/ck/ - Food & Cooking

those are in optimal OP, you get a better infusion letting the leaves swim. To this end, I suggest a french press, it strains it for you and give you room to let the leaves extract

If it's to sue at work or something similar, I am a big fan of those clip style infusers.

>>5007043
But you'd need an electric kettle to heat up some water for it.

I nearly bought this setup because my classic teapot and infuser is kinda deteriorating and rusting in the water. Muh $60 tea setup. I guess i should since i drink about a gallon of tea most days.

>>5007060
I just slip the beaker out and nuke the water in it

>>5007096
oh really. Guess i haven't picked one up to see if i could actually do that...

>>5007043
This is really the truth.

It's very hard to beat a french press. It's easy, it washes in your dishwasher and it makes more than just tea. Add a coffee grinder and a cheap electric kettle and your beverage future will be completely secure, until such time as you accidentally drop your french press on the floor.

>>5007043
I actually dislike french presses for tea - the mechanism is ideal for brewing then decanting the liquid, but the usual glass beakers used loses heat too quickly.

OP, Chatsford teapots are where it's at. If you must use a teaball, get pic related, they are perfect and last forever.

>>5007146
Where could someone get this contraption?

Is it big enough to hold about 3 TBSP of tea leaves?

I wouldn't recommend the tea ball in OP's pic. I use one of those for spices and it's hard to open and close. Plus, it seems like all the leaves would fall out. I'd get a mesh one if I were you.

Get a small glass tea pot with strainer.

They're very handy and cheap as fuck if you have an Asian supermarket nearby.

>>5007249
I actually bought one of those but for some reason, the handle was made of plastic so I guess you can imagine what happened after using it for awhile.

OP here, the french press is out of the question. I guess the real question is what is the best brewing method. Would it be best to just pour the water of the strainer or use a teaball?

>>5007294
Over*

>>5007294

The general rule with tea is the more volume the better. That way the leaves have more space to unfold.
Best would actually be steeping without a strainer/teaball. You can do this by having a pot for steeping and a separate pitcher for serving. That may be a bit cumbersome, though.

A teaball is probably a bit too cramped.

>>5007200
>>5007294
When you brew tea, you want the tea leaves to have space to unfold completely when they come into contact with the water so that all the surface area of the leaf is exposed, and the tea leaves need to stay submerged for the entire brewing time. If you're making a small quantity, the easiest thing to do is just to put the leaves into the cup and strain (or strain while drinking), see: Gaiwan. For 2-4 cups, a small tea ball is an okay option, but above that it's really better just to use a strainer that occupies as much volume inside the teapot as possible, again, Chatsford teapots are the bee's knees.

I bought this at World Market today, basically you put the loose tea in the spoon end looking part, and just let it sit in your mug of hot water. Then you push the grey handle in and it pushes down on the leaves like a little French press. It was $4. I figured I could just heat the water up in my mug in the microwave.

Before I was using something similar to Adagio's InginuiTea tea maker, but its a bitch to clean, and if you don't clean it right away it stains the plastic

>>5007294
Drop $10 for a ceramic teapot and another few for a strainer.
Done.

>>5007350
Yeah, I understand that. The problem is that I'm cheap, I have a larger pot like in your pic and the metal ball that came with it is rather lackluster and lets some dust through.

I do drink gunpowder green and learned less is more however I also drink rooibos which doesn't need as much space in the ball.