It's a matter of Taste

You'll find any number of tea experts who will tell you the "right" way to brew tea. They are by definition wrong because your mood, the time of day, the kind of water and even the tea will be different for you than it was for them. Even the same tea will vary from batch to batch as the weather and season of picking changes. To insist on brewing a summer picking of green Oolong the same way you brew a winter harvest would be plain foolishness.

Experiment with brewing your tea. Try it several different ways varying the ratio of tea to water, the temperature of the water, the length of brewing time and even the cup you drink the tea from. Each experience will be different. After a while you'll have a sense of the range of possibilities and you can brew your tea on a given day the way your own sensibility dictates for that day, that mood and that activity.

Now for some basic guidelines to get you started.

• 1/2 a teaspoon to a teaspoon per 8 oz. cup of water is a good ratio to start with. Play with it from there to find your perfect brew.
   

•  You can get multiple brews out of a batch of tea. Just increase the length of brew for each consecutive pot. But don't try to reuse the leaves the next day.
   

• Use the tea while it's still fresh. As the teas age they get drier and oxidize more, changing the taste.

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• You can just put the leaves directly into the teapot. However, if your teapot isn't designed for it it may make pouring difficult. You can also use a large tea ball or a filter basket. Just about any method is fine but remember that you want to give the leaves room to fully open. It improves the taste and watching the jiaogulan tea leaves open into big beautiful five leaf clusters is one of the joys of brewing with high quality tea.  Of course we think the absolute best method is a traditional Yixing tea pot from China. Check out our catalog pages on Yixing tea ware.
   
• Use either natural spring water or water that has been filtered (preferably through a reverse osmosis filtering system). Chlorine and fluoride present in most city water can ruin the taste.

• The water should be hot but not boiling. Boiling water tends to rapidly disintegrate the tea leaves and usually causes a bitter taste. Boiling also tends to give the water a flat taste. Try for a temperature of between 140º F and 160º F.
   
• Don't pour the hot water directly on the leaves. Put the water in the pot first. Wait until it is at the temperature you like and then gently settle the leaves into the pot.
   
• Give the tea leaves a rinse before brewing. All tea goes from the fields to your cup without being washed because exposure to water ruins the tea. So a quick rinse to remove the dust from its long journey is much appreciated. Discard the water from this rinse.  The Chinese sometimes call this "foot water".
   
• At first keep the brewing time down (1 or 2 minutes). Over successive efforts increase the time gradually until you find the right balance for you. Click here for brewing time recommendations for our different teas.