Green tea enthusiasts, teach me your ways!

October 11, 2018 4:29 PM

I have recently decided to start drinking green tea for the health benefits as well as to replace some of the sodas and coffees I drink throughout the day.

However, I'm not a tea drinker at all and am not familiar with brands so I wanted to ask: what do you drink and where do you buy? I would love some suggestions for tea bags or powders that I can brew at home as well as bottled teas that I could take to work. I have access to most major grocery stores as well as Amazon. I've never used loose leaf tea before but I can definitely learn if that's absolutely the best way to drink green tea or something.

Also, I have read about lead contamination in, say, black teas from China, but is that usually not a problem for green tea?

posted by massofintuition to Food & Drink (23 answers total)

Where are you located? Maybe there's a tea specialty shop nearby.

Here's my wisdom: brew it at 160-180 degrees Fahrenheit. This is not as hot as for black tea. This will keep it from being bitter, put a slight brake on the caffeine content, and is generally recognized as the best temperature for green tea.

Powdered/matcha green tea is a thing -- and it's increasingly displacing leaf tea on grocery shelves, which is a shame -- but I don't think it will give you the best experience unless you just want to mainline caffeine and/or mix it into something else as an ingredient.

Lately I've been partial to kukicha tea, but here's a list of some types of green tea. Here's another slightly longer list.
posted by amtho at 5:00 PM on October 11, 2018

Mighty leaf green tea tropical is my favorite. It's easy, not overly fruity or floral but has a little extra something to it. I'm not fancy, I just add a little honey to a mug and use the hot water machine at work, whatever temperature that might be. Available on amazon and at Whole Foods.
posted by ataco at 5:24 PM on October 11, 2018

Any jasmine is my go to, but jasmine dragon pearls are purty as well as delish. I use one lump of sugar, and I don’t pay any attention to the temp. But I don’t let green tea steep for more than 3 mins or it gets too bitter for me. (Black tea, though, I never even remove the tea bag. It just stays in while I’m drinking.)
posted by greermahoney at 5:33 PM on October 11, 2018

I’m a fan of gunpowder green tea.

This may be tea heresy but I like to drink it strong by tossing a bit into a cup and not straining it: the leaves are large and they will eventually sink, so it’s easy to not drink them.
I learned this technique from an old Chinese math professor who would drink it all day every day.
posted by SaltySalticid at 5:40 PM on October 11, 2018 [1 favorite]

I think your best bet here is to just spend a little bit of time in the tea aisle of whatever your local gourmet grocery is and see what looks appealing. Start with a flavor you like; you can get green tea with lemon, with mint, with the previously mentioned jasmine or tropical flavors. There is even a green tea with roasted rice which to me seems more savory or umami-ish (it's probably my favorite variety of green tea). If you find something you like and want to get more serious about it, check out a specialty tea vendor like TeaSource or Adagio Teas.

As amtho suggests above, you definitely don't want to use boiling water; it makes the tea too bitter, as does steeping for too long. Heck, you could even try cold-brewing if you prefer iced tea. I've cold-brewed the Mighty Leaf green tea tropical ataco mentioned and it was quite nice.

I can't really address the contamination issue. I've never worried about it, personally.
posted by Janta at 6:05 PM on October 11, 2018

Oh the genmaicha mentioned by Janta reminded me of hojicha, which is roasted brown to also give more savory/umami/maillard-reaction flavor, and is also wonderful.
posted by SaltySalticid at 6:31 PM on October 11, 2018

Reddit has a very nice tea forum where you can ask questions. Helpful and polite.
posted by valannc at 6:38 PM on October 11, 2018 [1 favorite]

The sidebar on r/tea over on Reddit has a lot of information, including brewing temperatures and times and a list of vendors. There is also a map of tea shops.

I buy almost all my teas from Upton Teas, who have a large green tea selection. My favorite green teas from there are the Special Grade Temple of Heaven Gunpowder Green, the Organic Ho-ji Cha which has a very earthy flavor, and the Gen-mai cha, which is green tea and roasted brown rice. Upton also sells a Green Tea Sampler, which is where I discovered the gunpowder green that I like so much.

