This may sound weird, but I’ve just suddenly started liking tea. I’ve tried over the years, but never been able to get into it. I mean, being from the south, I enjoy a good glass of half tea / half sugar every once in awhile, but I don’t like drinking my calories, and I’ve always thought unsweetened tea tasted like dirty water. I don’t know how or why that changed last week, but it did.
So what are your methods for making tea? I have a pretty standard kettle (with a missing whistle) that I boil water in, and then pour it over the teabag in my cup, wait 5 minutes, remove teabag, drink. This might sound hilariously ignorant, but-- is that how most people do it?
How many times do you use a teabag? I just started using them twice and the second cup seems as strong as the first.
What are your favorite teas? I have a bunch of Celestial Seasonings teas I’ve collected in previous attempts to like tea:
Fast Lane
Morning Thunder
Honey Vanilla Chamomile
Sleepytime Extra
Mandarin Green Tea
Peppermint
India Spice Chai
Blueberry Ice
And
Lipton Green Tea
My favorites are the honey vanilla chamomile and sleepytime, followed by fast lane, then the lipton green tea (which I drink cold), and finally morning thunder. The blueberry ice is gross, and I haven’t tried the india chai or mandarin green in recent memory.
In terms of steeping your tea, you more or less got it right. I would pay attention to what the box says for each tea, though. Herbal teas you can use as hot of water as you want and let them steep as long as you want and it won’t degrade the flavor. Other teas, especially green tea, if you let steep too long in too hot of water they become very bitter. Using the bag twice…again with herbal teas that might be OK, but with green or black teas I would avoid this.
You might try the india spiced chai with quite a bit of honey and some milk or half & half. It is a pretty good drink for those that perhaps don’t like typical teas.
Tea’s been in the air lately! (Just be sure your cup is there for when it comes down.) There are some great responses in this thread from about a month ago:
I don’t care for those herbal “teas.” I like black teas, very strong. I steep it much longer than the purists recommend; I like it that way. I have tea nearly every morning (I’ll have coffee instead maybe once a week), either black or with milk (almond milk these days) and honey, depending on what I’m having for breakfast. I get most of my tea in bulk from TeaSource. Of the supermarket varieties, I like Twinings’ Irish Breakfast best. I keep a box of that at work where I can’t deal with the teapot & strainer ritual.
I had the most amazing tea at the Mandaly (a Burmese restaurant in Silver Spring). It’s called “tea yay nway gyan” and I have been looking for a place to buy it ever since.
I found a local tea shop with 140 all natural (mostly organic) loose leaf teas and I’ve been trying as many as possible. Most of them smell A LOT stronger than they taste, which is a good thing in most cases, but disappointing in some. I’m really digging one they call Georgia Peach, which is just black tea with peach pieces and ginger. It’s very subtle; not like Snapple peach tea.
I bought a pitcher with a strainer built into it, so I can make a 1/2 gallon at a time now very easily. I thought one of those reusable Starbucks cups would be perfect to take iced tea on the road with me, but apparently they don’t make them anymore so you can only get them used for an arm and a leg. Well, I found a generic one that is bigger and doesn’t have a Starbucks logo on it-- both of which are huge plusses to me.
I drink herbal teas during my phases where I abstain from coffee to calm my stomach down. I like the Honey Lemon from Tim Horton’s, as well as the Wild sweet orange blend that Starbucks used to make. I’ve made a pretty close facsimile with orange extract, lemon grass and generous amounts of spearmints, though.
There’s a tea store here in Ottawa where I buy a bunch of loose teas, then put them in that metal…mesh…dealie together and let 'em steep! Martha Stewart taught me that with teabags, you’re paying top dollar for the worst tea. Only the leftovers that can’t get sold loose are put in tea bags!
If you like flavored teas, as the OP apparently does, Bigelow makes some good ones. Constant Comment is a popular one (it’s spice flavored) and I also enjoy their Raspberry Royale and Plantation Mint.
If you like flavored iced teas, a good summer cocktail is unsweetened or lightly sweetened iced tea with a shot of liquer added. Some of my favorites are peppermint schapps, amaretto, peach or raspberry schnapps.
For hot tea, at home it’s usually Earl Grey, but I also like Lady Grey, a good orange spice blend that I buy loose at the Asian market or once in a while Lapsang Souchong.
At work, where I use tea bags, it’s usually Irish Breakfast or Constant Comment. Iced tea is strictly Luzianne.
I am sometimes a tea snob. I order regularly from Upton Tea. My favorite lately is the Orthodox TGFOP* Darjeeling - it has a nice slight bitterness mixed with some light vegetal notes. I have an infusion basket from them as well, so I can make one cup at a time.
But one of my other favorites is Celestial Seasonings’ Decaf Coconut Thai Chai. I bought a sixpack from Amazon when I couldn’t find it locally anymore, and I make it with honey or sugar and (believe it or not) fat free half & half.
*That’s Tippy Golden Flowery Orange Pekoe, for the the uninitiated.
My local Target store has a Starbuck’s inside and they have several Starbuck’s branded mugs and cups for sale. I think they also have the kind with storage for some of the Starbuck’s instant packets. Maybe one of these.
That’s funny, I was going to ask if there were any good tea/alcohol concoctions!
I might get something like that this “winter” when I switch to hot tea. This is the cup I was referring to (note the absurd price, which I think has actually come down. Some comments I’ve found online suggest they were going for $80 at one point.) This is the one I got. I actually just got the package about 20 minutes ago and I’m drinking out of it as I type :D.
missred, that sounds delicious. What kind of tea would you recommend with peach schnapps?
I drink tea everyday, but I only drink East Asian teas like oolong and green with any regularity. As Jorge_Burrito mentioned, these teas tend to be a little more delicate, especially the green. After boiling water in the kettle, I usually let the water settle for a minute or two. Then, steep for 2 minutes max. Any longer and the tea will taste bitter. Oolongs are a bit more robust, but I still prefer about 2 minutes for the steep since I like my tea a little lighter.
For iced tea, if you have an Asian market near you, try some barley tea. Just add the bag into a pitcher of water, remove bag 1 hour later. It’s very refreshing on a hot day and tastes less bitter than most teas. I’m actually drinking some right now.
If I’m making good tea, I can be incredibly anal thanks to the influence of my every slightly OCD boyfriend. I boil the water, put in the tea leaves in the mesh infuser of my Beehouse teapot, add boiling water, swirl the teapot just a little and immediately pour out all the tea. This is supposed to help remove sediment from the tea and unfurl the tea leaves for a more even steep. Then pour in more water, steep 2 minutes, and then remove the infuser with the tea leaves (the leaves can be used 2-3 more times depending on the quality and type of leaves). Then I pour the tea through a fine mesh strainer into a tea cup. Drink. Ta-da. Anal, right? It does make a really good cup of tea though, but I doubt the difference is worth it for most people.
missred, that sounds delicious. What kind of tea would you recommend with peach schnapps?
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I usually just use what I make for everyday iced tea (Luzianne). I have made it with a couple of peach flavored bags thrown in. I couldn’t really tell a big difference.
My tea palate must suck from drinking Sweet Tea all my life. I really can’t tell the difference in taste unless it has added flavors. Hot tea tastes like, well, hot tea. The only one I’ve tasted that is different is Earl Grey–which, incidentally, makes a really good iced tea. I’ve always joked that, in Star Trek, I’d order Tea. Earl-gray. Iced.
