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Alright, thank you. I'll try to toss some more leaves in the gaiwan. I'll also wait longer after my rinse. Is that important? As is, I've been dousing the leaves in hot water, quickly pouring it off, then going about the business of making tea.
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Jul 29, 2018 21:28
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Rinsing then immediately steeping is the way it's generally done, but if you want a stronger first steep and want to avoid a long first steep, I find letting the leaves sit for short time after a rinse helps them release their flavor more quickly. I'd argue that lighter first steeps are more the appetizer for the main course than a problem to avoid, but if you don't prefer that then by all means adjust it, it's your tea. Anyway just experiment with times and amount of leaf and you'll get it figured out. IMO as a rule of thumb for most oolongs, you get about 5 minutes of quality steeping time, and you can break that up however you want. The shorter the times you use, the more leaf you need to prevent it from being too watered down and vice versa with longer times you want less leaf so that it's not overly strong and bringing out off flavors.
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Jul 30, 2018 00:16
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Bought a sort of tea flask so i can do some steeping at work. It works surprisingly well. Broke it in with some of tedragen's lapsang souchong. What a strange tea... It smells like a bbq sauce and has a very smoky(?) (but nice!) taste. Really unlike any other tea I've tried, unsure if I like this? I'm really weirded out by the meat aroma haha
Truck Stop Daddy fucked around with this message at 12:00 on Jul 30, 2018 |
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Jul 30, 2018 11:30
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tedragen owns I ended up having a long conversation with one of the founders (Hegre I think? kinda old-looking with glasses) when they had a stand in Oslo a couple of years back, and got like 100g of free pu-erh samples from his personal stash ulvir fucked around with this message at 11:49 on Jul 30, 2018 |
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Jul 30, 2018 11:47
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Thank you for all this. Too little leaf seems to have been the problem. I went and got a cheap gram scale for consistency, but yeah, adding more seems to have solved it. I really appreciate it because now I get to appreciate all these samples I've got. So far I'm digging this Huang Guanyin I got from TeaVivre, it vaguely reminds me of cigar tobacco in the best ways.
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Jul 30, 2018 13:58
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Truck Stop Daddy posted:Bought a sort of tea flask so i can do some steeping at work. It works surprisingly well. Broke it in with some of tedragen's lapsang souchong. What a strange tea... It smells like a bbq sauce and has a very smoky(?) (but nice!) taste. Really unlike any other tea I've tried, unsure if I like this? I'm really weirded out by the meat aroma haha Cool, I’ve ordered a bunch of different stuff from them these past months. Everything has been great so far. Would be cool to meet them or some other teafreaks sometime... I ended up ordering a new gaiwan from verdant tea a while back (before I knew that they apparently are bad dudes:/ ), and ended up adding some tea to the order to balance shipping costs. Really curious about this 1985 oolong I ordered some of. Those leaves are older than me :0
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Jul 30, 2018 14:17
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Verdant is fine, just don't put too much stock into the purported age of the puerh trees they advertise. They also tend to run higher on the price to value ratio imo. poo poo, a 1985 oolong? I think the oldest aged oolong I've had is late 2000s, and it had a really heavy, unpleasant sour quality about it. I'm not sure I'm into the whole aged oolongs thing.
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Jul 30, 2018 14:30
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An update on the cold-brewed iced tea: one ounce of tea for 2 quarts of water results in exactly the strength I was looking for, so thank you to whichever goon suggested that!! Gonna have to remember that. e: upon looking, it was Jhet suggesting using .5 oz or doubling it for stronger tea to dilute more, so thank you Jhet! gamingCaffeinator fucked around with this message at 03:54 on Jul 31, 2018 |
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Jul 31, 2018 03:45
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Teavivre is doing a random draw for registered account members. I spun twice and got 2 six dollar gift cards. I haven't gotten the email to redeem them yet, but that's nice. It's until the 31st of June. You can get: 6 dollar gift card 10 dollar gift card 20 dollar gift card 100 reward points glass pot + 100 gram dian hong golden tip [tin] award winning tea samples [tin] fudling white tea cake 100 grams https://www.teavivre.com/randomdraw/oneday
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Jul 31, 2018 05:10
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value-brand cereal posted:Teavivre is doing a random draw for registered account members. I spun twice and got 2 six dollar gift cards. I haven't gotten the email to redeem them yet, but that's nice. It's until the 31st of June. Looks neat, but mine seems to be broken. The wheel just spins forever and never stops, doesn't do anything when clicked, and never tells me if I won anything or not. I tried on Firefox and Chrome, but no dice. 
