Tea Adventures
Jul. 22nd, 2020 10:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
forestofglorySo one result of my recent enjoyment of Chinese dramas is that I've been learning about and tasting more tea.
It started when I was working on my Guardian Food and Drink Project. Someone commented on one of my posts about it with a link to this the Tea House Ghost Youtube Chanel and I enjoyed those videos very much! But for a while that was all. Fancy tea is intimidating, its expensive and it seemed like you need a lot of special equipment.
However earlier this year I decided that rather than being sensible and finding some good surveys of Chinese history I was going to dive into the deep end with some very focused academic history books. And the first thing I read was Tea in China: A Religious and Cultural History by James A. Benn. Which I really adored.
So that got me to take a few more steps. I order a tea filter and a few samples of different Chinese style teas. The tea filter is just a mess basket that sits in my tea mug, and you put the leaves in there while the tea is brewing. I also started actually timing how long my tea brews for, which isn't as complicated as I thought. I can use the clock on my phone.
So the tea samples where very enjoyable, and I wrote a fic featuring a lot of tea, and read another book about the history of tea in China (The Rise of Tea Culture in China by Bret Hinsch) so I decided to order more tea. After asking around I ordered form TeaVivre I still wasn't sure what I liked so I ordered a bunch of sample packs and also some things that where on sale. It's been great to have lots of try.
So far I've learned that I really like pu-erh, and don't like oolong. (I sent the extra oolong to a good home). Not only is the pu-erh delicious but its relatively low fuss. I got a bunch of mini tuochas or tiny cakes of pressed tea so its all pre-measured. Unlike some of the other teas I have it brews with boiling water so I don't have to fussy with trying to cool the water down. Also it can be brewed many, many times!
With green teas I'm still figuring out what I like. I've enjoyed the dragon well tea I have now and the sample of Bi Luo Chun was very tasty too. The fact that I don't have precise control of the water temperature is making trying the green teas a bit more difficult. I have fancy kettle that does variable temperatures on my wish list, I'm hoping some one will give it to me for my birthday if not I will buy it for myself.
Tea is great! It has been lovely to learn more about the history of tea and also taste a lot of different teas. It is a bit complicated to do loose leaf tea, but its simpler than I thought. Do you have favorite teas? I'd love to hear about them!
It started when I was working on my Guardian Food and Drink Project. Someone commented on one of my posts about it with a link to this the Tea House Ghost Youtube Chanel and I enjoyed those videos very much! But for a while that was all. Fancy tea is intimidating, its expensive and it seemed like you need a lot of special equipment.
However earlier this year I decided that rather than being sensible and finding some good surveys of Chinese history I was going to dive into the deep end with some very focused academic history books. And the first thing I read was Tea in China: A Religious and Cultural History by James A. Benn. Which I really adored.
So that got me to take a few more steps. I order a tea filter and a few samples of different Chinese style teas. The tea filter is just a mess basket that sits in my tea mug, and you put the leaves in there while the tea is brewing. I also started actually timing how long my tea brews for, which isn't as complicated as I thought. I can use the clock on my phone.
So the tea samples where very enjoyable, and I wrote a fic featuring a lot of tea, and read another book about the history of tea in China (The Rise of Tea Culture in China by Bret Hinsch) so I decided to order more tea. After asking around I ordered form TeaVivre I still wasn't sure what I liked so I ordered a bunch of sample packs and also some things that where on sale. It's been great to have lots of try.
So far I've learned that I really like pu-erh, and don't like oolong. (I sent the extra oolong to a good home). Not only is the pu-erh delicious but its relatively low fuss. I got a bunch of mini tuochas or tiny cakes of pressed tea so its all pre-measured. Unlike some of the other teas I have it brews with boiling water so I don't have to fussy with trying to cool the water down. Also it can be brewed many, many times!
With green teas I'm still figuring out what I like. I've enjoyed the dragon well tea I have now and the sample of Bi Luo Chun was very tasty too. The fact that I don't have precise control of the water temperature is making trying the green teas a bit more difficult. I have fancy kettle that does variable temperatures on my wish list, I'm hoping some one will give it to me for my birthday if not I will buy it for myself.
Tea is great! It has been lovely to learn more about the history of tea and also taste a lot of different teas. It is a bit complicated to do loose leaf tea, but its simpler than I thought. Do you have favorite teas? I'd love to hear about them!
no subject
Date: 2020-07-23 10:57 am (UTC)I'm not a tea connoisseur, but I was brought up by parents who only bought and drank loose leaf tea, which did at least leave me with a lifelong dislike of teabags!
Normally I drink black tea, with no milk, and my preferred kind is Darjeerling. I'll generally drink any kind of black loose leaf tea, though. I also like jasmine tea, and enjoy drinking green tea when I'm in Chinese or Japanese restaurants.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-23 06:56 pm (UTC)Drinking only loose leaf seems fancy to me! How do you usually brew your loose leaf tea?
no subject
Date: 2020-07-25 11:06 am (UTC)If I want to have just a cup, or if my husband and I want to have different types of loose leaf tea, we use infusers like this. You put a spoonful of tea leaves in the infuser, boil water, and hang the infuser in the mug, leaving in there to brew until it's ready.
When I said I wasn't a tea connoisseur, I meant that if I really cared about all this stuff, I would be weighing the tea leaves out on a scale, boiling the water to a specific temperature (which would vary depending on the type of leaves), and leaving it to brew for a specified amount of time (which would again vary depending on the leaves) — but all that seems way too fussy for me, so all my tea brews with boiling water poured directly into the cup/pot, and sits there either for five minutes, or until the colour seems right.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-26 06:32 pm (UTC)