TeaChat

I would like to experiment with roasting some of my oolong. Does anybody know how or can point me in the right direction?

Ask Andy in the chat sometime. He doesn't read the forums.

Oh my gosh, I'd love to know too!! Somebody get Andy on here to share!

How you roast depends on whether you want to refresh an old or aging oolong, or if you want to add roasted goodness to a boring tea. Refreshing is fairly quick and easy, but a real roasting will require a lot of patience. Before you attempt regular roasting, know that it can take up a week to achieve higher levels of roasting. For either, I would recommend using an oven or a rice cooker. It's possible to do it in a pan, but temperature control is almost impossible that way.

For a refresher roast, I think rice cookers are more commonly used. I couldn't find the exact post on the Puerh LJ, but the suggested method was to throw the leaves in the rice cooker one "warm" for a few hours. If you're roasting a sour tea, switch it to "cook" at the end. Just leave it open for that and wait until the leaves smell like they're improving. If you don't have a rice cooker, I think the "warm" setting is around 170F, and the "cook" setting is 215F.

For regular roasting, the oven might be easier to use. With the rice cooker, you would have to switch it to "cook" every hour or so to get anywhere. Basically all you do it throw the leaves on a cookie sheet, and put it in the oven at 215F. Because of how long it takes to roast at that temp, it's tempting to up the temp, but then the leaves will burn before you know it. 250F is the absolute highest temp I would take it, but don't recommend going that high. Roast it until you are satisfied with how it smells.

I do have a rice cooker, this is going to be awesome.

For those lacking a rice cooker, a slow cooker (ie Crockpot) will do the same thing.

This might be a dumb questions, but do the leaves go in by themselves? Do you add anything like water?

And the cookie sheet in the oven is an alternative plan to the rice cooker?

Actually, I think I'd do a pre-heated, covered dutch oven in the oven before a cookie sheet. But that's just theoretical. I'm not big on roasted teas.

What do y'all usually like to eat with roasted teas? Just curious what pairs nicely with the smokey flavors.

good instructions here - from a self confessed beginner, but hey, there are beginners, and then there are beginners...

http://tea-obsession.blogspot.com/2007/ ... -here.html