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Jul 31, 2018 09:17
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expected nothing, won a teapot and dianhong + 100 reward points  ...but that thing is 650ml, I don't need nor have space for this.
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Jul 31, 2018 09:26
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Bees on Wheat posted:Looks neat, but mine seems to be broken. The wheel just spins forever and never stops, doesn't do anything when clicked, and never tells me if I won anything or not. I tried on Firefox and Chrome, but no dice. same here
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Jul 31, 2018 09:49
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ulvir posted:expected nothing, won a teapot and dianhong + 100 reward points I guess you could bring it out once a year to make some blooming tea to impress houseguests? Only 200 reward points for me, oh well.
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Jul 31, 2018 15:46
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My Vahdam teas finally showed up after spending two weeks in customs! Hooray!
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Jul 31, 2018 16:27
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Teavivre's 10-40% anniversary sale is live. Lot of filler stuff in the 40% category though, only the charcoal baked anxi tgy and standard dragonwell seem worth it. Lots of other goodies in 30 and 20 off though. Keep in mind there are multiple pages in each % sale page.
hope and vaseline fucked around with this message at 23:13 on Aug 1, 2018 |
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Aug 1, 2018 23:11
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gamingCaffeinator posted:An update on the cold-brewed iced tea: one ounce of tea for 2 quarts of water results in exactly the strength I was looking for, so thank you to whichever goon suggested that!! Gonna have to remember that. Let me know how it goes if you re steep that. Because I've had no success with trying to re steep cold Brew tea and that's a shitload of tea to burn on a pitcher.
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Aug 1, 2018 23:54
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fknlo posted:Let me know how it goes if you re steep that. Because I've had no success with trying to re steep cold Brew tea and that's a shitload of tea to burn on a pitcher. The 0.5oz for 2L ratio works for me to resteep for greens, but I use a cheap Chinese black tea for generic black iced cold steeped so it's not super expensive. I get it for something like $22/pound. One pound typically will last me the summer and I can add any number of flavors to the cup.
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Aug 2, 2018 01:11
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Is there any good way to cut expensive teas with cheaper teas? Particularly for cold brewing? Edit: To clarify, I want to get a bit more use out of my nicer teas so I'm thinking of going 3 parts nice loose leaf tea to 1 part generic bagged tea when cold brewing. RandomPauI fucked around with this message at 06:23 on Aug 2, 2018 |
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Aug 2, 2018 02:07
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Oh, I'm getting close to replicating Adagio's rooibos vanilla chai! 1tsp Upton vanilla rooibos, 2tsp Upton chai namaste (a spice-only mix). Needs a bit more citrus and clove, but I can always add in some dried orange peels and cloves myself. I've been impressed with Upton's rooibos offerings. Nice big leaves, no dusty floor sweepings. Their unflavored stuff is nuanced and delicious. So during this chai-spice journey I also got a few samples from Harney & Sons, as I'm addicted to their Paris when I want a flavored black. It was not a great time. I've had a better cup of rooibos from Celestial Seasonings. Lots of tiny leaves, cinnamon without any flavor, everything just too mild to make an impression. I will give them this-- their Mulled Plum Cider smells like Christmas. (It does not taste like Christmas, as the chicory root aftertaste is not pleasant.)
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Aug 2, 2018 02:26
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I'm curious as to what people do to add fruit flavors to iced tea. I've found dunking fresh fruit in there disappointing, and I'm starting to wonder if all those recipes I've seen are just adding it for the aesthetics of it rather than taste. I mean, why try to steep fruit when you can just squeeze the juice out of it into the tea? Also trying to shove dried oranges into a cheap cold-brewed green tea did nothing but add gross chunks of tasteless bloated orange to it.
