How to Brew Your Tea, Properly

Notes from a Tea Sommelier

Most people have never tasted their tea at its best. Not because they bought the wrong leaf, but because the leaf never had a fair chance in the cup.

Brewing well is not complicated. It asks for three things: decent water, the right temperature and a little attention to time. Get those right and an ordinary morning cup becomes something worth sitting down for.

Start with the water

Water is most of what you are drinking, so it deserves more thought than it usually gets.

Filtered water is best. If your local water is hard, the minerals in it flatten delicate teas and dull the aroma of good ones. A simple jug filter makes a noticeable difference to a first flush Darjeeling or a light oolong.

Always use freshly drawn water. Water that has been boiled twice has lost much of its dissolved oxygen, and tea brewed with it tastes strangely dead. Boil what you need, and boil it once.

Measure the leaf

The standard is roughly 2 to 3 grams per 200ml cup. In practice, that is a heaped teaspoon for most whole leaf teas.

Large twisted leaves such as white peony or a rolled oolong take up far more room in the spoon than a fine broken leaf, so weigh them the first few times if you can. Your hand will learn the amount quickly.

Give the leaves space. A cramped infuser ball is the most common reason a good tea tastes thin. The leaf needs to unfurl completely and move freely in the water. A large basket infuser, or simply leaves loose in the pot, will always brew better.

Temperature matters more than you think

This is where most cups are lost. Boiling water scorches delicate leaves and pulls harsh tannins from green tea, which is why so many people believe they dislike it

If your kettle has no temperature setting, boil the water and let it stand. Around two minutes off the boil brings it to roughly 90°C, and five minutes to roughly 80°C. Pouring boiling water into a cold cup and waiting a moment achieves something similar.

Time it, and mean it

Steeping by instinct is how tea becomes bitter. Set a timer, even if it feels fussy.

Remove the leaves as soon as the time is up rather than leaving them sitting in the cup. Tea left on the leaf keeps extracting, and the pleasant astringency of a good black tea tips into harshness within a minute or two.

If the tea tastes bitter, steep for less time before you reach for the milk. Bitterness is nearly always over-extraction rather than a fault in the leaf.

Brew it again

Good whole leaf tea has more than one cup in it. This is the part most people miss entirely.

Oolong is the great example. A rolled oolong will give you four or five infusions, each one different from the last: the first floral and light, the middle ones fuller and sweeter, the final ones soft and mineral. Pu-erh and many greens behave the same way.

For second and third infusions, keep the temperature the same and add fifteen to thirty seconds to the steeping time. Brew them soon after the first rather than leaving wet leaves sitting for hours.

Milk, sugar and the rest

There is no rule here worth defending. Add what you enjoy.

That said, try a new tea plain first. A single estate Assam has a malt sweetness of its own that milk will cover completely, and you may find you want less than you expected. Milk suits robust black teas and breakfast blends. It rarely flatters green, white or oolong.

If you take milk, add it after brewing so you can see the colour of the liquor and judge the strength.

Look after your leaves

Tea is more fragile in storage than most people realise. It absorbs odours readily and fades in light.

Keep it in an airtight tin, away from sunlight, heat and anything strongly scented. Never store tea in the fridge, where condensation and food aromas will both find their way in.

Whole leaf black tea keeps well for around two years. Green tea is best within a year, and ideally within six months of harvest, when its fresh grassy character is at its peak.