Where are my DL tea connoisseurs?

Is this code?

MY ADVICE: Open your mouth and dip some balls deep.

Green Tea cuts down on heart attacks,

I make my own blend of green and keep it in a jar in a cabinet: gunpowder tea, sencha and some macha mixed together. A heaping tablespoon makes a big pot of tea, and then I put more water on the leaves and make a second pot. Blend them together when they're cool and keep them in the fridge. I heat up a big mug every morning. For green tea, the water is supposed to be below the boiling point, otherwise the tea can be so acidic it can easily upset your stomach. Boil a kettle of water and then pour in a good helping of cool water to lower the temp below the boiling point. If you live in a big city, Asian markets are the best place to look for tea, or Japanese groceries. If it's loose, it's fairly inexpensive in bulk. Many, many kinds for sale online, of course. You have to try it to see what you like.

A Korean restaurant I used to frequent served a barley and corn tea that was good hot or cold. I have also had just plain barley hot and that was good, too.

Green tea is healthier than black.

Currently I'm drinking Harney & Sons Earl Grey Imperial. I start most days with a mug of that. I know green tea is healthier, but I tend to order it in restaurants and not drink it at home. And, FWIW, when I visit Starbucks, I order a 1/2 & 1/2 green tea and lemonade; it's excellent if you need to rehydrate.

No tea is going to "cleanse your liver", you stupid fuck.

I don't know why R8 made me laugh.

Starbucks is absolute shit. I don't understand anyone drinking that expensive shit and tastes so cheap. I asked for some hibiscus thing once and they put these shitty frozen berries at the bottom. How the fuck is that hibiscus? And then I see they gave me some nonsense called "very berry hibiscus." How do you people drink that awful shit. Even their coffee is absolute shit.

Sttarbucks Earl Grey tea is wonderful. I like Stash Extra bergamont Earl Grey as well. Almost any of the Stash teas are great. Still like Constant Comment a lot. Thats all!

I missed the bit about cleaning your liver. A friend, and a recovering heroin addict, drinks milk thistle tea for her liver. I offer no warranty on efficacy.

I have a hard time paying $4 or whatever for hot water and a teabag (at Starbucks).

Try PG Tips (black) tea bags, OP.

I like a nice monkey picked tea.

R13 Yorkshire Tea is better.

Celestial Seasonings, if it still produces it, Tension Tamer, is a very good herbal tea.

Best Brit tea (bags): Lyons Original Blend, Barry's Irish Breakfast. The loose tea makes a far tastier cuppa, but I can't be arsed to clean up, so I use bags.

those are both Irish, imperialist @ r17

Black teas boost your immune system. Personal preference is Irish Breakfast tea. They say the Queen prefersEarlGrey. But I prefer Irish.

I don't know much about the green teas and wonder if someone could tell me the difference between Japanese and Chinese green teas. I usually drink Chinese, but maybe the Japanese taste better and are more effective with toxins.

^^They grow tea in Ireland now??

Teas that are made without Camellia Sinensis are called tisanes. Pure non-tea herbals.

I like any of the Zingers from Celestial Seasonings for tisanes.

My favorite green is Jasmine Green in any of its forms.

My favorite black is a aged Earl Grey.

I buy both, loose-leaf by the pound, from Numi through Amazon.

Don't get me started on Oolongs...

One cant become a tea connoisseur and then immediately ask about green and herbals.

I find that a lot of the herbal teas are too strong but blueberry tea is good hot or cold and the flavor is not overpowering.

I bought some concentrated sassafrass tea and drank it iced recently. It was delicious unsweetened, tastes like root beer.

I like to sample a lot of different black teas, but this is my personal favorite . . .

Silverneedle white tea with lemon.

Green teas are beneficial when you add lemon to it.

I just ordered a pound of my favorite Paris blend, which is a variation of Earl Grey, from Harney yesterday, R7. I think they are having a sale right now and I'm happy to help a smaller, family owned business.

