Tips for a beginner? (Switching from coffee)

[ChihuahuaTea]

Looking for some tips.

But some background as to what my situation is:
- heavy coffee drinker, but not thinking that much caffeine is good for me and I want to cut back
- looking to still drink a caffeinated tea to start the day, and a less caffeinated or caffeine free variation for the afternoon.

I work in an office and time is scarce. Can’t sit around watching over the brewing process, and resources in terms of heating water and cleaning up are limited.
My plan is to use an electric tea pot, and do about 3.5 cups for the morning brew and similar for afternoon.
I can use loose tea, and have disposable mesh bags for the loose tea (won’t use a metal mesh tea ball as that’s requires clean up).

I do not want to steep each cup individually. I don’t have time to do that. The plan is to put a tea bag in about 20-30 ounces in the pot and let it brew, and keep it warm for a while.

Right now I’m drinking twinings breakfast variations to start the day (Irish breakfast, Earl Grey, etc…) and have a variety of non-caffeine options for afternoon.
I like them well enough. But I know there is better out there.

I know the electric tea pot is not what a purist would use, and I’m probably sacrificing a bit. Like using a kuerig instead of a French press for coffee. But at the end of the day, I am happy just to have the option to use this method so I can’t complain.

I don’t mind spending money on the product, but I don’t want to spend just to spend and there will be a decent amount of waste throughout the week (I won’t drink 7 cups of tea a day, but I will brew it to have on tap so to speak)

Looking for any tips some might have.
- good options to try (Any suggestions are appreciated)
- how much tea to use per brew (seems that grams is the measurement?)
- tips on storing loose tea leafs

Also any basics about types of tea.
- I assume I’m drinking versions of black tea for breakfast?
- what is oolong or white tea, etc…
- what to look for with respect to caffeine levels, what types of teas have higher caffeine levels, etc…
- my teapot has temp control, and it has a setting for white tee or oolong, etc…, so tips on brewing temperatures and such

And I am not adverse to trying a better brewing method when at home. So any information as to why the method I will use at the office is inferior is still appreciated.

[.m.]

I prepare a big jar of tea for the day at home before i go to work. It's just a big jar in which i put the leaves and let them steep throughout the day until i finish it - for this you need a quality tea because you'd be getting everything out of the leaves, and not every type of tea can handle it (white tea, puerh and heicha tend to do well). Alternatively, you can just steep the tea at home for whatever time you like, and strain in it into a thermos bottle. The quantity: i think somewhere between 5-10g per 1liter, whatever works (i never weight it); too little and the brew is too weak, too much and the caffeine content becomes too big for me or the astringency too strong.

The tea: Find a local or online vendor that specializes in quality tea, and try whole bunch of different stuff. Try different vendors and different price ranges. Supermarket and brand teas range between really nasty and somewhat drinkable, but are almost never good.

The preparation: Put some leaves in, pour some hot water, wait a bit, and strain. Depending on taste adjust steeping time or amount of leaves. For teas that are on the green spectrum use slightly cooler water, for everything else use boiling. Vendors often give steeping instruction: i never follow them, but sometimes they may be a good starting point.

The caffeine content: Just trust your body - you'll know when it's too much.

[aet]

for me in the morning as a replacement works shu. Not because caffeine but , I think , because of thick mouthfeel ( for morning I brew to the black-ish color , instead usual dark red ) and probably from psychological side the color.
I'd suggest using small gaiwan 100-120ml and loose shu. Easy to control the steeping , no hassle with chipping some cakes / bricks , loose leave usually releases soup faster than pressed stuff.
You do 1st clean flush , then 3-5 other ones into the big mug or jar ( pouring in small cup later ) , easy , no hassle.
Loose shu - 1st grade and Gong Ting grades. These are the best for "morning pu-cofee".
Get different locations ( although from beginning u might not distinguish by taste much difference between them ) . Menghai, Lincang, Puer, Yongde
Try different storage GZ/HK/KM...make your very own taste preference , not based on recommendations.

