Walker Tea Review

video tea review and tea tasting blog

Main navigation

Teaware

How Do You Brew Tea?

by

Steep Tea Gaiwan

Some people run in fear of loose leaf tea because they think that brewing loose leaf tea is complicated or messy. They’ve seen all the fancy setups and get turned off or intimidated. Steeping loose leaf tea is really not much different from using a teabag.

Things You Need

1. Tea – Choose a good tea. Life’s too short to drink bad tea.

See also: Top 10 Teas To Expand Your Tea Palate

2. Hot water– at the right temperature. Good teas are more tolerant of hot water and produce less bitterness, but optimal temperatures can extend the life of your tea leaves and deliver richer character. A good kettle will help control temperature and allow for smooth pouring.

See also: Walker Tea Review Series: Water

3. A steeping vessel. This could be a gaiwan, teapot, tea infuser, or other. Avoid those infuser balls and similar gimmicky crap. If you want something that goes straight in a cup, get a brew basket instead.

See also:
How To Use A Gaiwan
How To Choose A Tea Infuser/Teapot
Steeping: Finum Brew Basket

What To Do

1. Get your cup and pot ready. If you want good tasting tea that isn’t weak and watery, you’re looking to add a good heaping teaspoon of tea for each cup of tea served at each steeping. Notice this is per steeping – don’t think that you need 5 teaspoons if you’re going to steep the tea 5 times. Most good teas can be re-steeped. In many cases, they can be re-steeped multiple times.

2. Heat your water. There’s all kinds of talk about how heating water in the microwave is bad. It may not be the best but it isn’t terrible either. Kettles are nice, and a Zojirushi is delightful. Aim to heat your water to slightly below a full boil- look for small bubbles, not a rolling boil. Most teas don’t need water that hot.

3. Add water to your cup/pot. Tea leaves will float. Try to pour so that all the leaves at least dip beneath the surface for a second.

4. Wait 30 seconds and then decant. “Decant” is just a fancy way of saying get the water off the tea leaves. You may be thinking that 30 seconds isn’t enough. You may be right. Use 30 seconds as a rule of thumb- as you learn to use the tea leaves you’ll find a your ideal amount of time. In most cases you certainly don’t need more than 2 minutes for a first steep. That’s just over-steeping tea leaves that can be better used on the re-steep. As you re-steep, steep a little longer each time – add 10 to 30 seconds to the previous steep time.

5. Enjoy.

See also: 10 Commandments Of Tea

Steeping: Finum Brew Basket

by

Finum Brewing Basket - Medium

For the longest time, having tea at the office or away from home has involved compromise. In most cases, the compromise came in the form of a teabag. Even when teabags have high quality tea, it rarely compares to a well-steeped cup of quality loose leaf.

This compromise on quality often comes at greater convenience. Or at least that is the prevailing logic.

But the Finum Brewing Basket offers a middle path that comes closer to achieving Tea-At-Work-Nirvana.
…

Read More

Product Review: Bonavita Gooseneck Kettle

by

Bonavita Gooseneck KettleIt would seem that right after building a better mousetrap, mankind has striven to build a better kettle that would bring the world a-knocking at the door. Despite all the bells and whistles, everything from the Breville 800XL Tea Maker to the Keurig is still, at its essence, a kettle that heats and distributes water.

So how does the Bonavita BV3825B stack up?

…

Read More

Review: Breville 800XL Tea Maker

by

Introducing one of the heavy hitters in the tea-making arena.

The Breville BTM800XL tea maker packs a combination of powerful features:

  • custom temperature and steep times for different kinds of tea
  • an automated brew basket that lowers and rises on program
  • “set it and leave it” for scheduled tea brewing

The positives:

  • BPA free lid
  • a brew basket big enough to allow for leaf expansion, even for oolongs in 1.5L of water
  • a keep-warm feature- for those times when you can’t get to hot water just when you’d hoped
  • Durable: I’ve personally used this teapot almost daily for over 7 years. It’s never let me down.

The negatives:

  • the lid absorbs aromas easily. Avoid strong-smelling teas, or leaving a tea in the pot overnight.

Overall, it isn’t the cheapest teapot out there- but you’d expect that from a dependable tea kettle made of the highest quality materials available. Its automation also allows for hands-free operation when making a larger volume of tea. This tea kettle is definitely worth considering if you are a regular tea drinker seeking greater convenience in preparing larger volumes of tea.

On the other hand, if you are the type who prefers to use a gaiwan or yixing teapot, the Bonavita Gooseneck Kettle will give you the precision pouring you’re looking for.

Read more about: