometer is fine.) Start by brewing it for 1 minute. If you brew it too long, it will get better. And drink it immediately. It turns brown and oily and bitter if you let it sit!
It’s more expensive, but you can also get multiple brewings out of the same leaves. Just add fresh water and steep it a little longer for another cup, and another. The flavor will evolve slightly with each re-infusion.
I’m also a big fan of the red tea (rooibos). It has a nice hint of vanilla. I like it with a little sugar. Unlike true tea (black, green, or white) rooibos doesn’t expand much as it steeps, so it’s perfectly okay to get it in bags, IMHO. Republic of Tea has some good reds, plain and flavored.
I second the recommendation for Adagio. They’ve got some good tea, but they’re very beginner-friendly. My favorite selection is a green called White Monkey. It has the subtle taste of a nice white tea, and a nice sweet undertone, but it’s much more forgiving to brew—hard to oversteep. For whites, I recommend Silver Needle.
I prefer green, but I did recently find a heavenly white pear tea. I don’t much like black tea – now that I’m used to green, I can’t go back.
I’d never heard of red tea until this thread, though.
My best friend adores white tea, but I’ve always found it too fiddly and not having enough taste for what goes into it. The first few times I tried it, I honestly couldn’t taste a difference between it and hot tap water. If you’re really into fine, delicate teas then white tea is for you. I’d rather have a nice toasted kukicha or genmaicha, myself.
I’ve seen Chinese red peony tea referred to as “red tea”, and it is: when brewed it comes out a dark blood-red, with a slightly sweet and very earthy flavor. Hellaciously expensive, though. Rooibos is pretty good for times when you want a hot drink that’s not caffeinated, and makes a good base for Indian chai.