For the office I'd suggest to get one of those bottles with separate brewing compartment.



my apology to community it taken as self-promo but it's not meant that way. If not Ok, I'll delete the link.
You can find newer model on Aliexpress / E-bay and cheaper with shipping included.
Nice could be some oolongs , white ,green ,black tea , depends on the season ( weather ) .

[ChihuahuaTea]

What is a reputable online vendor?

I just order a few items from teavivre. Seems some people use them on this forum, and they are $15-25 per 100 grams.

[Victoria]

What is a reputable online vendor?

I just order a few items from teavivre. Seems some people use them on this forum, and they are $15-25 per 100 grams.

If you share your location will be easier to narrow down vendor recommendations. Welcome to TeaForum.
For extended brewing sessions I enjoy white 1st flush Darjeeling. Basically, you’ll be brewing extended ‘Western style’.

[ChihuahuaTea]

Thanks for the advice…
But I can’t imagine a gaiwan works for the situation I described?
I need to keep the materials used to a minimum. I can’t be doing dishes.
The supplies I have at my disposal are:
1. 7 cup electric tea pot
2. Disposable/self fill tea bags
3. Cup of some sort to drink out of.
4. Sink to rinse out the tea pot and mug (not really to rinse out a reusable filter/mesh ball for loose leaves)(keeping in mind I will be wearing a suit and tie while doing the rinsing so not looking for anything requiring scrubbing)
5. Time matters. I have to “set it and forget it” until I go to pour the cup and I can’t be up at the sink doing a bunch of dishes

I can’t see how a gaiwan would work in an office environment? They seem to be multiple piece endeavors.

[ChihuahuaTea]

What is a reputable online vendor?

I just order a few items from teavivre. Seems some people use them on this forum, and they are $15-25 per 100 grams.

If you share your location will be easier to narrow down vendor recommendations. Welcome to TeaForum.
For extended brewing sessions I enjoy white 1st flush Darjeeling. Basically, you’ll be brewing extended ‘Western style’.

United States

[ChihuahuaTea]

Also, what is “shu” and do you have recommendations as to one’s to try?

(I googled it but it seems the answer is somewhat complicated with many variations)

[ChihuahuaTea]

What is a reputable online vendor?

I just order a few items from teavivre. Seems some people use them on this forum, and they are $15-25 per 100 grams.

.
For extended brewing sessions I enjoy white 1st flush Darjeeling. Basically, you’ll be brewing extended ‘Western style’.

So I see this and it blows my mind. Not in a bad way, but realizing how much of a noob I am.

So from my limited research, I interpret this as:
- Darjeeling is a black tea?
- but this recommendation is a white Darjeeling?
- and from my limited knowledge, 1st flush or 2nd flush or autism flush (I think I have those right) are when the leaves are harvested, lord of selections don’t even specify what flush it is, and I can’t really tell why one is better than the other. The prices seem similar regardless f what flush the product is.

Thanks for the help

[Ethan Kurland]

What is a reputable online vendor?

"What is.....?"

Do you want a definition for reputable...; or, are you asking "Who is...."?

Working w/ your plan.... Darjeeling is too big a stretch from the black tea you have in mind. Many of us think that darjeeling belongs in a category of its own. Assam falls into your idea of black tea, is a black tea....

I think a quality electric variable temperature kettle & a teapot w/ small holes to prevent leaves pouring out with your drink is better teaware for you. Put the mesh teabags in the closet. The kettle will keep water at the temperature you have found to be ideal for the leaves you will steep. (For the black tea that I drink, Championship Black, I use water that is 96C. I know others use water from as low as 92C & as high as boiling.) I use a Bonavita kettle. There are other brands & threads about electric kettles you can study here.