I realize that using tea bags is easier, but I find that the extra steps I need to go through to brew loose leaf tea make a nice break in my day. Instead of tossing a tea bag in a cup of hot water and going back to whatever it was I was doing, I have to stop, measure out my tea, fill the kettle, prep the tea steeper, and then... wait. Wait for the water to come to the right temperature, wait for the tea to steep the required time, and wait a few minutes more while my tea cools down just enough for me to enjoy it. Doing all this forces me to stop, take a breath, and refocus before I get back to whatever it was I was doing.
posted by ralan at 6:46 PM on October 11, 2018 [3 favorites]

We have maybe 60 different types of green tea in a cupboard at my office, although I am not a connoisseur. I have to say that green tea is best as loose-leaf tea, especially because you can brew a few rounds with the same small amount of tea leaves - it has a slightly different taste for each round. All of it is tasty, but I have a few favorites.

- Any pouchong tea. This is my absolute favorite. It's about 10% fermented (vs. un-fermented for green tea), and it has a wonderful sweet flavor. Makes super great iced tea. Ten Ren Tea has some.
- Oolong tea. Somewhere between green and black tea, it's got a robust flavor. Alishan (Ali mountain) tea is one of the best oolong teas I know.
- I love the Gunpowder tea mentioned above. It's my normal drink-in-the-winter tea.
- I also have to say that Pearl Jasmine tea is great. It's wonderful to be enveloped by a fragrant cloud as you drink your tea. If you have a good sense of smell, it's particularly nice. And it tastes nice too.
posted by gemmy at 7:17 PM on October 11, 2018

This may be tea heresy but I like to drink it strong by tossing a bit into a cup and not straining it

That's how it's done in China! People will often carry a jar and keep pouring hot water over the same leaves; some people eat/chew on the leaves too.

The loose leaves are much more flavorful than the tea bags- I recommend finding an Asian/ Chinese supermarket and getting the tightly-packed bags of loose leaf green teas. Not expensive.
posted by bearette at 7:48 PM on October 11, 2018 [3 favorites]

Nthing Upton, I'm much more a celon or oolong drinker but tea is vastly more varied than standard teabag blends. Brewing loose is not hard, a filter is nice but the leaves will sink to the bottom. A pan works just fine, although a nice teapot is a pleasure in so many ways. Upton has sampler packs for just about every tea, definitely the way to go in learning mode.
posted by sammyo at 8:39 PM on October 11, 2018

Numi is my favorite tea brand! They're available online and at Sprouts and Target as well. They have Jasmine Green, which I think is perfect for a starter, and Gunpowder Green, which is great if you like stronger tea. They sell bags (very good) and loose leaf.
posted by typify at 8:57 PM on October 11, 2018 [1 favorite]

I like Harney & Sons for buying my tea online and they have a nice selection of different green teas (as well as plenty of others). It's possible to buy in a number of units, too, from small samplers to big bags. That's great for dialing in what you like then ordering plenty. Every time I order, they toss in some sample sachets of other teas, too.

Their website and iPhone app are both great e-commerce experiences, too. Super easy to order.

On the topic of how to prepare it, I'm going to note that I really love my Cuisinart CPK-17 PerfecTemp kettle. It has temperature presets for many kinds of teas, and will hold the water at that temperature. It's great just filling it up, pressing the right button, and knowing the water will be at the right temperature within a few minutes, and will stay that way for 30 minutes.

I also have a Finum mesh tea infuser. I learned the hard way that the stainless steel infusers can be hard to clean. The Finum rinses out really easily, so you get better flavor and it's easy to clean up.
posted by mph at 9:33 PM on October 11, 2018

re: 180 degrees -- if you don't want to get a kettle with temperature settings or stand there with an insta-read thermometer, a friend told me that when the bubbles are the size of shrimp eyes, it's ready for white tea, when the bubbles are the size of fish eyes, it's ready for green tea, and when it's at a rolling boil, it's ready for black tea. My insta-read thermometer and I confirm this.

