Tea?

[ArcticChicken]

My mom is getting my BF an infuser for his birthday, and I'd like to get him some nice tea to go with it. Problem is, I know almost nothing about tea. I was hoping for advice.

He likes most kinds of tea, although it has to have actual tea in it, can't be all herbal.

He seems to most enjoy green and white tea, things that are subtle, but he also likes chai, so...

Anyway, advice would be most welcome.

[CoffeeMonkey]

I get my tea from Adagio. (www.adagio.com) They ship fast, price isn't bad, and you earn rewards on all your purchases.

They have an excellent early grey. I'm very fond of the masala chai. It's a spiced black tea with lots of clove and other spicy goodness. Add some sugar and cream and it tastes like Christmas.

I get jasmine yin hao for my green, and I LOVE their peach black. My favorite thing is to mix half green and half peach. Light and floral and fruity. It's good iced, too.

[teh_blumchenkinder]

there's a thread in late july last year that prompted me to join, because of tea. If he's not a tea novice, get him some white tea from a reputable place. It's pricey... but damn. Maybe try some Assam or Darjeeling, both 'region'/types of black tea, or whatever he usually/never has gotten. Generally, like sushi, price is an indicator of awesomeness. Per-uh tea is ... an acquired taste, try the Magnolia type from Numi/magnolia flowers in it, it's not nearly as ... strong, and has awesome natural sweet/heavy/not sugarysweet taste to it; but it's certainly something to kick you out of a rut!! o__o Per-uh is fermented black tea. It has sooo many different layers in it... but mostly it kicks you in the face.
EDIT: by 'acquired' I mean 'I had to have two or three cups of it, but then, yay! ... and the magnolia variety I tried really was easier to like.'

[Kara]

Ask Lupo. She's a walking tea encyclopedia. And a walking advertisement for adagio

[Elspeth]

I just would like to thank you guys for posting about tea, because now I must buy some. Must not order tea until hubby's camera is fixed

[Kara]

I've got my electric kettle running right now so I can have some Vanilla Rooibos before work

[MaggieTheCat]

It's funny this thread popped up here, since I just responded to a thread about tea on another message board that I frequent. I'll just copy/paste my response to that one.

There are lots of different kinds of teas. Black, green, white, red, herbal, oolong...those are the ones I can think of offhand.

Actually, there's really only one kind of plant that is truly "tea." Black, green, white, and oolong are all made from this plant. The difference between them is how old the plant is when it's picked, and how it's treated after being picked. The difference between individual tea within the same type (such as earl grey and English breakfast, which are both black teas) depends on where and how they're grown, as well as additive flavors that are included.

Herbal teas may or may not have actual tea leaves in them, but they all contain some kind of dried herb or other plant that changes the flavor. For example, spearmint tea can either be made with black tea and dried spearmint leaves combined, or just spearmint leaves alone. In the case of the latter, it's not technically tea since there's no tea leaves in it, but it's still considered herbal tea.

Red tea, also called rooibos tea, comes from a type of plant grown in Africa. It's steeped the same as regular tea and often has the same kinds of flavors as other types of tea (for example, you can get a jasmine herbal tea or jasmine red tea; the herbal tea will have black tea leaves and dried jasmine flowers in it, while the red tea will have rooibos leaves instead of tea leaves.) The one big difference between rooibos and actual tea is that rooibos is caffeine free. (as a side note, any kind of tea that you see that says "caffeine free" doesn't actually contain actual tea leaves, since the tea plant contains caffeine. Herbal teas that are caffeine free are probably just the dried herb without tea leaves.)

An important note about tea is that certain teas should be steeped at different temperatures. Boiling water is too hot to steep some teas, and will result in a burnt or bitter flavor. White, green, and some oolong teas should be steeped in water that is NOT boiling hot. All others, including rooibos, can be steeped in boiling water. If you get your tea from a reputable place, they should tell you what temperature to steep your tea at.

Speaking of which, go here! http://www.adagio.com/

They have a great selection of teas, as well as accessories, including water kettles that have temperature dials on them so you can set what temperature to heat your water to.

Personally, I like black and herbal teas the best (jasmine is my favorite, but I also like mint, lemongrass, ginger, and spiced chai.) I despise white tea, I cannot drink it, it's the most vile tasting drink I've ever tasted. Obviously, you will have to try different types of tea to see what you like and don't like. One nice thing about Adagio is that they sell samplers so you can try a bunch of different kinds and flavors and see what you prefer.

Loose leaf tea is the best. Adagio ALSO sells disposable loose leaf tea bags, which you can put loose leaf tea into to steep. You can also steep loose leaf tea in tea balls or just straight in the water, but the balls need to be cleaned after each use and steeping straight in water means you have to strain the tea when it's done steeping (or just swallow the tea leaves, which won't hurt you, but I don't like the texture.) The disposable loose leaf tea bags are cheap ($5 for 100 I think) and can just be tossed once the tea is done steeping.

[Eireann]

White Monkey. Rapscallion can back me up on that.

[teh_blumchenkinder]

There's also about a bizillion different strainers, too... but your friend already knows, I'm sure, if he's into white tea... or has moved away from bags. It's usually one of those things. I prefer ones that take up the whole cup.

[ArcticChicken]

Thanks guys! If I can afford it I'm getting him a tea of the month subscription, otherwise I'll get him a few samplers.

[Rapscallion]

White Monkey. Rapscallion can back me up on that.

Indeed I can. I also love pure Assam as well. White Monkey is more a special occasion type on the grounds of cost. Has an interesting creamy back-taste.

Rapscallion

[BookstoreEscapee]

I have a tea infuser similar to this one; it doesn't have a lid, though, and it came with a little ceramic dish so it doesn't make a mess. The handle is long enough that it can sit on just about any size mug, so if you have a wider mouth mug it won't fall in. It's not hard to clean (and I find that if I just dump out as much of the tea as I can and leave whatever's left stuck to the sides to dry, I can just brush out the dried leaves with a napkin. Then I rinse it and make more tea! (I do that a lot because I use it at work and sometimes I don't get around to cleaning it out before I leave for the day, so it sits overnight and dries out.)

I also have the tea filter bags from Adagio. They were $3 for 100 and they come in really handy when I'm feeling especially lazy. Republic of Tea also makes a similar product, which I've seen at Wegmans for about $5. I would imagine they can be found at other stores, too.