h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

My father-in-law is very particular about his tea. On one occasion while on holiday he actually marched off to the kitchen of the restaurant where they were eating, just to show them how to make tea properly!

Oh, and Aimless, not all English people like strong tea. My mother-in-law likes hers really weak. On one occasion my father-in-law made her a cup of tea and forgot to put the teabag in. She never noticed! Richard and I don't like our tea quite that weak, but we generally go for a Darjeeling blend because it doesn't have quite so much tannin. (That's what makes the tea strong.) Too much tannin makes my tongue curl at the sides - definitely not refreshing the way tea should be.

The water for tea or coffee (ground, not instant) should be between 193 and 195 Fahrenheit. I'm sorry I can't convert that to Centigrade; I'm just another ugly American myself.

For the best flavored instant coffee, you should start with COLD water in a saucepan, add instant coffee powder, and bring to the boil slowly.

To Bald Bloke--you wouldn't believe what you can sue for and win in this country. To this day, McDonalds is forced to place large warnings informing the customer that the liquid in their hot chocolate/coffee is indeed, in fact, hot. (Shocking notion, hmm?) It stems from a lawsuit from some poor hapless lady who accidentally recieved a lapfull of hot coffee after going through the drive-up window. She sued for a million, and won.
A whole conversation thread could be devoted to the lengths that companies have to go to to protect themselves from the clumsy fools who think that they should sue for every little thing. I AM one of those clumsy fools, and just because I tripped over nothing and hit the floor last night, I'm proud to say I wasn't tempted to sue the makers of my floor/carpet/home for negligence. I was too busy nursing my wounded body (and pride).

To Cheerful Dragon: I'm from the southern part of Illinois. Quite a way away from Boston--never been there, in fact. Went to Washington D.C. once when I was younger. Been to London, though, if just for a few days en route to the continent for a month. Probably saw more of Europe in a month than I've seen of the States in a long time. Funny, huh?
Congrats on retaining something you learned in history class. Don't worry--I doubt I could do English history justice either...

But, what can you say about a person whose ancestors felt compelled to dress like the natives, whoop, holler, and fling tea into a horbor.

I once went to a lecture on the history etc of tea (yes, an entire *hour* of the stuff - only in England ) and the lecturer revealed that travellers used to take whole bricks of pressed tea leaves with them wherever they went. You could either break bits off and make tea with it, or suck/chew on the brick "raw". Well, much as I like the stuff, I'm not *that* enthusiastic...

I once went to a lecture on the history etc of tea (yes, an entire *hour* of the stuff - only in England ) and the lecturer revealed that travellers used to take whole bricks of pressed tea leaves with them wherever they went. You could either break bits off and make tea with it, or suck/chew on the brick "raw". Well, much as I like the stuff, I'm not *that* enthusiastic...

I once went to a lecture on the history etc of tea (yes, an entire *hour* of the stuff - only in England ) and the lecturer revealed that travellers used to take whole bricks of pressed tea leaves with them wherever they went. You could either break bits off and make tea with it, or suck/chew on the brick "raw". Well, much as I like the stuff, I'm not *that* enthusiastic...

"Well, much as I like the stuff, I'm not *that* enthusiastic..."


But posting it three times just makes you look that way

My big gripe is always with the milk in a cup of tea. The water needs to be hot for the tea, maybe, but if you put the milk in afterwards it doesn't taste so good to me. It the milk is in first, it only gradually warms up as the water goes in, and so doesn't scald.

I've heard that the temperature should be close boiling, but not boiling. I've seen instructions for temperatures as 80 C¡.

Have got back from a couple of weeks" leave in time to stir things up a bit.
The Chinese do not use boiling water for tea ("freshly boiled" yes, but not still boiling) A tea ceremony I went to recently in Beijing went against fifty years of British training and took the kettle to the pot rather than vice versa.The charming young woman (she charmed us into buying a "special dragon tea-set") also moistened the leaves first (to uncurl them and bring out the flavour) waited about fifteen seconds and then filled up the pot with said boiled water (as one is supposed to with "proper" coffee in a cafetiere) So the answer to the original question is "just below boiling"/"just off the boil.