I have a feeling that you would enjoy Hunnan black teas; however, when I drank them (enjoyably for a couple of years) I never got so many infusions from the leaves (3 at the most, if memory serves). High quality black tea from Taiwan proved to be more durable, suiting your needs. (The CB that I drink & sell, not now--out of stock, is the only one that I have used for gongfu style, very quick steeping of many infusions, but I think others could be used this way.)

For your wanting tea w/o bother, I suggest a lot of leaves (6 - 8 grams per 100 ml) to be infused no > 15 seconds. Pour your tea (after hardly waiting for it to steep), take the lid off the teapot so the leaves don't steam in the pot between infusions, & enjoy your tea. How easy! Pour hot water into a teapot, the brew into your cup, & fresh water into the kettle when it needs it (probably only once after the initial filling); & at end of day dispose of the used leaves & rinse out your teaware w/ hot water.

[ChihuahuaTea]

What is a reputable online vendor?

"What is.....?"

Do you want a definition for reputable...; or, are you asking "Who is...."?

Working w/ your plan.... Darjeeling is too big a stretch from the black tea you have in mind. Many of us think that darjeeling belongs in a category of its own. Assam falls into your idea of black tea, is a black tea....

I think a quality electric variable temperature kettle & a teapot w/ small holes to prevent leaves pouring out with your drink is better teaware for you. Put the mesh teabags in the closet. The kettle will keep water at the temperature you have found to be ideal for the leaves you will steep. (For the black tea that I drink, Championship Black, I use water that is 96C. I know others use water from as low as 92C & as high as boiling.) I use a Bonavita kettle. There are other brands & threads about electric kettles you can study here.

I have a feeling that you would enjoy Hunnan black teas; however, when I drank them (enjoyably for a couple of years) I never got so many infusions from the leaves (3 at the most, if memory serves). High quality black tea from Taiwan proved to be more durable, suiting your needs. (The CB that I drink & sell, not now--out of stock, is the only one that I have used for gongfu style, very quick steeping of many infusions, but I think others could be used this way.)

For your wanting tea w/o bother, I suggest a lot of leaves (6 - 8 grams per 100 ml) to be infused no > 15 seconds. Pour your tea (after hardly waiting for it to steep), take the lid off the teapot so the leaves don't steam in the pot between infusions, & enjoy your tea. How easy! Pour hot water into a teapot, the brew into your cup, & fresh water into the kettle when it needs it (probably only once after the initial filling); & at end of day dispose of the used leaves & rinse out your teaware w/ hot water.

Thanks for the tips.
I few follow up questions if you don’t mind:

1. I’m confused about not using the mesh bags, and just using loose leaves. Wouldn’t this be messy? I am putting the bag into the electric kettle, so wouldn’t the loose leaves float around and make clean up a bigger issue. (I looked at the bonevita and it seems a little similar to mine, same price range at least)

2. Your last suggestion really confused me. You mention don’t infuse greater than 15 seconds, but then it seems like you keep the leaves in the hot water for as long as needed but just take the lid off? Then you reheat the water before each new cup? (I’m not sure this is a practical option for my situation, but I am not sure I even understand it?)

3. Thanks for the suggestion re Hunnan. Not to be nit picky, but I’m seeing hunan with one n as an option? And that seems to be more of a varietal than a brand or distributor? Do you recommend a source for online ordering?

Thanks again for the help!

[Baisao]

Thanks for the advice…
But I can’t imagine a gaiwan works for the situation I described?
I need to keep the materials used to a minimum. I can’t be doing dishes.
The supplies I have at my disposal are:
1. 7 cup electric tea pot
2. Disposable/self fill tea bags
3. Cup of some sort to drink out of.
4. Sink to rinse out the tea pot and mug (not really to rinse out a reusable filter/mesh ball for loose leaves)(keeping in mind I will be wearing a suit and tie while doing the rinsing so not looking for anything requiring scrubbing)
5. Time matters. I have to “set it and forget it” until I go to pour the cup and I can’t be up at the sink doing a bunch of dishes

I can’t see how a gaiwan would work in an office environment? They seem to be multiple piece endeavors.

