Monday 17 January 2011

any tips for preparing green tea?

For some reason, I bought an inhumane amount of China Sencha Dong-Bai green tea a while back. I've complained about it here before. Well, it's not bad tea. But each time I've brewed it, it's been rather bitter.

Have tried steeping it with water of different temperatures. I used to steep it much longer, but have incrementally lessened the time and it still retains its flavour when it's steeped for as short as three minutes. So that's what I do.

But I've decided to lay this out for those of you who know green teas better. By varying the steeping times and lengths, how much influence can you have on the way the tea tastes? Although I drink a lot of green tea, I read again and again that green tea is more sensitive than other tea.

Am I not being careful enough?

I've also read that you should soak green tea and discard the water before steeping it. The explanation was that many green teas are still dirty from the processing. I've never washed tea before I drink it. Do you? Does it make a difference?

One of the things I like to do most here is to help people who are curious about or new to tea. If you've had similar problems/questions regarding green tea, please say something in the comments and I'll write more about this in the future.

If you've got some advice about the particularities of green tea, please let us know. What's been your experience?

4 comments:

  1. Hmmm with sencha, use a smaller leaf to water ratio, and brew for 1 minute at about 70 degrees celsius, next brew at 30 seconds and 70 degrees celsius, and next at about 45 seconds to a minute.
    I brew sencha in a kyusu, so im not sure about the exacts of your teapot.

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  2. I also read that before putting some more water, you should leave your leafs rest a couple of minutes.

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  3. It all sounds very mumbo-jumboish to me... I ONLY ever drink green tea, and don't think there's a great big secret to it. Just either boil the water and leave it to stand for a bit, or take it off before it boils and use. If it doesn't taste nice, maybe just try a different tea:)

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  4. I don't know about trying this with a Chinese encha, but the recommendation have received from obubu tea for steeping their sencha teas is to use hiere leaf to water ratio (5g leaf in about 180ml), BOILING water, but only steep for 30 secs (1st infusion) 10 secs (2nd infusion), then 30 secs upwards om there. I find this works brilliantly with their teas. Maybe give that a tttt? I think the key is to just keep experimenting... If here's anything to learn from this its that three really are no rules... Or that s what I think anyway. I would never have considered using boiling water on a japanese green if I hadn't had it from obubu themselves (and heard Michael Coffey mention it also).

    On the other hand,perhaps is is just not a very nice tea? Always a possibility.

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