From the experts comes this advice on how to make a perfect cup of tea.
Yorkshire Tea reveals how to make the perfect cuppa
I don’t know how to do that many things well — but when it comes to making tea, I do it perfectly.
From an early age, I used to make my mom a night-time cuppa, brewed in a small teapot, which I would take up to her bedroom for her to drink in bed before she said her prayers and went to sleep. I did it every night for years until I went to boarding school, and even then I’d do it for her during school holidays, right up until I moved out of home.
I have, in short, brewed thousands of cups of tea in my lifetime.
New Wife drinks tea, upwards of six cups a day where possible, and she says that indeed, I make the best tea she’s ever had. (She drinks Yorkshire Gold, by the way. I turned her onto it before we got married, and now it’s all she drinks.)
Just for the record, I make her tea precisely the way that Yorkshire Tea says it should be made, with one small addition: I first warm her cup with hot water while the water is boiling before emptying it and putting the teabag in, then pouring the boiling water over the teabag. (The tea brews more quickly that way.)
And before anyone gets on my case about teabags vs. loose tea: with YG, there is no difference in taste between the two — yes, I did a blind taste test with New Wife, who couldn’t tell the difference. (And if she can’t, nobody can.)
Finally: I’m a Tiffy. Always have been, because putting the milk in after the tea has brewed is the only way to bring the tea to the desired color / strength. Some people like it brown, others lighter. My kids — also devoted tea drinkers — prefer it strongly-brewed but paler (D1 in the chart below), with sugar, while New Wife prefers it to be medium strength and a sort of tan color (C3) with no sugar. It’s an art.
Like I said, this is important stuff.
Yorkshire Gold is the finest brew I’ve ever tasted (among teas) and in 84 years I’ve had the (dis)pleasure of tasting quite a few
Thank you very much for the referral several years ago
Milk in tea. Suitable for tossing into Boston Harbor. There’s no accounting for the taste of you Anglosphere transplants. Still, thanks for the Yorkshire Gold recommendation.
Whenever I drink Western tea – not often – I tend to gravitate toward Earl Grey. I grew up drinking genmaicha: Japanese green tea spiked with roasted brown rice. My grandmother Kuniko made her own; she’d roast the brown rice in a skillet. I’ve never been able to duplicate her concoction. If you’re in the mood for a change of pace, this is the stuff I recommend.this is the stuff I recommend. I’m tempted to say it’s better than my grandmother’s. But if I did, she might rise up out of her grave and stab me with her chopsticks.
KDT – you’re right. HTML tags are a PITA.
my wife gets David’s tea. Unfortunately they went woke and they are in Canada. I think we have some Harney and Sons around here too. I don’t put anything in tea but usually I drink coffee. I think it’s David’s Tea that has “Just Peachy” which makes a great iced tea for the summer.
Just plain black for me, no cream, no sugar, no fancy flavors.
I couldn’t tell you the name of the best tea I’ve tasted. It came from a box with a label written in a Cyrillic alphabet. You have to be careful when selecting from an Eastern European market, they sell a lot of weird flavored teas.
The secret to good rich tea is heating the water to just threatening to boil, but not boiling out the dissolved oxygen.
To the young lady at the coffee kiosk…
Earl Grey is not plain black tea! (nasty stuff)
My Baltic German grandmother used to drink tea with a bit of milk. It isn’t bad that way.
My normal method of making tea is to carefully read the instructions on the package, and then put it back in the cupboard and brew a pot of strong dark roast coffee. Then drink it black or with a tiny dash of milk occasionally.
Turns out I’ve been making it right. I’m with Kim on boiling water in the cup, then dump it to preheat the cup.
Yorkshire Gold is good, but I prefer Beweley’s Irish Breakfast.
Steep for 4 minutes, 27 seconds. 4:30 would work, but I like the way 4:27 looks on the timer on the microwave.
I guess I’m about an E3. We have one particular Fiestaware cup that I like the color to approximate.
Ah now, tea. I’m more of an E2. None of that girly Earl Grey muck thanks very much, and the tannin in the Yorkshire brew will take the enamel off your teeth (we Brits got enough trouble in that area already).
