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The Tea Thread

One aspect to tea which hasn't yet been mentioned is temperature.

I find drinking at the optimum temperature is crucial in a fully satisfying cuppa. You obviously can't drink straight away & have to leave to cool but leave too long & it loses it's vitality. Tepid or lukewarm doesn't cut it, and the ideal temperature doesn't last long. It's a tricky one & timing is crucial.

My own preference is very hot - makes a world of difference to the satisfaction involved.
 
hunck said:
One aspect to tea which hasn't yet been mentioned is temperature.
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That is why it is best drunk out of a small teacup with a shallow gradient so the bit you are drinking is at the temperature you want it to be. I don't like it tooo hot so pour it out and let it cool down a little before drinking.

(By the way - great thrad.)
 
People definitely have very different tolerances for hot liquid in their mouths (go on, if you must). I routinely drink tea or eat soups and stews at a temperature which the rest of my family cannot stand. If in a hurry, I can happily drink tea almost immediately after adding milk (yes, I shun etiquette as I'm terrible at judging quantities by eye), although at higher temperatures the flavour is not so perceptible, in my opinion.
 
Coal said:
^^This^^, can't bear lukewarm tea.
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Having a big family, so there was always a toddler around for years*, meant that I became resigned to not getting a drink until it was nearly cold. These days I'm OK with anything that in't actually stone-cold.

*I saw lots of patients in hospitals over the years with upper-body burn scars from pulling hot drinks and pans on themselves as toddlers. Even Techy has such a scar.
 
hunck said:
One aspect to tea which hasn't yet been mentioned is temperature.

I find drinking at the optimum temperature is crucial in a fully satisfying cuppa. You obviously can't drink straight away & have to leave to cool but leave too long & it loses it's vitality. Tepid or lukewarm doesn't cut it, and the ideal temperature doesn't last long. It's a tricky one & timing is crucial.

My own preference is very hot - makes a world of difference to the satisfaction involved.
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Exactly: you need to wait maybe a minute(?) until it's just bearable. Then you get get to make the special Tea Drinking Noise (pretty much an automatic reflex due to the heat). With an optional 'that's a nice cuppa' or 'ooh, that hits the spot!' for the over-forties.
 
hunck said:
...My own preference is very hot - makes a world of difference to the satisfaction involved.
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Yes. Hot as hell. But not out of a flask...never out of a flask; instant coffee actually tastes nicer when it's been in a vacuum flask for a couple of hours - but tea tastes like three day old horse-piss that's been passed through a rusty steam engine.
 
Incidentally, the worst tea I have ever tasted (that wasn't out of a flask) was when I was working in Copenhagen.

Don't get me wrong - everything else about Copenhagen was fantastic, but no-one could mash a brew if their life depended on it.
 
At rowing events, the clubs usually served a hot liquid in a foam cup that was almost but not quite, entirely unlike tea. That in fact made it quite drinkable as you weren't really expecting tea in the first place.
 
Spookdaddy said:
- but tea tastes like three day old horse-piss that's been passed through a rusty steam engine.
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To make and keep tea in a flask with any success, firstly it has to be black. Secondly, you need to make it weaker that you would otherwise. In a 1.2L flask I use two tea bags (generally one EG one Ceylon) for perhaps two minutes.

This is perfectly good, if not as good as brewed in a teapot.
 
Spookdaddy said:
Incidentally, the worst tea I have ever tasted (that wasn't out of a flask) was when I was working in Copenhagen.

Don't get me wrong - everything else about Copenhagen was fantastic, but no-one could mash a brew if their life depended on it.
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I made a cuppa for my boss at a pub I worked at about ten years ago .. a milky one but not pale .. she looked at it and rudely said in front of our customers ( and no polite "thank you" was offered to me for making her the cuppa in the first place) "Oh dear, I can see I'm going to have to teach you how to make a proper cup of tea!" :mad: ...

I wasn't impressed ..

I made her another cup, this time a darker brown colour with an added "Here you go .. would you like a knife and fork for that?" .. she knew she'd stepped over the tea line, I promise you ..
 
Love tea of all sorts.

My Eastern European colleagues have got me hooked on Melissa Tea- a most delightful brew.
 
