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Brewing Tea | Chai Cooking Instructions | Tea Notes | Weight Loss Challenge | Growing your own tea
Brewing Tea
 
Brewing tea is really quite easy. I was frustrated at first when I was unable to get my first cups of tea to taste exactly the way I wanted! The secret is to have patients and lots of them, if the tea doesn't fulfill your needs, try adding more tea leaves or less depending if you want the tea to be stronger or weaker. If you like a more bitter taste or stronger taste in your tea, steep it for a longer period of time. What your looking for is there, you just have to take a little time to figure how to get it! Now, after saying all that, here are some instructions for brewing a perfect cup of Treys Tea.
 
• It's essential that tea is never allowed to over infuse. You'll end up with bitter, ruined tea. For stronger tea, add more leaves rather than infusing longer than recommended. At the end of a timed infusion, decant all of the tea or remove the tea leaves to avoid ruining your beverage.
 
• Use loose leaf tea whenever possible. The tea used in teabags is usually broken, dusty bits of lesser quality leaves.
 
• It is best to boil fresh tap or bottled water (not distilled water) and try to avoid reusing water that has already been heated or boiled. This is 'flat' water and the oxygen has been depleted making it less than ideal for brewing a good cup of tea. A good example of this is the coffee machines at a workplace which have "instant" hot water. The water is instantly hot because it has been boiling in that container for the last hour and all the oxygen is gone, some might disagree but in this situation I would recommend taking fresh water from a drinking fountain and putting it in the microwave for 3 minutes to maintain a fresh boil and then placing your tealeaves in the water after the boil is reached to steep your tea! ohhh, the miracles of technology!
 
• A Smart Tea Maker or Strainer is preferable for infusing loose leaf teas (rather than a tea ball or clamping spoon) in order to give the leaves plenty of room to expand and fully infuse.
 
The water temperature does not have to be exact. The main thing to remember is not use boiling water for Green or White teas. This will burn the leaves and create bitter flavors.
 
TIP: A good way to guess at the water temperature without a thermometer is to bring the water to a boil, and wait 2 minutes (for Green & White tea) before pouring over the leaves
 
The Crucial Amount:

For a perfect cup:
8oz of water (Smart Tea Maker ½ Full) = 1½-2 Tsp of Tea
16oz of water (Smart Tea Maker Full) = 3-4 Tsp of Tea
Pour boiling water over Black tea and let steep for 2 ½-3 minutes
For white & Green tea, bring water to a boil and let sit for 2 minutes before pouring over leaves.
Let steep for 3 minutes.
 
 
Chai Cooking Instructions
 
What you need:
1 cup of milk
1 cup of water
2 tablespoons of Chai (Assam Chai or Breakfast w/ Hoppe)
Couple packets of sugar
Smart Tea Maker		  
   
 
1. Pour 1 cup of milk and 1 cup of water into stove pan.
2. Place pan onto stove with medium heat (no more or the milk will come to a boil and spill over)
3. Once the liquid comes to a simmer pour 2 tbsp of your favorite Chai into the simmering milk & water
4. Stir and let simmer for 4 minutes, keeping the pan on the stove with medium heat.
5. Once the 4 minutes are up, pour through a strainer or a Smart Tea Maker into a cup.
 
Ideas:
If you do not currently own a Smart Tea Maker, I strongly suggest getting one off our site. The Smart Tea Maker will make your Tea life a lot easier. Second, since you don’t own one quite yet, use a coffee filter to pour the tea through with all the tea particles, this way you get a nice, clean, and crisp tea!
 
Chai Instruction Video: http://www.jkltea.com/content/Blog/blog.html
Tea Notes
Watching your health with White Tea:
If you are drinking tea for your health, you may want to consider white teas. There is also considerably less caffeine in white tea than the other varieties (great after a hard day of work). Studies have shown that white tea contains more active cancer-fighting antioxidants than green tea. Another note to be aware of is white tea does not hold the “grassy” taste that a green tea carries. White tea is known for its light and sweet taste.
Silver Needle: The Silver needle white tea holds a light hue when brewed and contains a light but sweet taste with a smooth finish across the lips.
A Leaf & A Bud: This white tea is known for its boldness in taste for a white tea, it holds a darker hue compared to the silver needle and has a stronger body.

Increasing your metabolism:
Jasmine Green:
Green Tea is a healthy choice to drink a hot cup of after any meal or during the day between meals. By drinking a hot cup of green tea after a meal will help increase your metabolism by 30% and by drinking a cup in between meals, green tea acts as an eating depressant.

Taste: The delicate lingering bouquet of night blooming jasmine adds a sweet, nectar-like flavor to the fresh full leaf green tea, and also brings out a minty aroma reminiscent of lavender. The nutty full flavor green tea flavor blends perfectly into the sweet jasmine aroma.

Stress Release:
By drinking black tea four times a day for six weeks, men were found to have lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol than a control group who drank a fake tea substitute, a researcher said in a study published in the journal Psychopharmacology. The tea drinkers also reported being in a more relaxed state after performing tasks designed to raise stress levels.

Cream of Assam: Wonderfully aromatic with notes of ripe fruits, a sweet malty flavor and light brisky ending. With noticeable bite, fruity notes and full mouth flavor, this is defiantly the top organic single malt harvest of the autumn season.

Ginger Peach: This tea holds a comer aroma which strikes you of a mellow peach. Once poured, the tea gives off a nice flowing texture carrying a sweet ginger peach taste.

Relax (Ice Tea):
Nilgiri Red Raspberry: Red Raspberry holds a nice berry woody taste of red wines, mixed with the sweet succulent aroma of raisins. The ice tea is made to contain a light taste of raspberry with a light taste of tea, making there no bite but a smooth flowing tea from start to finish.