It always bugs me to watch people pouring boiling water onto good tea. I found out a long time ago that boiling destroys the flavor of my favorite green teas. Here's something I wrote on the subject. If anyone would like to offer feedback, especially to correct errors, I'd be grateful for that. I'm an avid tea drinker with more than a dozen types in house but I could afford to learn more.
https://medium.com/@toycritic/you-are-d ... f6dfc6ae37
Brewing time discussed on Medium
Some teas, particularly yancha and other roasted oolongs, are meant to use water that is boiling. In fact, part of the reason why people buy clay teapots is because the tea retains the heat better than porcelain gaiwans, which keeps the water closer to boiling for longer.
Additionally, if you are trying to make the 'perfect' cup of tea, you will often want water cooler than boiling for many other teas, as you correctly pointed out in the article. However, by using boiling water it brings out more of the bad stuff, but also more of the good stuff. This is often a great way to 'push' a tea and taste more of the flavors within it, particularly for testing purposes. If a tea can still taste pretty good after using water that is far too hot for it, then it is probably a really good quality tea.
Additionally, if you are trying to make the 'perfect' cup of tea, you will often want water cooler than boiling for many other teas, as you correctly pointed out in the article. However, by using boiling water it brings out more of the bad stuff, but also more of the good stuff. This is often a great way to 'push' a tea and taste more of the flavors within it, particularly for testing purposes. If a tea can still taste pretty good after using water that is far too hot for it, then it is probably a really good quality tea.
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Teachronicles
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I use boiling water on everything but green teas, matcha an extension of greens, and some white teas (tho some, as well as aged, can handle boil temp) Ive heard and experienced that when you use boiling water you get more body in exchange for, like @chofmann says, potentially more negative aspects of a tea (astringency, bitterness). I don't always find those two as negative aspects tho, they often make the tea more interesting, astringency only if it's coupled with salivation, and bitterness if it's not offensive bitterness.
Last edited by Teachronicles on Sat Feb 02, 2019 9:07 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I rarely drink green teas, but i tend to think that good tea should withstand boiling water, even if that may not be the best way of brewing it. Like greens, some delicate tippy black teas can also be tricky to get right. Too hot and the flavour and aroma gets destroyed, too low and it doesn't get released. It's not just the temperature, but rather the temperature curve and the time length of the infusion. Sometimes you may want the heat but only very shortly. Like doing a flash infusion. Or for example, using a very flat teapot or shiboridashi, so that the initial temperature drops very quickly. And as others pointed, some teas can be pretty tasty if actually boiled. 
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Teachronicles
- Posts: 436
- Joined: Tue Dec 12, 2017 1:13 am
- Location: SF Bay Area, CA
This sort of applies to both this topic and the 'do you ever drop the temperature' topic: a long time ago I read a brewing suggestion from Greg Clancy (Norbu Tea) to 'wake up' some chinese green teas with higher temperature water--not boiling, necessarily, but a flash infusion. I can't remember which tea he described infusing this way, but here is an example of a session from 2012 I posted about in another forum:
"a lovely tasting today: I tried the free sample of the 2012 Gu Zhu Zi Sun from Norbu and compared it to a newly-opened package (my last) of the 2011 that so delighted me last year. I'd been hoarding the 2011, really, probably longer than I should have.
2.5 grams of each tea with 80 mL water per infusion in a pair of Petr Novak iron-rich shiboridashis. I"m alternating tea with a honeydew melon, a very nice combination.
First infusion 180 degrees, 30 seconds: both delicious, vegetal, delicate. Despite being well-sealed, there is no doubt that the 2011 has lost a little bit of the floral freshness that is much stronger in the 2012.
2nd series 150 degrees, 30 seconds again: delicious, with similar differences between the teas again apparent--a little deterioration of the 2011 due to my delay in drinking it.
170 degrees, 1 minute: melon and cucumber, delicate and delicious, in the 2011; similar elements but an overlay of more floral/sweet freshness in the 2012. Still LOVE this tea so much….
180 degrees, 1 minute: bigger difference between them--the 2012 is a sweet alpine meadow of spring/summer flowers. The 2011 is the same but muffled. This is the best infusion yet!
190 degrees, 1 minutes: just enjoying the delicious scent first, delicate, floral, melon, flowers. Mmm. So happy. Delicious.
190 degrees, 2 minutes: again, the scent is so nice. Mmm. Delicious tea.
205 degrees, 2 minutes: mmm, mmmm
205 degrees, many many minutes--long enough for the liquid to cool to room temperature: tasty, but the leaves are done now, as there's finally some astringency apparent.
I will certainly be ordering more of this tea in the future, although my green tea supply is now such that I can't do it right away, or I'll risk deterioration of the ones I've already got like the 2012 that I held a little too long."
"a lovely tasting today: I tried the free sample of the 2012 Gu Zhu Zi Sun from Norbu and compared it to a newly-opened package (my last) of the 2011 that so delighted me last year. I'd been hoarding the 2011, really, probably longer than I should have.
2.5 grams of each tea with 80 mL water per infusion in a pair of Petr Novak iron-rich shiboridashis. I"m alternating tea with a honeydew melon, a very nice combination.
First infusion 180 degrees, 30 seconds: both delicious, vegetal, delicate. Despite being well-sealed, there is no doubt that the 2011 has lost a little bit of the floral freshness that is much stronger in the 2012.
2nd series 150 degrees, 30 seconds again: delicious, with similar differences between the teas again apparent--a little deterioration of the 2011 due to my delay in drinking it.
170 degrees, 1 minute: melon and cucumber, delicate and delicious, in the 2011; similar elements but an overlay of more floral/sweet freshness in the 2012. Still LOVE this tea so much….
180 degrees, 1 minute: bigger difference between them--the 2012 is a sweet alpine meadow of spring/summer flowers. The 2011 is the same but muffled. This is the best infusion yet!
190 degrees, 1 minutes: just enjoying the delicious scent first, delicate, floral, melon, flowers. Mmm. So happy. Delicious.
190 degrees, 2 minutes: again, the scent is so nice. Mmm. Delicious tea.
205 degrees, 2 minutes: mmm, mmmm
205 degrees, many many minutes--long enough for the liquid to cool to room temperature: tasty, but the leaves are done now, as there's finally some astringency apparent.
I will certainly be ordering more of this tea in the future, although my green tea supply is now such that I can't do it right away, or I'll risk deterioration of the ones I've already got like the 2012 that I held a little too long."
Sorry, I know I've misread it.Teachronicles wrote: ↑Sat Feb 02, 2019 9:09 pmI worded my comment wrong. I meant I use boiling water. I've edited it. Though, I do actually boil or simmer some teas, aged yanchas, aged whites, some aged puers after infusing some times.
Recognising that boiling occurs at different temperatures depending upon altitude, I believe that oolong tea should be brewed with the hottest water available.
Even 'greener' oolongs like TGY or a lishan? I definitely feel this way about roasted oolongs, but I typically do the 'greener' ones around 195-200.
Same for me! Nothing worse than a good high mountain tea wasted by low temperature. I think sometimes people mistake green Oolong for green tea when they are in fact quite different.
Yes - even the greener ones. Bok is right - these aren't like green teas.Bok wrote: ↑Mon Feb 04, 2019 12:40 amSame for me! Nothing worse than a good high mountain tea wasted by low temperature. I think sometimes people mistake green Oolong for green tea when they are in fact quite different.