I accidentally bought “family size” teabags, and the instructions don’t say how much water to use, just that it’s made for a teapot. It also says “4-5 or 6 servings”.
I don’t have a teapot, and would rather not buy one. How much water should I use with these giant teabags?
Thanks.
Forgot to mention; I like tea average strength.
Just enough to fill it.
No, really … I’d start with around 4-5 measuring cups of cold filtered water. Bring the water to a full rolling boil and begin brewing immediately. Adjust the quantity with each batch until you like your results.
Be sure to prewarm the pot and cups with steaming hot water before brewing or pouring the tea. You’ll also want to fish out the teabag once it’s at the desired strength.
What sort of tea did you buy?
It’s a cheap supermarket brand “orange pekoe and pekoe cut black”.
A “serving” of tea is 8 fluid ounces (aka 1 cup). I imagine that if you want average-strength tea, use 5 cups of water.
If you like iced tea, these sound perfect for making 2 quarts. Just fill your pitcher with cold wated, drop in the tea bag, and refrigerate for six hours (or overnight) and remove the tea bag.
That’s might be a good idea with the iced tea, thanks Podkayne. I’ve seen “special” tea that they say is made for cold-brewing, but this isn’t it. Will mine still work?
I make all my iced tea in the refrigerator, and I use all kinds–high-end loose tea, cheap bagged black tea, herbal tea, whatever–using one single-serving tea bag (or one teaspoon of loose tea) per pint. It seems to work okay for me, but I wouldn’t call myself an iced-tea connaisseur–I’m really more of a hot tea snob. 
I don’t know what they would do to tea to make it specially for cold-brewing, but I suspect it’s largely just a marketing ploy.
I like my ice tea just a little sweet, so after taking out the tea bag, I add a little syrup. Heat about 1/3 cup of water to boiling and add 1/3 cup of sugar and stir until it dissolves. You can make it sweeter with more syrup, if you want–just use equal parts sugar and water.