Now THIS is the stuff you want https://www.cornish-tea.co.uk/collections/smugglers-brew/products/1100s-smugglers-brew-catering-pack?variant=42372325408992.
Yes, I do get it in these bags as you can’t buy it locally. A splash of milk, no sugar, hot as you like. No bitter taste. And if you want the flowery stuff, this is the only one I’ve ver been able to tolerate.
https://www.cornish-tea.co.uk/collections/organic-fusion-teas/products/15-x-red-berry-fusion-bags?variant=42372323344608
I’ve been drinking tea since before I can remember. My mother is from Scotland. Her family emigrated to the US in 1921. So, in the truly Scottish tradition, as a baby, if I started fussing my mother would stick a spoonful of white tea (milk and sugar) into my mouth to shut me up. So I started drinking tea before I could walk or talk. Only after leaving home and joining the navy did I switch over to coffee as my daily drink. Currently, I drink Yorkshire Tea (the red stripe box) as that is what is available at the local grocery store. But I honestly prefer Builders tea but none of the grocery stores here in Florida carry it. I’m lucky I can find the Yorkshire.
Like you, it was my responsibility to make my mother’s tea in the morning before she went to work. In one of the houses we lived in during the 1960’s this meant I had to build the fire in the franklin stove every morning to heat the kitchen and boil the water. In the afternoon, I was the first one home after getting out of school so it was my job to have the tea and coffee ready for mom and dad when they got home from their respective jobs. My mother had one simple rule for making tea. “If you can still see the bottom of the cup while it’s steeping, it’s not strong enough.” Words I still live by today.
I, too, was taught the correct way for brewing tea at a young age and I do it similarly. In Canada in the 1960s and 70s it was Red Rose all the way, but they changed something a few years back and it just tastes…off to me now. I settled on PG Tips and I find it quite pleasant, although I have yet to sample Yorkshire Gold.
Until a few years ago I used a small Brown Betty teapot with loose tea for my morning cuppa, even though it was just one cup, but the fuss became too bothersome and I went back to tea bags straight into a mug. But the process remains the same. Scald the mug, bag in, stir once, steep 3-4 minutes (I like it a bit weaker), sweetener, then milk; stir, and enjoy. Always with one or two shortbreak cookies, and my pipe with a nice English or Balkan blend.
For me, tea season coincides with long-sleeve shirt season and soup season; late-September until about early May.
De gustibus non est disputandum. If you like it, it’s good. I drink my black tea from a pint mug and prefer it stiff with milk & sugar. But I’ll drink green tea straight.
BTW if you want to save water, put your dry mug in the oven instead of pouring a dose of hot water in.
You’re warming the china just the same
As for the picture above, F6.
Of course, I’m a heretic in that I like my tea cold and bitter, like my heart. Simple, Lipton cold brew tea bags. Rotate two gallon pitchers so there’s always cold tea available. Average probably a half gallon a day.
In the past year or so I’ve had to cut back on sugar, so it’s one cup at F6 w/o milk or sugar for me, too.
I always thought you had to boil down one of those little dogs to make Yorkshire tea.
Yorkshire Gold is a black tea. Yorkshire Tea is an orange pekoe I think. Most pearl Grey’s are black tea based.
I prefer a 3 minute steep with a dollop of lemon juice, in a double walled stainless steel thermal cup. Keeps the tea hot and burns your mouth on the first gulp!
Orange Pekoe is still black tea. Orange refers to the grade (size) of the tea leaves and pekoe is the style of cut to make the little skinny strips of tea leaves.
Dang it, even that explanation is wrong. Suffice to say that orange pekoe is a graded leaf from teas outside China (Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia, etc.) In the US, it basically means a medium grade black tea.
s/pearl/Earl/
The Last Wife, of Punjabi/Persian persuasion, fancies Typhoo twice a day, D4. Over brews it, adds almond milk and nukes it in the microwave for 45 seconds, then downs the whole thing in under 90 seconds. There’s no excuse for that sort of behavior, especially since she spent her formative years in the UK and went to UCL and King’s College, so she should know better.
I, on the other hand, prefer Yorkshire Gold or Fortnum and Mason’s Royal Blend, brewed the Yorkshire Way, with no milk and one sugar.