Why tea?
Tea is extremely cheap and extremely artisinal. You can become a sophisticant while paying very little. There are very few things in the world like this.
If you have a caffeine habit you can swap it in for that. A regular tea session is about 5-8g of loose leaf tea which is as much or more caffeine than a double shot of coffee.
The popularity and history of tea has led it down countless winding roads that mean there is a way too much variety for you to explore. The ubiquitousness in parts of the world is exactly what makes it both interesting and cheap. You will pay between 4 for a tea session. This is starting to be cheaper than good coffee when you make it at home.
What you should do
1. Only buy samplers
It is the most fun to maximize for variety, at least at the start. Each tea session is ~6g so just buy that much of each and change the tea you’re drinking every day.
I recommend buying white2tea minis. They are great quality, and beautiful objects. You will get great joy from drinking these teas. Keep in mind they specialize in pu’er and white teas. You will need to look elsewhere to really explore other kinds like green, oolong, and black. Check out the tea subreddit for recommendations.
Take notes as you go, like I do here: 🍃 Tea Notes
2. Buy equipment
You should be making tea Gongfu style. You may be used to Western style where you brew ~2g of tea in ~400g water for ~3 minutes. With Gongfu it’s ~6g tea in ~100g water for 5-20s brews, and you do multiple on them. Gongfu is the far better way to do it if you’re taste-maxing. You get far more intensity and notes out of the tea.
I usually sit at my desk while working and make a new brew every 5 minutes while I’m working. It’s extremely quick and fun.
It does require some equipment
In China they use a gaiwan, literally a cup with a lid, or Yixing teapots. In Japan they have teapots (kyusus) and teapots without handles (houhins). You can find a gaiwan online for extremely cheap. I bought a vintage houhin on ebay because it was beautiful.
Just pick something, it probably won’t be your last if you get into it. If you buy something without a handle just make sure to use a rag when handling it because it gets hot with all the boiling water.
Small pitcher
You brew for like 10s then pour it out. So you need something to pour it into
Cup
The smaller the better. You could probably use a mug as a pitcher and just drink out of that. But it’s much fancier when you have small cups, and then you can share too if you have multiple.
Optionals
Variable Temperature Kettle: You need less than boiling water for some teas like greens and yellows. But you can get away by just waiting for water to cool a bit. Also you can just brew oolongs at boiling temperature, you’ll be fine.
Tray: to carry all your stuff around the house
How to brew
- Boil water and pour in thermos
- Put tea in vessel
- Pour water on tea and close lid
- Wait 10s
- Pour it out into your pitcher
- Pour into cups and drink
- Repeat
With each tea you’ll probably dial in how long to brew between 5-20s and usually you increase the brew time as you go.
NOTE FOR DRAGON BALLS: With the minis like from white2tea minis, they come in pressed balls. It takes some time for water to saturate to the inner layers because of the tightness and geometry. In this case, do the first brew for 20s, pour it out, then wait with the lid on for like 2 minutes for the water to saturate, before continuing like normal.