liirogue, I would be happy to send you some tea. My mother-in-law kindly bought tins for me, but I don’t care for the type she sent. PM me with your address, if you would like it.
I am partial to Tetley’s, in Canada. In the US, I buy Tetley’s “British Blend”, which is what is sold as plain old Tetley’s in Canada. It’s a blend of Pekoe and Orange Pekoe, which are black teas.
Just to make it absolutely clear: The quality of the water, the temperature, the atmospheric pressure, the precise time spent steeping, all make a difference. However, nothing, nothing is as important as the quality of the tea itself. If you start with poor quality tea (and trust me, I’ve had some that was far worse than American Lipton), there’s absolutely nothing at all that you can do to make it good. By contrast, if you start with a good quality tea, then even if you don’t know what you’re doing, it still won’t come out bad. Mind you, it’ll still be better if you do everything right, but it won’t be bad.
Personally, the best tea I’ve had in the US is the Stash brand English Breakfast. They have other varieties, too, but I’m not a big fan of the extra flavorings in most other teas. Do try them at least once, though: Your tastes and mine will probably differ.
On other points, I leave the spoon in the mug, and when I can’t quite see the bowl of the spoon any more through the tea, I find it’s just about right (strong flavor, but without most of the tannins). This is also just about the time that it’s cool enough to drink: I like my hot beverages just shy of scalding my mouth. All I add to mine is a spoonful of sugar or honey, no milk, lemon, or other additives, but again, tastes differ.
I’ll admit that most of the tea I drink at work is made from a teabag and microwaved tapwater. So I do try to get good quality tea (Bigelow, Twining or Stash) to make up for the poor quality of the preparation.
Thanks everyone for your recommendations - I am going to try to hunt down some of the suggestions listed here.
I certainly have my Christmas list going!
I drink Oolong tea all the time. Steep it for 1-2 minutes, and don’t put anything in it. If you’ve bought a decent grade of tea (I’m partial to Ti Kuan Yin) you can re-use it 3 or 4 times.
For a black tea (ie. normal tea, or English tea) I’ve become really fond of Keemun. It’s strong enough and smooth enough to drink unadulterated, which is good since I don’t like milk in my tea.
When it comes to tea, remember that it came of age in an earlier era, so English Breakfast is a better grade (ie. less harsh) than Scottish or Irish.
Earl Grey is a fragrant black tea, flavoured with Bergamot - a tad ‘girly’, but better than many other tea-imposters. And I would say that Lapsang Souchong is definitely worth a try-out. It has a smoky flavour, rather in the same way as Jim Beam bourbon does, for instance, and this gives it a distinctive tang. Good served black with some sugar to calm the bitter edge, in my opinion (maybe it helps that I smoke, mind…).
I’m familiar with both teas. I can enjoy Earl Grey when I’m in the mood for it. But I think a lot of its popularity is that it’s regarded as a “sophisticated” tea - you switch from coffee to tea to show you’re more sophisticated than coffee drinkers and then you switch from regular tea to Earl Grey to show you’re more sophisticated than regular tea drinkers. Or you’re a Star Trek fan who wants to be like Picard.
Lapsang Souchong, on the other hand, I have no use for at all. I’ve drank hundreds of different teas and that was the worst. Obviously there are people who like it but tea with smoke flavor is not my thing.
And I stand by the point I was making. Somebody like liirogue who is looking to expand beyond Orange Pekoe shouldn’t jump into a cup of Earl Grey or Lapsang Souchong. Work your way through the Oolongs and Darjeelings and Assams first and then move on to the more exotic stuff if you want to keep going.
I adore both Lapsang Souchong and its kissing cousin, Russian Caravan. This tea does tend to inspire either love or outright loathing. I know of no one completely indifferent to its rich, smoky enticements. To me, it is the taste of Harlech on a slighly dour day.
My wife and I are quite particular about tea. We end up ordering quite a bit from the Algerian Coffee Co which we manage to visit whenever we go to the UK. It is well worth it.
That Boston thing was an example of American depravity,not only was the water not even hot,let alone boiling but it was salty as well.
I also like Lapsang Souchong (haven’t tried Russian Caravan, but I’ll have to look some up, thanks!) It’s not the type of tea I drink every day (I haven’t had it in months, actually) but every so often it just hits the spot. To me it tastes like a pine forest after rain-- I used to go to camp in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, in an area with tons of magnificent pine trees, and drinking Lapsang Souchong brings back those memories.
Otherwise I’m fond of white teas. There’s either a Bigelow or Celestial Seasonings one with pear flavoring that is really good in a pinch (for bagged tea, that is). The important thing with white tea is not to steep it too long, or it’ll get really bitter.