Andy_X said:
Exactly: you need to wait maybe a minute(?) until it's just bearable. Then you get get to make the special Tea Drinking Noise (pretty much an automatic reflex due to the heat). With an optional 'that's a nice cuppa' or 'ooh, that hits the spot!' for the over-forties.
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I have adopted the south Asian tea drinking noise (by habit-osmosis via family on my OH's side) - a thorough slurp followed by an audible exhale with a slight hint of "ahhhhh!"

it needs to be very hot to achieve this level of tea-ness :)
 
Traditionally, we are told, water used for making tea must be at boiling point when it first goes into the pot. 100 degrees C. On the side of the box of Orange Pekoe I bought the other day, it recommends a temperature of 80 degrees.
Just doesn't seem right.

As for drinking, I would guess you have a window of about seven minutes when the tea is at it's best for drinking and eating cake or biscuits. These for example are very nice but not really for dunking.
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davidplankton said:
Traditionally, we are told, water used for making tea must be at boiling point when it first goes into the pot. 100 degrees C. On the side of the box of Orange Pekoe I bought the other day, it recommends a temperature of 80 degrees.
Just doesn't seem right.

As for drinking, I would guess you have a window of about seven minutes when the tea is at it's best for drinking and eating cake or biscuits. These for example are very nice but not really for dunking.
View attachment 3505
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Oooohhh yes, I like those biscuits.
But I'm not allowed.
 
AnonyJoolz said:
I have adopted the south Asian tea drinking noise (by habit-osmosis via family on my OH's side) - a thorough slurp followed by an audible exhale with a slight hint of "ahhhhh!"

it needs to be very hot to achieve this level of tea-ness :)
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That's the chap!

davidplankton said:
Traditionally, we are told, water used for making tea must be at boiling point when it first goes into the pot. 100 degrees C. On the side of the box of Orange Pekoe I bought the other day, it recommends a temperature of 80 degrees.
Just doesn't seem right.

As for drinking, I would guess you have a window of about seven minutes when the tea is at it's best for drinking and eating cake or biscuits. These for example are very nice but not really for dunking.
View attachment 3505
Click to expand...

I've been trying to spread the word about the 80 degrees method since I saw a telly scientist insisting that (at the sort of altitudes most people live at) that's the optimum temperature. I've yet to find a single person who doesn't think it might be bollocks.
 
davidplankton said:
it recommends a temperature of 80 degrees.
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I have always thought tea needed boiling water. Newly drawn and freshly boiled till it rolls; the ritual of warming the pot was to ensure that little of the temperature was lost in those vital early seconds. Though some cultures boil their tea, we were warned against such "stewing."

I have, however, seen much lower temperatures advocated for coffee: it is said professional coffee-tasters prefer something around 80 degrees. Of course espresso is an exception to that coffee-rule.
 
I used to have a teasmade that produced appalling tasting tea. I always assumed it was because it produced hot rather than boiling water.

Does anyone even use teasmades nowadays?
 
graylien said:
Does anyone even use teasmades nowadays?
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Goblin Teasmades only produced Goblin-tea. I thought they must be amazing when I was about eight and browsing the mail-order catalogue.

This Wikipedia page does not explain the name. I did, however, learn that we nearly got a "Teesmade" - until the sensible folk of Teeside objected.

There have since been models from Swan and Breville. I once read that ownership of even a single Breville appliance meant social death!

The need to have tea-making linked to the alarm was a weird hangover from the days when electric kettles were very slow.

I own a 1930s electric kettle - a lovely chrome thing with the element hidden in the base. Visitors sometimes ask me if it still works; truth to tell, I last fired it up about twenty years ago and it was working then. Time taken to boil was around twenty minutes! It was sold at the time as a way for the lady of the house to brew her own tea on the maid's day off! :)
 
graylien said:
I used to have a teasmade that produced appalling tasting tea. I always assumed it was because it produced hot rather than boiling water.

Does anyone even use teasmades nowadays?
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Possibly terrorists. You can make quite an efficient little boom unit using one...I believe. (No, I did not try and do this with some mates at school as a 'chemistry project' and get detention for a week.)

And personally I can't think of any better reason to use a Teasmade than to blow up a Teasmade.
 
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