Wednesday TeaDay 3/10/10 Most difficult tea to brew is ... ?

[Chip]

Yesterday we asked, "Why tea?" You can still vote and discuss this topic!

Welcome one and all to TeaDay. Please share what is in your cup today...all day. Be sure to see what others are sipping today as well.

Today's TeaPoll and discussion topic. I wonder what tea or teas we had difficulty brewing. Please share your most challenging tea or teas. And WHY?

I hope to see everyone on TeaDay. So, bottoms up...refill...repeat...

Last days of the contest, submit your best guess here:
http://www.teachat.com/viewtopic.php?f=62&t=12429

[debunix]

Green teas. It took me a long time to be able to control the bitterness and find any palatable without a overdose of jasmine.

Now they're some of my favorites, and most days start with sencha, although this was an odd single-tea day.

[dooble]

Yeah, green it is. Some greens are easy-going and tolerate much, but especially some japanese greens are difficult.
And I must also say yellow tea .
Today it will be Yunnan Yellow, maybe Snowbud and matcha!

[Trey Winston]

I agree with the two posters above. I have to be really watchful to get some greens right without bitterness. Some of them are very fickle about temperature and steeping time.

Having a relatively forgiving Dragon Well right now. Second steeping.

[brad4419]

Its black for me. I have trouble keeping black teas consistent. It seems I can use the same amount of leaf to water ratio and time/temp the same and I get different results

Sencha or Japanese teas would come in second because just a little overbrewing causes bitterness.

Yunnan Gold this morning.

[omegapd]

Green again. And again, because of the bitter factor.

[Jasmin]

For me it's oolong. It tastes different every single time. Sometimes I love it and sometimes I hate it.

[LauraW]

I'm in agreement with most previous posters - green. Haven't had much non-japanese green, so I really can't say for that, but it's been a longish road to being able to make it right, and I'm still not quite there yet. Everything else has come fairly easily. Oh, and matcha is definitely included in that since I haven't gotten the hang of making it yet (not that I have the right materials...).

Not at work yet, but probably Darjeeling once I get there.

[Aphroditea]

I answered 'black', which, I think is in some way ironic since that is what the majority of the Western teadrinking world drinks and it should really not be as fussy or as complicated as other teas I drink. The only black that I have repeated success with is chai, but other than that it is hit or miss.

With my fussier teas I tend to set aside the time to...well, fuss with them. I also tend to gongfu many teas, which, once you have learned the premise is not too hard - you just have to have the time. If I western steep a tea (usually black, green or white....very rarely an oolong, those I tend to almost exclusively gongfu) I tend to double the lead amount and half the time. For green, this means it is a short enough interval that I can stand at the counter while it steeps, with whites I have some time to go off an do something - like swap a load of laundry. Blacks, steeped by the Western method, steep neither short enough for me to stand there nor long enough to really go off and do something - which inevitablly means the timer goes off while I am right in the middle of something - ergo, oversteeped black.

Oversteeped black teas are why I believe the gods invented honey. I realize the simple solution to this is to NOT double the lead and NOT half the time on my blacks....but there is that early morning bootstapping issues of making good decisions before the caffiene has been applied to the system.....

[RachelC]

I said "black" because even though you do the same thing time and time again you don't always get the consistency you would like.

[Victoria]

Japanese Greens for me. The reason being I brew primarily oolong and black and some whites, which I do mostly by sense. With Japanese greens you have to use a scale, a thermometer and a timer and have a strainer out too. And the preheating, etc. Wow. That's a lot of precision and still there is a failure rate. They take a lot more time and effort. Impossible on 10 hr work days.

Marybong Supreme FF Darjeeling from Imperial Teas in my cup this morning. No weighing, no thermometer, no preheating, no straining, just an easy brewer. Yum!

[JBaymore]

Japanese greens.......... to get them right.

best,

...............john

[msurads06]

Definately green, esp sencha. i have manged to get some drinkable chinese greens, but sencha just doesnt seem to work out. I like teas that dont require alot of fuss, and sencha seems to me to be so fickle it just isnt worth the trouble, even if i could get it to come out right.

[geeber1]

Green!

Yunnan black at home today. I'm currently brewing up a mixture of Nilgiri Nonsuch/Glendale. I didn't have enough Nonsuch for a full cup, so mixed it with Glendale.

[brian]

(Disclaimer: I'm still very new at this)

I'm a little surprised at all the reports of difficulty with sencha. I've only been brewing tea for a couple of months now, but I think my sencha is going pretty well. Mind you, I'm using a scale, and thermometer, and timer But I feel like I'm getting pretty good cups for 3 or 4 infusions, only occasionally getting a little bitterness. But this is likely a false sense of security based on inexperience, probably my sencha brewing is only "good", and the "better" is still out there (and "great" is WAY out there).

The one that seems to be causing me problems is oolong. I got the rock oolong sampler from Seven Cups. I'm about half way through with them, and so far the results have been uninspiring. It may not be the best tea, but I'm sure it can be better than what I'm doing with it. It may also be that I just don't care for it. I'll keep at it, my latest attempts are in a gaiwan and with more leaf/shorter infusions, and maybe it's better, but still not satisfying like the greens.

Drinking some Yin Gou Mei Cha from Seven Cups Chinese green sampler this morning. Not bad, I think I brewed it a little on the weak side but not too much. Yesterday I had the Meng Ding Cui Zhu from the same sampler, interesting comparison. The Cui Zhu was very nice, rich and full with a nice sweetness, and lasted for many infusions; later ones were very mild and mellow, but the sweetness continued. The Mei Cha this morning is simpler, more straightforward green leaf flavor, and gave up more quickly. Now I understand why some tea costs $7 for 50 g. and some costs $27 for the same amount!