I also love Bangkok which is a green tea with lemongrass, coconut and ginger. I found it a few years ago when Trader Joes was carrying it as one of their store brands but then abruptly discontinued it. After a few months of withdrawal, I was delighted to discover that it was actually available from the "real" company when I stumbled across the store while wandering from SOHO. And I like the Herbal Hot Cinnamon as a dessert tea because it is naturally sweet so no added sweetener means I don't have to feel quite as guilty about the chocolate cake.

I prefer (fresh) mint tea myself. I pretty much drink it all day every day.

If you want to go with expensive and delicious tea, you should try Laduree. I love it!

I love lapsang suchuong - very smoky and perfect fit a cold day. I also like peppermint and jasmine.

I try to mostly buy loose teas.

No evidence green tea is better for you than black. Herbal tea is not tea.

Im a big tea whore.

Anything with mint tastes good hot or cold.

I like jasmine and hibiscus teas a lot lately. Hibiscus tea can get very bitter but it has a ton of health benefits including liver health and lowering blood pressure.

Thyme tea also has numerous health benefits. Ive been drinking it for sore throat in the last couple of weeks.

My go-to herbal tea is chamomile. I also enjoy ginger-peach tea.

Otherwise, English breakfast or Prince of Wales tea in the morning, Chai or Constant Comment in the afternoon. Earl Grey is my weekend special.

R32 chamomile tea is also an excellent skin care product.

During a recent ( pre Covid-19) trip to Morocco I enjoyed their mint tea.

Did you also enjoy Moroccan man whores r34?

I've loved teas all my life. Jasmine, especially with the flowers included, for the aroma and mellow taste, Constant Comment for the refreshing flavor of spiced orange, and as a good hearty black tea, Lifeboat is the best I've ever tasted. If you enjoy a good, robust english black tea I highly recommend trying Lifeboat. I'm not much of a fan of herbals, but will drink chamomile on occasion. I often have mid afternoon hot tea as a pick-me-up, and rarely miss my bedtime tea. The caffeine in tea never affects my ability to fall asleep. I been a tea drinker since early childhood. It was always present in our home. I don't use sugar, honey, lemon or milk, as it takes away from the flavor.

I like all of David's Tea's Rooibos teas. There are good shelf brand rooibos as well. I drink both rooibos and chamomile on ice in the summer.

I've been enjoying this brand of green tea.

I love Celestial Seasonings Tension Tamer. Stay away from their camomile, however. It tastes like horse piss.

I like Clipper Teas which I drink on a daily basis, they have great quality green and white teas:

All their teas are organic and Fairtrade, no child labour involved.

Are the gays more likely to like teas? Is it a queenie thing?

I am just crazy about Bigelow Cinnamon Stick tea, it can be a little harder to find than Bigelow's other teas.

Re R38: Ito En is pretty good quality Japanese tea. Costco sells boxes of their "house" brand (Kirkland brand), which is actually Ito En tea, and says so on the boxes - 100 teabags for about $20 if you have a membership. It is sencha, with a dusting of macha powder in them. A good bargain. I would put the packs in a sealable glass jar to keep the stuff fresh.

All the big American tea sellers have green tea lines now and most of it is crap. E.g. Bigelow green tea has all the flavor of 6-month-old lawn clippings...it's garbage, basically.

very very saddened that Kusmi has gone all modern to appeal to middle class American women. You can't get their classics anymore, Caravan (smoked Russian) or Earl Gray Polansise. Not since the fall of the Romanovs has there been such a loss!

I agree with you R45.commercial green teas are awful. Although I doe drink Mighty Leaf. Expensive but good. I get my teas online and I get loose tea.

I'm curious about ItoEn. I wish there was a way to try the tea before spending $20 at Costco on it.

^If you have an Asian supermarket where you live, Ito En sells "sleeves" of loose sencha for about 8 bucks. It's probably more than a third of a pound of tea. A Japanese friend of mine introduced me to it. If you like sencha, it's good quality stuff, fresh and bright green.

Teavana is terrible, too. WTF is with adding the rock candy to practically every tea blend?

Latest fad now is Guava Leaf Tea

Loose leaf tea, bought in bulk, and an electric kettle with temperature settings (especially important for green tea). Avoid all those flavored tea bag things.

For the pedants here: the Oxford dictionary includes this as a definition of tea: a drink made from the infused leaves, fruits, or flowers of plants other than tea.