If you go the loose leaf route, there's no real need for an infuser / strainer: it's ready when the leaves sink to the bottom. You can also re-steep loose leaf tea and get a quality nth cup, unlike with tea bags.

But if you want tea bags, my dad, who has drunk green tea his entire life, likes Bigelow green tea just fine. Maybe just because that's what his office has, but he doesn't object, and it's a fine place to start!
posted by batter_my_heart at 10:27 PM on October 11, 2018 [1 favorite]

Yes to all the fancy tea instructions. For cheap workday teabags on the go I prefer Do Ghazal green tea - it's quite strong, you can easily get two-three cups out of one teabag, so it appeals to coffee drinkers in my office. I don't fuss with a thermometer at work, but wait 4-5 minutes after the kettle boils for the water to cool down a bit.

(If you're interested in black tea as well, their Ceylon with cardamom is gorgeous and just as cheap.)
posted by I claim sanctuary at 10:27 PM on October 11, 2018

Try cold brew tea. Put a pinch of a good quality jasmine or a nice oolong in a litre of room temperature water and put it in the fridge. Take it with you the next day. Adjust amount of tea to taste as you decide what you like.

I second those suggesting you use tea leaves rather than teabags. I don't bother with removing leaves either, or if I'm feeling fussy, I use a gaiwan but green tea is inherently an unfussy beverage: leaves, water, go. As someone else mentioned, you can even eat the leaves afterwards.
posted by tavegyl at 10:37 PM on October 11, 2018

Yes to loose leaf teas, and just drinking them unstrained if you like. Note that you do not need to use a lot of leaves for this method. For a decent quality loose leaf tea about six leaves or pearls will do me for 3-4 steepings of the same cup, YMMV.

If you’re looking for a cold green tea to replace your soda habit, the Ito En brand you can buy at asian supermarkets is way way better than the bottled green teas you find at regular supermarkets. They don’t put in a bunch of sweeteners or “natural flavoring” or any of that stuff, so it tastes like tea instead of chemical peach.

If you’re more in a bag tea than loose tea frame of mind right now, asian supermarkets are probably also your friend. I like genmaicha, mentioned above, as an entry level tea because the popped rice flavor is kind of fun! You might also think about trying out some oolong teas, which are a little like the point between green and black tea. Kuan Yin, aka Iron Goddess of Mercy, is a popular style of oolong.
posted by Concordia at 2:56 AM on October 12, 2018

As you've no doubt noticed, this is a totally subjective area, so I hope you'll view all these answers as a menu of options to experiment with until you find your own unique personal preferences.

In my experience, there are four things that affect the taste of tea:

1. LEAVES
I agree with the consensus that loose whole leaves will result in better-tasting tea than little broken bits in a bag. This is probably the closest thing to an Objective Truth you will find in the world of tea-drinking. You can get as fancy as you want with straining your tea leaves, but a simple brewing basket is probably a good place to start.

If that's too fussy for you, you can always get teabags that contain proper whole leaf tea instead of little broken bits. These will often be labeled "whole leaf tea bags" or "loose leaf tea sacks" or something like that. In my experience, the results are better than standard tea bags, but not as good as loose leaf in a strainer basked. Some people claim it's because the leaves don't have enough room to expand in a bag, but I suspect that it's because tea manufacturers use slightly lower quality loose leaf tea when they sell it in bags On the few occasions where I've gotten the same whole leaf tea in loose form and in bag form, the taste has been pretty indistinguishable.

If you have a specialist tea store near you, that's where I'd start. Ideally they will let you buy a cup of tea brewed in store so you can see if you like it before committing to a tin of it. Also they will likely sell tea strainers and a decent kitchen thermometer if you don't already have one.

2. WATER SOURCE
No matter what tea you drink or how you prepare it, most of what goes into your mouth (and over your taste buds) will be the water that you started with.