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Aug 2, 2018 02:54
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Stuporstar posted:I'm curious as to what people do to add fruit flavors to iced tea. I've found dunking fresh fruit in there disappointing, and I'm starting to wonder if all those recipes I've seen are just adding it for the aesthetics of it rather than taste. I mean, why try to steep fruit when you can just squeeze the juice out of it into the tea? I just juice or muddle them normally as it's the best flavor I'm going to get. You can also make extracts with vodka or flavored sugar syrups. The extracts last longer because 40% ethanol. I suppose you could also hot steep things and turn them into ice cubes for flavors that you can't just squeeze into the container. I think the store blends for teas are normally meant to be brewed hot and then chilled, but the only one I've found that I like at all is a lychee flavored one that steeps well cold and that's because it's an okay fit when the shops don't have ripe lychee.
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Aug 2, 2018 05:21
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Vahdam likes to throw in free samples in an order and this time tumeric was one of them. Has anybody had a tumeric tea? It does not sound appealing to me.
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Aug 2, 2018 14:16
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Out of curiosity, what's the going opinion on TeaVivre's oolongs? I'm gradually working through them, liking them, but not sure what I'm getting in the grand scheme of things. So far I've mostly seem people rave over their dragonwell. Did pick up some of the charcoal baked Ti Kuan Yin that's on 40%, I've got good hopes for it.
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Aug 2, 2018 16:30
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david_a posted:Vahdam likes to throw in free samples in an order and this time tumeric was one of them. Has anybody had a tumeric tea? It does not sound appealing to me. Does it have other spices with it to make golden milk tea? Turmeric, ginger, cinnamon, etc? If so it is delicious.
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Aug 3, 2018 00:07
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hope and vaseline posted:Teavivre's 10-40% anniversary sale is live. Lot of filler stuff in the 40% category though, only the charcoal baked anxi tgy and standard dragonwell seem worth it. Lots of other goodies in 30 and 20 off though. Keep in mind there are multiple pages in each % sale page. I bought a stupid amount of tea in their two sales last year, so I think I'm gonna wait until Black Friday this year. Lord knows I have enough tea to last until then... The standard Longjing is definitely the best bargain at 40%. At 30%, I'd go for the Yunnan Gongfu Fragrant Black Tea- it's a pretty good Dian Hong that has an interesting raw pu-erh-ish kind of quality, and a very good deal for the price.
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Aug 3, 2018 09:03
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I have about 150g lying around from 2017 but I'm out of my favorite stuff. The Dragon Well is super cheap. Might end up buying 500g with some Bai Hao and Mao Jian.Agrinja posted:Out of curiosity, what's the going opinion on TeaVivre's oolongs? I'm gradually working through them, liking them, but not sure what I'm getting in the grand scheme of things. So far I've mostly seem people rave over their dragonwell. Did pick up some of the charcoal baked Ti Kuan Yin that's on 40%, I've got good hopes for it.
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Aug 3, 2018 09:36
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RandomPauI posted:Is there any good way to cut expensive teas with cheaper teas? Particularly for cold brewing? to be honest, i'd just buy loose leaf teas known for being good value and being robust enough to support multiple steeps. the reason generic bagged tea is generic bagged tea is because it's fannings, which is basically tiny sawdust-sized pieces of tea leaf--they infuse really fast and with a bold flavor, but they also release bitter/acrid off-flavors quickly. i don't think there's any way to extract good flavors from loose leaf tea without leaving the tea bags in long enough to extract unpleasant flavors from those. maybe try cold brewing with just the tea bags in a seperate container, and and then mixing it with cold-brewed loose leaf tea? that'll let you know whether the combination is palatable with minimum risk.
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Aug 4, 2018 00:25
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That's really helpful, thanks a lot.