Fuck the Oxford Dictionary.

I love Rooibos (red tea) in the evening with tea biscuits.

Porto Rico Coffee Co. out of New York has a big selection of Chinese teas, reasonable prices, and they deliver all over the US. Some of them are VERY expensive. It's amazing what some Chinese and Japanese green and white teas cost. There are also big online tea companies in the SF area, but I can't remember the names of them now. Maybe Five Mountains? (Yea, I looked it up, I have some of their tea back at my house).

OP, I too am interested in what others use for iced tea (I don't think I've seen anyone respond to that request yet). Right now I use Luzianne, but would love to find something better. Lipton's, Tetley and other brands are crap when it comes to brewing iced tea. And Starbucks' iced tea is abominable.

I eat PILES of shit!

R27 I too love Harney and Sons and was first introduced to them at the Neue Galerie’s Cafe Sabarsky many years ago with their Vienna 1900 tea. I swear that is the name that I ordered it from them as for quite a while, but the name now seems to be Viennese Earl Grey. It is a lovely tea. The Paris does have notes of bergamot, but also vanilla and lavender.

R55: The only one I try to use for iced tea is Red Rose. It's very good, and not expensive. They sell boxes of 100 teabags in the large grocery chains in the South, but if you can't find it otherwise, it's worth ordering online. I agree about Tetley being no good, same for Luzianne; Lipton's is tolerable to me but maybe I'm just used to it. Tea bags need to be kept in air-tight containers or the stuff goes dead on you pretty quickly.

R42 it must not be or you would be all about it MARY

R58 Is that the tea that comes with a cute little porcelain collectible? I always wanted it, but it seemed like old lady tea.

Constant Comment from Bigelow is my favorite. Other than that, R21 pretty much nails it.

R60: Yes, apparently they stopped inserting the little figurines in the boxes recently. It is good stuff, my preferred black tea, as far as the ones that are broadly available are concerned. I just looked it up, Walmart sells it. I know a couple of little old lady Anglophiles, and it's their preferred brand, for whatever that's worth (not much, I know).

Red Rose tastes a lot like the old A&P house brand of tea. A&P went out of business, what, 20 years ago?

Another vote for Harney & Sons tea, though I would add that a summer time favorite for ice tea is their selection of fruit teas. They've got a couple of different flavors, but mango is the best. It smells absolutely wonderful.

Drink gallons of it. Mostly Yorkshire. Stick a tea bag in a mug and let it mash for as long as you fancy. Since lockdown Yorkshire has been a little hard to get at times so also PG Tips. A little harsher but maybe just because I’m not used to it. Also Early Grey and a nice, spicy black chai. Have green and nettle tea too but should probably drink more. Not keen on fruit teas. Peppermint is good on cold winter mornings, first thing with some honey.

There is an amazing book called For all the Tea in China: How England Stole the World’s Favorite Drink and Changed History by Sarah Rose, which is excerpted here in a Smithsonian article. China had a lock on the tea trade and its about a Scotsman who does industrial espionage to find and steal the secrets of tea, which eventually lead to the UK using India as a giant tea plantation to subvert them.

At the time green tea and black tea were purported to be varieties from different plants, rather than different stages in preparation of the tea leaves. England really loved its green tea, but one of the things he discovered is that the Chinese were dying the green tea to make it look very appetizingly green, but was actually using potentially toxic materials to do so, something they did not do with their own tea. It was quite the scandal and there was a movement away from green teas to black teas that defined the likes of Brits, and most of the world ever since that time.

Love this thread. Just ordered some Harney's teas online.

^ I like their new flavor, Miso Harney.

Earl Grey Creme from Teavana is really good

At the risk of making the purist's head explode I am going to add that I also frequently purchase the Decaf Iced Green Tea bags on Amazon. The Target store brand is not bad, but they don't carry decaf green.

I'm part Japanese and have been a tea drinker since my teens, I'm now 40 so I have tons of experience and knowledge about tea. I drink about 4-6 cups a day. Many of the older relatives on that side of the family drink green or oolong tea and are generally healthier than the non-tea drinkers on both side of my family. Even the elderly relatives with lifetime smoking habits (unfiltered cigarettes mainly) are still kicking it, even there they attribute it to green tea. In Japan the tea growing regions have some of the highest longevity rates in the country.

