Feb 10th, '09, 04:20
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brita filter makes tea light?

by mr. Less » Feb 10th, '09, 04:20

yesterday i bought a brita filter, and was very curious to try it out.
I noticed immediately that the scale was reduced
But when i tasted some of my teas with it (gan nen a thai oolong and a tie quan yin from palais du thés) i found that the teas were very light, the flavour , the taste wasnt strong enough any more, and the fruity hints were gone also

hace anybody experienced the same?Or does this just mean that with filtered water you have to increase the steeping time?
my parameters for brewing : a 150 ml yixing teapot
10 g of tea
infusions : 30 sec - 45 - 60

maybe i just have to get used to my brita and adjust some of the parameters, but at the moment i am a little dissapointed
can someone help me out here?
Thanxs

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Feb 10th, '09, 08:43
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by Warden Andy » Feb 10th, '09, 08:43

Brand new brita filters add a sharp taste that doesn't seem to help any kind of tea. I don't know what causes it, but it goes away after you filter several pitcher fulls. Until it goes away, maybe adding some of the water you would normally use would dull the sharpness.

If that doesn't work, you might just like harder water for tea. I like using brita because the very soft water is good for green tea, but it usually isn't very good when brewing yancha or old puerh.
Super elite tea facist....

Feb 11th, '09, 20:07
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Maybe Warden has it rightly.

by Intuit » Feb 11th, '09, 20:07

If you have used Brita filters for a length of time, you become familiar with the slightly grey tinge to the first several pitchers after soak/rinse of the new filters.

I suggest that the microparticulate filter (mixed bed activated charcoal/ion exchange resins) dusts absorb volatile and somewhat insoluble oils that are part of the flavor and smell of tea extracts.

Although the reside is very dilute, it has an incredibly high surface area. The absorbed/complexed volatile fatty acids, esters and nonvolatile oils probably won't be detected as easily in the oral cavity - they are too large to fit into receptor binding pockets (maybe).

I would try rinsing the filter a bit more, and then retesting the tea brewing result for improvements in taste/odor.

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Feb 11th, '09, 21:39
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by joelbct » Feb 11th, '09, 21:39

I like the PUR ultimate, replenishes the water with some minerals, tastes delicious alone, and great w/ tea too.

It fits directly at the faucet, so I would fill an airtight glass pitcher and keep it in the fridge.

Feb 11th, '09, 22:59
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Huh?

by Intuit » Feb 11th, '09, 22:59

"I would fill an airtight glass pitcher and keep it in the fridge"

Now, why would you do that? The tap water comes out cold. It's been freshly aerated and filtered.

In the refrigerator, in a pitcher, it will be slowly going flat. Moreover, refrigerators are usually odorous and a significant source of bacteria and mold spores due to humidity/moisture entrapment from door opening and proximity to slowly decaying food.

As a matter of fact, this issue of 'flat' filtered water is a concern I have in using my Pur filter pitcher. It gets refilled maybe twice per day. It certainly has lost most of its dissolved gases from the aerator attachment I use on my kitchen faucet, once it's sat for a couple of hours.

I've reverted to using tap water again and I can taste the difference, albeit more obvious for a larger pot of tea compared a small teapot or gaiwan.

The purpose of the tap aerator is to strip out chlorine. I slapped it on before I sat down and examined the city/county well and surface water quality data (part of my job). I used the Pur filter because I wanted to make sure that certain mineral residuals were removed from the water - a fraction of the high quality supply is from a deep hydrothermal well (85 deg C).

Fortunately, I can get away without filtering my water, where I live; the source water quality is exceptionally good- low dissolved solids considering that it's a shallow groundwater source, has very low microbial counts, low dissolved nutrients and organic matter, and virtually no heavy metals or pesticides.

I was able to use the tap water as an 'unknown sample' when assessing parameter data quality for a project a few years back (EPA cert'ed government lab). :-)

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Feb 12th, '09, 19:00
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by Susana » Feb 12th, '09, 19:00

Just as an FYI I read that you are now able to recycle the filters. I read that participating Whole Foods will collect them and the company Preserve will reuse them for their products if you mail them in.

http://www.preserveproducts.com/recycli ... lters.html

I attached a link with the details.

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