I had the same parameters when I worked in an office. I chose to drink an organic sencha (sencha is a Japanese green tea) because it was good for health and kept me alert/focused but not wired. Sencha can sometimes be a little tricky to brew but I found one that was forgiving.

Equipment:
1) A pleasant to hold cup (a blue yunomi given to me by @debunix)
2) A Bodum brand electric kettle for heating water at my desk
3) Self-sealing teabags (not ideal because of microplastics but they work great)
4) Ramekin for holding my tea bag

I'd heat the water until I could hear it simmering but not boiling. Sencha likes cooler water of 185° and below so using this sound to indicate temperature works. Fill cup with hot water, add teabag, let steep, remove teabag and place in ramekin. Drink the tea at my leisure then repeat using the same teabag throughout the day.

That one teabag could make a liter of tea that lasted me the entire day over multiple steeps, as it should be. If I made the liter all at once, it would not be ideal by the end of the day. Steeping multiple times is preferable for greens.

Clean-up was minimal. Toss the bag at the end of the day. I'd clean my mug once a week. I use it at home now and it is spotless after a few wipes with a Magic Eraser.

This was super easy to do. No fuss, no muss. AND it was great tasting tea!

Other loose leaf teas may not require even a teabag. They can be brewed "grandpa style".

HTH

[Baisao]

Also, what is “shu” and do you have recommendations as to one’s to try?

(I googled it but it seems the answer is somewhat complicated with many variations)

It's a fermented tea from Yunnan. There are various styles of it and because it is fermented it has an unusual flavor. The market is flooded with foul tasting shou (aka shu). These can have barnyard or fishy notes. Better ones will not have these flavors and will be a joy to drink, especially after a large meal.

It is a dark tea and is close to coffee in mouthfeel. However, and I don't know why, I haven't found any shou to have much caffeine or other stimulating effect. It's unfermented sibling, sheng, is notoriously stimulating!

Generalizations
Shou: fermented, not-stimulating, soothing to the stomach
Sheng: unfermented, stimulating, hurts the stomach

[mbanu]

Looking for some tips.

But some background as to what my situation is:
- heavy coffee drinker, but not thinking that much caffeine is good for me and I want to cut back

How do you drink your coffee? Cream and sugar? Plain? Light or dark roast? If you drink coffee with cream, a good place to start might be teas with milk, as the dairy connection will provide a common theme. If you are a plain dark roast drinker, a dark-roast oolong might be more familiar.

- looking to still drink a caffeinated tea to start the day, and a less caffeinated or caffeine free variation for the afternoon.

This is a good goal. However, different tea styles have different historical brewing methods, so it can be hard to know exactly how much caffeine is in a tea generally. It is sort of like if someone were to try to find an average amount of caffeine in coffee but lumped together coffee and espresso. One can make guesses based on certain things, though.

I work in an office and time is scarce. Can’t sit around watching over the brewing process, and resources in terms of heating water and cleaning up are limited.

Office tea has polarized into the two schools of thought, which I guess you could call the British school and the Chinese school.

With the British school, the tea is processed to shorten the brewing time, prepared to shorten the cooling and cleanup time. So a crush-tear-curl British black tea might take 4 minutes to brew, a few seconds to a minute to either remove and toss the teabag or remove the brewing basket and rinse it out, and the tea is cooled with cold milk, so it is ready to drink very quickly.

With the Chinese school, the tea is processed so that the tea can be left in the cup without causing any problems, mostly by processing it in a way where it does not really get bitter if left in, and rolling in a way where all the tea remains settled at the bottom of the cup. So the tea is added, the water for brewing added, and then the whole thing is taken to your workspace and left there.

Besides personal tastes, an important thing to keep in mind is whether you work somewhere that is nervous about liquids. If you can't keep the tea by your workspace due to the risk of spills, the Chinese style of brewing is not going to work as well. Also whether you have an area for cleaning cups. If you don't, the British style of brewing is not going to work as well.

