loose tea?

**highlands** · #61 02/15/12, 04:35 PM

We make tea by drying mint plants and then stripping leaves. The stems contain a bitter taste, the leaves are the good flavor. We store them in gallon jars. When we want to make tea, which is once or twice a day, we put the loose tea in a stainless steel metal tea ball and put that in boiling water. I find you can use the leaves twice. We go through about two gallons a year of the leaves.

Cheers

-Walter
Sugar Mountain Farm
Pastured Pigs, Sheep & Kids
in the mountains of Vermont
Read about our on-farm butcher shop project:
http://SugarMtnFarm.com/butchershop
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ET1 SS · #62 02/15/12, 05:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by highlands

We make tea by drying mint plants and then stripping leaves. The stems contain a bitter taste, the leaves are the good flavor. We store them in gallon jars. When we want to make tea, which is once or twice a day, we put the loose tea in a stainless steel metal tea ball and put that in boiling water. I find you can use the leaves twice. We go through about two gallons a year of the leaves.

Cheers

You mentioned mint, what about tea [ Camellia sinensis] though?

wes917 · #63 02/15/12, 08:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Limon

Try Upton Tea. They offer sample-size packages of their teas so you can try a bunch without breaking the bank. All their tea is loose, and I've always had great customer service from them.

ETA:I don't mean the sampler sets linked from the main page. Those are small tins of a related group tea in each set. If you go to the listings of the individual teas, one of the sizes will be marked as a sample.

I will second Upton I get the majority of my teas from them. Great selection, decent prices, and fast shipping.

Miz Mary · #64 02/15/12, 08:56 PM

I am ordering a few samples from Upton today .... will post on speed of delivery , taste etc !!

chewie · #65 02/16/12, 12:48 PM

ordered a tiny sample of oolong on ebay. was maybe a 1/4c of leaves, I've made over half gallon of really GOOD tea with this. and i bet there's a cup or two left too, those leave just keep going!

Limon · #66 02/16/12, 01:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by oth47

All this talk about tea made me want a big mug of Lapsang Souchong..I ordered it from Upton Tea Imports over 10 years ago and it's still good.I think it'll keep forever in the 125 gram tin as long as the lid's on tight.Upton has a tremendous selection of tea and reasonable prices.

Upton definitely packages their tea right. I love their tins. One got misplaced during a move, and spend about 16 months in an uninsulated garage before being found, and the tea was still excellent.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ET1 SS

You mentioned mint, what about tea [ Camellia sinensis] though?

As mentioned above, growing tea is pretty simple. If you're far enough south, you can grow it outside, otherwise it needs to be grown as a container and brought in during the colder months. There's a tea plantation somewhere down in the Carolinas, actually.

The issue is turning the leaves into something good to drink. The process of making tea involves bruising, oxidizing, cooking, smoking and/or drying the leaves (and I'm sure I'm leaving some steps out.) The order you do the steps, how long you do each step, and how long in between steps determines what type of tea you end up with. All the varieties of green, white, yellow, or black tea, plus all the variants within, start with the same leaf. There are people who do it as a hobby, but there is definitely an art to it.

ET1 SS · #67 02/16/12, 01:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Limon

... As mentioned above, growing tea is pretty simple. If you're far enough south, you can grow it outside, otherwise it needs to be grown as a container and brought in during the colder months. There's a tea plantation somewhere down in the Carolinas, actually.

The issue is turning the leaves into something good to drink. The process of making tea involves bruising, oxidizing, cooking, smoking and/or drying the leaves (and I'm sure I'm leaving some steps out.) The order you do the steps, how long you do each step, and how long in between steps determines what type of tea you end up with. All the varieties of green, white, yellow, or black tea, plus all the variants within, start with the same leaf. There are people who do it as a hobby, but there is definitely an art to it.

Yes. I grow tea.

Just Little Me · #68 02/16/12, 11:08 PM

I gather and dry my tea all summer/fall. I have sassafras trees here in the backyard. Plus grow all kinds of mints. I have roses. I store it in gallon glass jars. I make our tea by the gallon in the morning. I run it thru my coffee maker.

Paquebot · #69 02/17/12, 01:12 AM

Got a good Kenyan tea last week which is really good and was a perfect match or pumpkin honey. Only problem is that weren't enough to last me for a month, darn it! I had some real nice East African teas in South Africa but never able to find them around here. It's macerated real fine and makes a real strong drink probably perfect for the English cream and sugar way of drinking it.

Martin

chewie · #70 02/22/12, 05:00 PM

got my oolong trial pack, and yum!! the loose leaf packet, which was tiny, made over 4 huge mugs (probably double sized mugs). mixing green and black is what it tasted like, only this tea seems 'cleaner' tasting. got myself a little strainer, cheapo off ebay, so now planning a little splurge on some loose teas via internet. really starting to love this tea habit--feeling like munching but not actually hungry>? tea!! cold? tea! tired? tea! hot? iced tea!! and now going a bit less sweet than at first. kicking the soda habit won't be so bad!

Hazmat54 · #71 02/22/12, 05:13 PM

2+ weeks with no Dr. Pepper. The loose tea is working for me. It kind of spoils me though. Iced tea at restaurants seems pretty tasteless now.

ET1 SS · #72 02/22/12, 05:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chewie

got my oolong trial pack, and yum!! the loose leaf packet, which was tiny, made over 4 huge mugs (probably double sized mugs). mixing green and black is what it tasted like, only this tea seems 'cleaner' tasting. got myself a little strainer, cheapo off ebay, so now planning a little splurge on some loose teas via internet. really starting to love this tea habit--feeling like munching but not actually hungry>? tea!! cold? tea! tired? tea! hot? iced tea!! and now going a bit less sweet than at first. kicking the soda habit won't be so bad!

And there are other things you can mix into your tea to change up the flavor

Try growing your own green tea, it works for us. Like someone else said you can do it if your too far North. But for folks like us here in Maine it is just right

We also grow a selection of mints for teas.

wes917 · #73 02/22/12, 05:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hazmat54

2+ weeks with no Dr. Pepper. The loose tea is working for me. It kind of spoils me though. Iced tea at restaurants seems pretty tasteless now.

This happened to me also, most restaurant teas stink by comparison. One of the guys at work didn't understand why I had loose tea and didn't care for the bagged stuff, then I gave him a cup, now he orders loose tea all the time.

Miz Mary · #74 02/22/12, 05:43 PM

I recieved my order from Upton ...came fast ... tea is good .... I wish they put more info on the bags because Im now looking them up to read again what they have in them ! Maybe its because I only ordered the sample packs ..... Have an order coming from
www.therepublicoftea.com .......

loose teas taste fresher .....
WAY TO GO Hazmat on no DP !!!! If you go another 3 weeks , I'd bet if you tasted DP again - you wouldnt like it , it would be too sweet and syrupy !!!