Some people claim that bottled or filtered water makes better tea than tap water. I've tried various filters and brands of bottled, and I've preferred tap water in nearly every instance. Again, I encourage you to experiment and find out what works for you. (And remember that tap water is different everywhere, which is another reason you can't take anybody else's advice as gospel. The tea I rave about when I brew it here in London is going to taste quite a bit different when you brew it wherever you live. )

3 & 4: TEMPERATURE AND BREWING TIME
I'm listing these two factors together because they are so closely related. The hotter the water, the more quickly it will extract the tea compounds from the leaves, and the less steeping time you'll need.

This is why I don't personally recommend leaving the leaves in your tea while you drink -- you're giving up control over a major factor of the flavor.

You will often see lists of the "correct temperature" for various kinds of tea, but any such list is just a general guideline, and every tea is different. Fortunately, high quality teas will generally come with instructions on recommended temperature and brewing time for that specific leaf. (In fact, if the tea does NOT have this advice -- or if, God forbid, it's green tea but the box tells you to use freshly boiled water -- it may be a sign that the tea maker doesn't care all that much about flavor.)

Even when there's a recommended time and temperature, it's not the One True Correct Way To Brew That Tea. But it's generally a good place to start. Brew your first cup of tea as recommended, and then if it's too strong or weak for your taste, you can experiment with different temperatures and times.

If you are as obsessive as I am, you can get a fancy tea maker that raises the water to a specific temperature and then brews the tea leaves for exactly the right time. But to start off, you should probably just use the timer on your phone and whatever kitchen thermometer you've got handy.

IN SUMMARY
I hope this isn't an overwhelming amount of detail! If you buy decent quality tea, and brew it with your local tap water according to the instructions, you'll be fine! Just think of water source, temperature, and brewing time like the knobs on your stereo. Have fun tweaking them to suit your personal tastes, but don't get too hung up on the perfect correct setting.

PS: I asked about lead in Chinese tea a few years back. It was in the context of ordering direct from China, but one of the answers suggested that Chinese tea purchased in the US isn't likely to be much different. My personal decision was to make Chinese tea part of a varied tea diet instead of my main source, but as with everything, your mileage may vary.
posted by yankeefog at 5:34 AM on October 12, 2018 [1 favorite]

I decided to learn to like green tea, and it took me a while to find one that I actually enjoyed. This is it.

Nutritionfacts.org (my favorite nutrition info site) has a video on lead contamination of tea.
posted by FencingGal at 7:00 AM on October 12, 2018

I'm no connoisseur, but this is my current favorite green tea.
posted by Jacob G at 7:12 AM on October 12, 2018

I highly recommend getting a mug with a built-in steeper basket. They range from traditional (like this one) to more modern (like this one) to much more modern (like these cute animal ones) and really simplify the process. Tea will taste better if it can move around in the water, and using bags or pouches will limit this.
posted by capricorn at 9:33 AM on October 12, 2018

I am yet another fan of Upton Tea. The Temple of Heaven Gunpowder (mentioned above) is one of my favorites as well. Currently in my desk drawer, I also have gen-mai cha (green tea with roasted barley) and lung ching. There is a surprising amount of variety of green tea flavors, so a sampler is a good way to get started. I've also been enjoying non-tea brews, such as spearmint, honeybush and lapacho. As mentioned above, time and temperature is very important when brewing green tea. The strainer that yankeefog mentions is the best and easiest way to brew loose leaf.

There is lots of good advice in this thread. Follow it and you'll be well on your way to green tea deliciousness.
posted by slogger at 10:52 AM on October 12, 2018

I've been a green tea drinker for the past 15+ years, and you totally have my permission to disregard any and all advice re: "the right way" to do it!

I've tried powdered, loose leaf and bagged, and you know what? Tossing a tea bag into a cup of hot water the first thing in the morning, before I'm fully awake, is still as good as doing an elaborate 45-minute ritual.

And I tried all the cheap bagged green teas at my local shops, found the one I like (unflavored, basic green tea), and now it takes almost zero effort (not to mention money) to have a constant supply of tea I like.

It's perfectly fine not to get fancy with your tea! (Unless you want to, of course!)
posted by gakiko at 1:24 AM on October 13, 2018