I get a good quality matcha. A lot of companies sell low-grade, culinary matcha to Americans who don't know better, and it tastes bitter so people think that's how it's supposed to taste. So they put them in smoothies to disguise the taste. Please don't do that. Buy directly from online Japanese stores if you can, I used to buy them from the Lupicia USA online store and still do from time to time, but they've closed all of their US stores except for one in Hawaii where you can still order tea from. But for matcha I've been ordering from Hibiki-an.com (linked below), I also buy loose leaf gyokuro green tea from the online store. They sell other items beside tea too.

Anyways for matcha, I don't even bother using the wooden whisk anymore. I put about 1 tsp of matcha and enough cold water to make a slurry. Then I pour hot water (boiled water that's been rested for 2 minutes) to make about 12 oz. of tea. You can also cool the tea to make ice-cubes for hot summer days, pair the ice cubes with iced fruit-flavored teas.

Gyokuro is another great type of green tea, it's basically grown the same way as leafs used for matcha, meaning it's grown in carefully covered shades to encourage retention of chlorophyll in the leafs. Except gyokuro is allowed to grow and mature longer than tea plants used for matcha. What I do with the gyokuro loose tea is that I grind them in my trusted coffee grinder for about 30 seconds or so until the leafs become almost like coarse, gritty powder. I got the idea from watching my Japanese grandparents who both lived to healthy 90s (aged 95 and 97) and their neighbors in Japan. They'd chew a bit of the loose tea after drinking the tea. When I asked them why they did that, they told me it's healthy and something that they'd seen their elders do. So I started grinding gyokuro into coarse powder about 15 years ago. Benefits include no need for steeping instruments, cost-effectiveness since I end up using a lot less tea and don't waste anything, and cold brew convenience since I can just put the gritty powder into cold water in my hydroflask and let it steep for about 20 minutes while I'm out on the go. The tea grounds sink to the bottom so you don't have to drink it if you don't want to, you can just rinse the bottle or cup out.

In the past 8 or so years I'd added oolong tea to my regular tea consumption. Get a premium grade of Taiwanese oolong grown in the high mountains, you'll not regret it. Oolong is sort of a cross between green and black tea, as it's partially fermented unlike black tea which is fully fermented. I get plain oolong and oolong scented/ blended with jasmine or chrysanthemum flower, absolutely divine. Oolong tea tastes more fuller bodied than green tea but less smokey than black tea. Whatever you do, do not buy oolong tea grown in China, it's not as good and unverified quality control unlike in Taiwan where oolong tea is a source of national pride. I also grind loose oolong tea into coarse powder but unlike gyokuro, it's not really that conducive to cold brewing.

Sorry here's the link to hibiki-an

Here's the link to Lupicia online store which ships from Hawaii, since hibiki-an isn't shipping to the US for now.

^Where do you get your oolong? Thanks for all of the above information, very useful.

Hi R74 I buy oolong from this online store directly from Taiwan, tea is fresh unlike some of the tea from generic online tea stores. That's why I like to buy from company from the regions where the tea comes from.

R44 I buy it in a box of 20 each tea bag is sealed in a aluminum packet so it stays fresh.

R47 I buy it at 99 Ranch a box of 20 tea bags is around $4.00 it's available at most Asian supermarkets plus they have other flavors ors in that line such as Matcha, Jasmine and lemon.

I miss Queen Mary!

I like Harney and Sons Pomegranate Oolong

Any love for TAZO tea?

Osmanthus Oolong is delicious.

I like the Tazo English breakfast tea

Y'all are basic bitches if you feel all cultured while sipping your mass marketed breakfast tea blends! If you want the good stuff, get your loose leaf T from CHYNA!

I like the flowering jasmine pearls and Japanese matcha. Also a big fan of Earl Grey.

That was actually way fucking hilarious R82!

I fancy PG Tips every afternoon. I sometimes use Tazo Awake. Maybe I'll see if there's some Taiwan Oolong on Amazon.🍵

I like this variety of green tea.