Tea Class 2-2/13 – How to Brew Leaf Tea
- Salina Hainzl
- May 23, 2013
- 4 min read
How to Brew Leaf Tea?
Are you one of those who say “well, hello? Just pour hot water in!”
In this video you will learn that pouring boiling water in is not your best bet. If you want to get the best flavour from your tea, water temperature is important.
And, no need to be scientific like our coffee friends 😉
Watch now – it’s pretty easy and simple!
Brewing tea… You will probably say how else are you going to brew tea? Just pour hot water in!
The thing is, the water temperature is going to affect the brew and there are also other aspects that need to be considered.
Depending on how you are going to use it, maybe for ice tea or if you want to drink your tea with milk, plus the fact that there are a lot of people out there that is so used to using tea bag that when it comes to brewing leaf tea, they are quite a bit unsure.
Allow me to start from the basic, let’s go with Herbal and Fruit infusion first because they are the simplest.
You start by pouring hot water in, off the boil is perfectly fine, let it sit for 3-5 minutes and 1 teaspoon per cup. If you want your tea stronger, do not brew it longer because brewing it longer is not a good way to get that strength or strong flavour from your tea.
If you want to get the best flavour out of your herbal or fruit tea, double the amount of tea leaves that you used.
For example, if you are making your fruit tea with cha-cha or making a caramel black tea and you want to make it into an iced tea, in order to double the strength you need to double the amount of tea leaves that you use. Since you are going to have ice in it and it will dilute the tea.
Now, we are going discuss how to brew the more standard leaf tea, such as black tea, green tea, oolong, white tea and so on…
Since they have caffeine, which in its pure form tastes bitter, if you are going to use boiling water, it is going to draw that caffeine out of the tea leaves which will also draw that bitterness out.
With Black tea, even if it can tolerate hot water, 100°C is a big NO! In brewing black tea, go back down to 90°C. You can brew the tea longer without the bitterness but still retain the strength. It is going to be worthwhile if you actually establish such as habit in brewing your tea.
If you are brewing green tea or white tea, especially the more delicate types like if there is a little bit of buds in it, use cooler water. For Chinese green tea, you can use warmer water.
I have experimented with my tea a bit and found out that it is best to brew your tea in a cooler, more drinkable temperature, so I can brew it a little bit longer to get that strong taste without the bitterness.
So, after brewing, there is a cup of tea that you can enjoy right away, no need to cool it down or blow it to cool.
It only takes a mind-set change to do away from the boiling water brewing method.
There is also one other interesting thing that I have explored and it is warming the tea cups. It is actually being done in restaurants; you might have experienced it already, like warming the plates to help keep the food to stay warm longer.
With tea, in warming the tea cups, aside from the benefit that it keeps the tea warm longer, if the water is a bit too hot, what you can do is to pour it into the cup first then pour it into the teapot where your tea leaves are. By doing that cycle, you can actually cool down the water by 10°C while warming your cup.
If you are making iced tea, as mentioned earlier, double the amount of tea leaves that you are going to use, pour it like a normal hot tea (no need to wait for it to cool down) because it you filled your glass with ice (like half portion of it) and when you pour your strong hot tea in and spice it up a little bit, some lemon perhaps, stir it and drink it! Good to go.
See, you don’t have to be overly complicated in making iced tea and that is something that you can explore. Moreover, you can make tea in advance without adding any dairy to it, cover it up, and store it in a fridge for a long time.
If someone wants some iced tea, just pull it out from the fridge and serve it. You can even make it stronger, more concentrated, just dilute it in water, you may even add milk or make an iced tea latte or frappe.
There are definitely different ways that you can experiment and make a good speedy flavourful cup.
So there you have it, a little bit about brewing leaf tea.
Also, don’t forget about the good ol’ infusers that you can use, if you want to do away with teabag or even teapots.
If you want to make a quick tea drink, there are infusers that are quite easy to use.
It will be more fun if you use these infusers for presentation and also for your customers to see a little bit of tea making ritual. Maybe you can use a glass teapot for them to see what is going on, on the inside and pour it in in front of them.
What’s in store on the next video series? We are going to discuss private label tea, choosing the right tea, selling tea profitably and etc.
I hope to see you on the next video! 🙂
If you have any feedback, we would love to hear them! Just drop us a line using the contact us form at Teas.com.au or drop us a comment under this blog post.
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