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Aug 4, 2018 11:27
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Agrinja posted:Out of curiosity, what's the going opinion on TeaVivre's oolongs? I'm gradually working through them, liking them, but not sure what I'm getting in the grand scheme of things. So far I've mostly seem people rave over their dragonwell. Did pick up some of the charcoal baked Ti Kuan Yin that's on 40%, I've got good hopes for it. I don't have any experience with TeaVivre so I can't comment on that, but FWIW the best (Taiwanese) oolong shop I know is tea-masters.com. I've had great teas from other shops but I've found him to be by far the most reliable in terms of quality. So, his stuff is kind of my reference point for what good TW oolongs should taste like at whatever given price point. For mid to heavy roasted teas in particular I think he's a real cut above the other western facing vendors.
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Aug 5, 2018 04:21
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good taiwanese oolong vendors imo (incomplete list (from cheap to expensive)) zen8tea's ebay page (stupendously cheap tea, cheap shipping too, cheapest "real" yixing i've seen on the internet. cheap. but decent!) taiwan tea crafts (crazy selection, generally great value-for-money, cheap-ish shipping) floating leaves (seattle-based, often considered low-altitude specialists, kinda pricy but nowhere near the next two vendors) red blossom (san francisco based, high-altitude specialists, relatively high prices) tea masters (run by a french person, crazy high prices and quality, good place to blow a paycheck on teaware also)
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Aug 5, 2018 07:34
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Taiwan sourcing is good too. bit pricey though
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Aug 5, 2018 10:49
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Thank you all very much, I'll have to give a look over. So far, oolongs are a bit of a mess to sort through compared to blacks, but it's been interesting and fun.
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Aug 5, 2018 16:01
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Don't forget j tea, which I am lucky enough to live near. The owner Josh goes to Taiwan and China and sources the tea himself from farmers. The selection isn't massive, but it's consistently great, and if you want recommendations you can just call.
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Aug 5, 2018 17:28
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Reiterpallasch posted:good taiwanese oolong vendors imo (incomplete list (from cheap to expensive)) Great list! Will have to check out some of these. Currently steeping the 1985 Oolong I picked up. Very distinct taste! Smells and tastes of raspberries or some other berry and baked goods, with a more spicy aftertaste. Possibly cloves. I really like this
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Aug 5, 2018 17:38
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I'm taking a trip to China soon, and will be in Beijing mostly. Any places to check out tea-wise? I'll have some locals with me, but they didn't have any suggested places.
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Aug 6, 2018 02:10
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Ehhhh. If you just want to go see it, Maliandao is this mile-long commercial district/street in the rear end end of Western Beijing with nothing but tea-related businesses (including this Mall-of-the-Americas-size complex with literally thousands of tea vendors inside). It's definitely a sight, but the stores themselves mostly deal with the commercial wholesale market, with a side hustle of fleecing tourists. Wouldn't really suggest actually buying anything there, at least not more than just buying off the internet. If you can deal with the pushy sales tactics and have a Mandarin-speaker along, it might be a good chance to have a vendor brew some samples of any niche teas that you want to try before buying.
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Aug 6, 2018 08:07
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MarshalN has a four part guide for bying tea in China if you really, really want to. but he also tells you to be cautious like the post above me.
ulvir fucked around with this message at 13:33 on Aug 6, 2018 |
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Aug 6, 2018 13:22
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Yeah, I have low expectations. I just figure if I'm going all the way to China, I may as well check out some tea? Thanks for the advice, I'll see if we have time for one of those.
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Aug 6, 2018 15:49
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Can anyone recommend a good creamy herbal mint tea? I was organizing a cupboard and found a bag Teavana peppermint white chocolate tea. It tasted meh after being cold brewed but it works great for ice cubes. I don't have much left though and I'd like to get a cheaper replacement.
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Aug 12, 2018 07:52
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Anybody tried infusing alcohol with tea? They were selling some glass bottles with spices at the state fair but I figured I have enough tea here already. The instructions on the bottle said to pour in your alcohol of choice, let it sit for 15 minutes, then strain it. I’m kinda curious if Earl Grey vodka or whatever is actually any good.
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Aug 13, 2018 00:02
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