Food & Drink Any tea drinkers about?

Hey,

This summer, while working in an office, I started drinking tea. At first it was for caffeine without the, erm, "GI effects" of coffee. I started drinking cheap green tea, then started buying black tea variety packs. By the end of the summer I bought a teapot and a few kinds of loose leaf tea. I really prefer loose leaf tea to bags, it just seems to taste better. My favorite teas are Twinning's Irish Breakfast and Lapsang Souchong.

So far I've stuck with the Twinning's brand mostly because I love their Irish breakfast tea.

What brand/flavors do you prefer and where do you buy your tea?
(I ordered from Twinning's website this summer since my small town only had a few varieties and no loose leaf. Now that I'm back in Minneapolis I will probably look for a tea shop.)

-Sammo1999

 

earl grey and i usually buy it from sainbury/tesco etc

 

I'm a big fan of Lapsang Souchong and Rooibos tea, but the cupboard is chock full of around 15-20 different boxes of all sorts of green, black and herbal teas, which I'll have once in a blue moon (quite a few are probably stale by now though)

 

Yes, but it's just normal black tea with milk in it.

 

Yorkshire tea. Milk, 1-2 sugars.

I can't stand Earl Grey.

- H.

 

Ugh. Can't stand Lapsang Souchong. Or early gray. For me it has to be really powerful and strong or really delicate. Lapsang just feels poser-ish to me (just imo) and Earl Grey is too peppery. I

really got into tea thanks to my gf who introduced me to it at Uni. I love trying different types and in Derbyshire used to live quite close to a proper tea merchants. Gunpowder was my fave, with a nice dark and coarse taste. They had 250 varieties there, but I only ever tried a handful compared to that.

Move away from Twinings IMO - it's nicer than the usual crap, but that doesn't make it particularly good quality. It's like waitrose sausages are nicer than Asdas - but organic stuff fresh from the farmers market still shits all over the rest.

Try some of the fruit teas too - apple tea is especially nice. Nettle tea is also quite good once in a while.

 

Yorkshire, a small amount of milk, no sugar.

 

Second vote for rooibos tea (also called redbush tea) for when I want something different - it's got quite a spicy taste.
Usually have a herbal tea before putting the light out at night - usually a mint tea or lavender if I'm having problems getting off to sleep.

 

For normal everyday tea, I have two yorkshire gold in my mug, which holds a shade under two pints.

I am also quite into chai and mango tea that I tend to get from Whittards

 

Loose leaf tea is indeed of much better quality than tea bags. Tea bags are designed to infuse quickly so the tea leaves are ground/fragmented to suit this. In practice this means that tea bags get filled with the dusty crap that settles at the bottom of the canvas bags in which the tea gets exported.

Like the Chinese, I drink loose leaf tea without a tea egg --you just suck the last gulps through clenched teeth. The Chinese consider this part of the tea drinking experience.

My favorite teas are: green orange pekoe for daily drinking at work --mixes well with fresh mint also; silver needle supreme for a rehydrating crisp pick-me-up; Dragon Phoenix Pearl (jasmin and green tea rolled into small balls, which slowly unfurl during infusion) to relax, although I am also partial to a good quality green Oolong tea. The last one is hard to get (Jek The makes the best, IMO), but Whittards actually does a reasonable approximation.

The best general source in the UK is the Algerian Coffee Company; the best brand tends to be Ming Cha but you pay for it.

 

not into any of these flavoured teas people drink, Just a yorkshire tbag, two sugars and a bit of milk is fine.

hot water obv

Stired with whatever is laying about.

 

I drink Tetley or Twinings Every Day.

 

Pure builders tea here. I prefer PG but like a cup of Twinings every now and then.

 

To be honest, i have never tried tea, because of the smell, which has always put me off. Is it time i tried some tea of sorts?

Sam

 

If my GF makes it for two she puts a normal teabag in the teapot and either x2 Lady Grey if it's late in the day, or x2 normal teabags and an Earl Grey if it's early. For normal tea we tend to use PG Tips. Then a tiny bit of sugar and milk in the cup first.

 

I once saw tea flowers, which practically explode into spiky balls when heated. Looked cool.

My sister came back from a Senegalese tribe recently who introduced her to the Senegalese tea ceremony. It takes sooooooo much preperation that I've never made it myself, only had her make it for me on a handful of occasions. It's worth the effort though and the tea itself is called Attaya. I googled the recipe for you:

Attaya (Senegalese Tea)

Attaya is the Senegalese tea ceremony. It’s served in three rounds. The first is strong and bitter, the second more sweet with a little mint, and the third is very sweet with more mint. It’s supposed to reflect friendship: The longer we’re together the sweeter it grows.


Round one (called Lewel)
In a small tea pot (brada) put one cup water, 1 small glass (Kas) of sugar, and 1 small glass (kas) of tea leaves (warga). Set the pot on the fuurnu (small grill or gas burner) and bring the mix to a boil. Remove from heat and pour some of the content into each of the four small glasses. Begin pouring the liquid back and forth between the glasses until each glass has foam on it. Keeping the foam in the glasses, pour the liquid back into the brada and bring to a boil again. Remove from heat and pour into the glasses. Mix again until foam is even bigger then serve round one.


Round two
Add water to the brada (warga should still be in the pot). Add mint leaves (nana) and/or pastilles (a mint candy similar to gum drops) to the pot. Bring to a boil. Add two generous kas of sugar, bring to a boil again. Remove from heat and pour some of the content into each of the four small glasses. Begin pouring the liquid back and forth between the glasses until each glass has foam on it. Keeping the foam in the glasses, pour the liquid back into the brada and bring to a boil again. Remove from heat and pour into the glasses. Mix again until foam is even bigger then serve round two.


Round three
Add water and a little more warga to the pot. Add mint leaves (nana) and/or pastilles to the pot (be generous, this is the yummy round!). Bring to a boil. Add three generous kas of sugar and bring again to a boil. Remove from heat and pour some of the content into each of the four small glasses. Begin pouring the liquid back and forth between the glasses until each glass has foam on it. Keeping the foam in the glasses, pour the liquid back into the brada and bring to a boil again. Remove from heat and pour into the glasses. Mix again until foam is even bigger then serve round three.

 

No - it's weakly strained evil. Stick with coffee

 

Just yorkshire tea with milk and 1 sweetner. Always made in a teapot! Thats a must

Ian

 

Does ice tea count?

 

You can't beat a good cup of loose leaf tea. Unfortunately being of the lazy variety, I settle for Twinnings everyday breakfast. Just out of curiousity, do any of you loose leaf tea people read your leaves? Look you've got money coming