I do not want to steep each cup individually. I don’t have time to do that. The plan is to put a tea bag in about 20-30 ounces in the pot and let it brew, and keep it warm for a while.

A difference between tea and coffee is that some teas do very badly when kept warm. This has to do with differences in how tea and coffee are manufactured. Brewed green tea, for instance, tends to stew if it is kept warm in a thermos, because the warmth causes it to oxidize. This is one reason why historically green tea cups and pots were so small. However, the cooling time is shortened the smaller everything gets, which also shortens the overall time it takes to have a cup of tea. One thing to consider instead of keeping the tea warm is to keep the water warm. Waiting for the water to heat up and the brewed tea to cool down can take up more time than the actual brewing of the tea, but is easy to overlook.

I know the electric tea pot is not what a purist would use, and I’m probably sacrificing a bit. Like using a kuerig instead of a French press for coffee. But at the end of the day, I am happy just to have the option to use this method so I can’t complain.

By electric teapot, do you mean that you are boiling the tea in the pot? Normally with tea the water is boiled in a kettle and poured over the tea, either in the cup directly, in a teapot, or in something like a brewing basket that sits in the cup to steep it. However, some tea traditions do boil the tea instead of steeping. It is just good to be clear because the other ways that the tea is treated change based on how it is being brewed.

- how much tea to use per brew (seems that grams is the measurement?)

This depends on the brewing method. One advantage of loose-leaf tea, however, is that you can adjust it easily to your tastes. Having only teabags tends to be a burden here, sort of like if you could only make coffee using coffee pods -- what if you want a cup and a half of coffee?

However, once you find an amount that works for you, you can save some time by pre-measuring the tea out ahead of time.

- tips on storing loose tea leafs

Most tea likes dry, cool, dark places, with dryness being the most important. However, there are a few teas that are exceptions to this. These types of tea are very popular in places that are hot and humid, because keeping tea dry and cool is such a challenge when the weather is against you. If you aren't sure which type of tea you have, it is best to assume that it is the kind that likes dry, cool, dark places, as that is the most commonly encountered.

Also any basics about types of tea.
- I assume I’m drinking versions of black tea for breakfast?

Twinings is black tea usually, yes. "Breakfast tea" has two meanings, one old-fashioned, and one new. The new version usually means that it is a black tea designed to be drunk with milk and sugar, where the tea itself is the meal. The old-fashioned version means it is a black tea that is thought to aid digestion when drunk after a heavy meal. The change happened as British breakfast habits changed and people became more rushed.

- what is oolong or white tea, etc…

They are different ways of processing the tea to change the finished flavor. Coffee mostly does this through changing the roasting style or changing the bean-base (Arabica vs. Robusta, etc.) Tea also does these two things, but also has a third method of change caused by controlling the oxidation of the leaves. This is because tea-leaves can be bruised sort of like bananas. Sometimes in baking, a recipe will specifically call for bruised bananas, because the flavor is different than unbruised bananas. It is sort of the same way with tea.

[ChihuahuaTea]

Also, what is “shu” and do you have recommendations as to one’s to try?

(I googled it but it seems the answer is somewhat complicated with many variations)

It's a fermented tea from Yunnan. There are various styles of it and because it is fermented it has an unusual flavor. The market is flooded with foul tasting shou (aka shu). These can have barnyard or fishy notes. Better ones will not have these flavors and will be a joy to drink, especially after a large meal.

It is a dark tea and is close to coffee in mouthfeel. However, and I don't know why, I haven't found any shou to have much caffeine or other stimulating effect. It's unfermented sibling, sheng, is notoriously stimulating!

Generalizations
Shou: fermented, not-stimulating, soothing to the stomach
Sheng: unfermented, stimulating, hurts the stomach

Any recommendations as to purchase online?