Have got back from a couple of weeks" leave in time to stir things up a bit.
The Chinese do not use boiling water for tea ("freshly boiled" yes, but not still boiling) A tea ceremony I went to recently in Beijing went against fifty years of British training and took the kettle to the pot rather than vice versa.The charming young woman (she charmed us into buying a "special dragon tea-set") also moistened the leaves first (to uncurl them and bring out the flavour) waited about fifteen seconds and then filled up the pot with said boiled water (as one is supposed to with "proper" coffee in a cafetiere) So the answer to the original question is "just below boiling"/"just off the boil.

Sorry. Obviously "Whatever I tell you twice is true"

Would that be for green or black tea?

Assuming they don't take milk, I suppose it's possible that they want to avoid getting some bitter high-temperature-soluble compounds out of the leaves that in milky tea would combine with milk fats or protein and be rendered less unpleasant.

Also, I suspect the 'must be *absolutely* boiling' people are indulging in their own kind of harmless ritual. Water has a very high heat capacity and I would have thought a just-boiled kettle will stay within a couple of degrees of boiling point for a minute or two.
Even at 1000m above sea level, where the boiling point is ~97C, I don't recall tea being particularly bad. I must say I haven't had many decent cuppas above 2000m/~94C, except when boiling everything together chai-style, but I suspect that's more down to the lack of fresh milk.

Green (with jasmine) or black, which they call red.But unless from Xinjiang they don't put the milk in
I agree with you about high altitude tea -fine unless someone has put (possibly fermented) milk into it. Same thing with coffee cooked over a camp fire.
I have a related question - I bought some Christmas blend tea last year, which has a wonderful spicy smell, but which (to me) tasted awful with or without milk. What was I doing wrong? I ended up using it as a base for hot toddy.

Well in Morocco, we boil the water well before adding it to tea. If it's mint tea (most of time, it is), then we boil the teapot again right after adding water to tea, mint and sugar.

For teabags or the black tea, it's not as complicated, put the boiling water on it

For those who would never tasted a mint tea and would try it, don't forget that the mint must be put together with the (green) tea, and below it in the pot, not above

Abdelaziz
(Better have a orange/cinnamon tea)

Ah yes! Obviously in Morocco, we boil the water separately in a kettle before adding it to the pot, where mint and green tea and sugar were already waiting for the boiling water

Besides, I read something in the thread about Darjeeling. As it's not a common type in Morocco, could someone tell me if it's the tea that grows in the Himalaya or somewhere in the region (but at very high altitude) ? Thanx

Other ways to prepare mint tea: put only the green tea, preferrably in Morocco the three-star (up to five stars) Thé Vert de Chine, or the four-star Saharan Green Tea, in the pot, add the boiling water, and then put in your cup or mug the desired amount of spearmint (naa'naa' in Arabic), peppermint (flee'yoo in Moroccan colloquial Arabic), marjoram (merdeddoosh) and watermint (hebaq), and add some sugar. You may also add absinth (but only in small quantities) to it, it tastes great

Well, do you still want other ways to taste your green tea? Add some dried figs (sheree'ha), cinnamon (qerfa), or fresh orange blossoms (zher), or better, some bitter-orange blossoms (zher der-renj)!

Hope you'll like some of those ways Tell me if you are some original and tasteful ways to prepare your tea!!

Later

One becomes accustomed to a certain tea-taste. I was brought up in a very hard-water area. I am used to seeing calcium carbonate taking up 1/3 of the area of my kettle. I love how my tea tastes when made with this water. I have recently moved 3700 miles across the ocean to where the water is very very soft and contains hardly any chalk. No matter how hot I make the water (even with Typhoo bags) the tea tastes like I've added fluoride, chlorine and seawater...

What do you mean by boiling water? Water boils at different temperatures depending on the air pressure, so if you are sea level it's 100 degrees celcius, but say art Lhasa in Tibet only about 90 degrees. The moral is you can't get decent tea in Tibet as it needs to be as close to 100degress as possible. I like my tea fairly weak but very fresh with a drop of milk and two sugars please!

Perhaps Tibet university has a pressure chamber?

I don't know anyone who would place anything (especially a liquid) at 100 degrees C into their mouth. Obviously the water should be reasonable hot or it would be a cold drink (and as we know only Americans consider such things as cold tea). Therefore, if you can dip your tongue into it without screaming aloud, then that is exactly the correct temperature.