35-second tea

A while back I started sampling some expensive teas just out of curiousity. Since then I found one tea that I really like. I will not write the name of it because it is a rare tea and I don’t want it to be publicized, but nonetheless it is a premium-priced tea that is basically about four times more expensive than most teas.

Initially I would just steep the tea one time and then discard it, until I found out that that is a complete waste. Because this tea – this one in particular I am using – can be steeped at least five times. Literally five times. And each successive steeping after the first is just as good.

I’ve been experimenting with timing: With teas it’s all about timing. First, after the water boils in the electric water kettle the timer is set to 2 minutes to allow the water to cool a bit.

Then the tea is steeped and I use another timer for this. The ideal amount of time depends on which number steep it is and what type of tea. For the expensive tea I found that the ideal time for the first steep is just 35 seconds. 35 seconds. That is amazing.

With my favorite regular tea – an organic Darjeeling from the Makaiban estate in Sri Lanka – I found that it is good for at least two steeps. The effectively halves the price of the tea.

With the really expensive tea, if I get five steeps that actually makes it cheaper per pound that most average teas.

It also turns out that this particular tea is the “heart attack” tea that I wrote about previously when I went bicycling after having drank over-steeped tea. It was this expensive tea that I had drank which apparently amped up my system so much that when I hit the trail on my bicycle, feeling so exuberant, that my heart started to beat extremely hard and fast and I started to feel nauseous. Having that over-steeped tea was the equivalent of 5 or more regular cups of tea!

Tea that is over-steeped like that is not really enjoyable. The flavor is just waay to overcrowded and the fine delicacy which makes tea so enjoyable is gone.

In fact that’s also why, when I first started sampling this expensive tea, I didn’t think it was actually that good. Live and learn. Or in my case, do background research on tea and learn 🙂

35-second tea. Love it!