Tea

[Barricus]

I'm big into tea.  Not Lipton, not powdered, but real full leaf teas.  I have three teapots (soon to be four and a guiwan), and have sampled teas and tisanes from all over the world.  Anyone else a tea guru?  Or have any questions about tea?  I'm teaching a class about tea next month and I want to know what people want to know about tea and what they already know about tea.  Also, I just like to talk about tea.

[Stupot]

I wouldn't call myself a tea buff, but I do like to try all kinds of teas.
But for all the different varieties that exist out there, at the end of the day nothing beats a good old English cuppa.
PG is my brew of choice, milk, one sugar, ta muchly.

[Gilbert]

I'm not a tea guru, but we Cantonese are into it. It's just commonplace to have a pot of tea (yeah, leaves, not T-Bac tea bags or powder) when we go to Yum-Cha (which literally translates to "Drink Tea") for lunch (even though the restaurants use cheap and crappy tea leaves in general).

[Babar]

My mother is obsessed with tea to the level of having at least 3 cups a day to function normally. I am not. Nor coffee... On the rare occasion when it is cold, and I am in the mood, I have some jasmine or mint tea with lemon and honey.

[Igor Hardy]

This thread is like something from a tea-induced dream.

[Barricus]

I've gotten into Puerh Tea recently.  Puerh is tea that is aged and pressed into bricks and disks.  Some people describe it as earthy.  Long story short, I'm into old tea that tastes like dirt...but in a good way.  Right now, my favorite Puerh is a 5 year old blend made mostly of white tea buds.  It has a sweet and bitter flavor, almost like lemon.  I also like white, both Chinese and Japanese green teas, oolongs, and a select few black teas.  I'm not a fan of the traditional English or Irish Breakfast or Earl Grey, since the quality is so poor for these teas in the states, I've had some bad experiences with these blends.  I will try them eventually, if I find myself happy with my Darjeeling and Lapsang Souchong.  I've also been branching out into oolongs more these days.  I started drinking Ti Guan Yin and I loved it so much, I really didn't see the need to look at other varieties of oolong.  I just found a Jasmine oolong, which is amazing, the jasmine essence brings out slight banana flavors in the oolong.  The most recent thing I drank was a Japanese green tea called Hojicha, which is amazingly good, especially at this time of year.  It's a roasted green tea that has notes of barley and toasted rice. 

[Gilbert]

Puerh is the most common kind of tea people would order when they go to Yam-Cha, mainly due to its mildness. However, being most popular makes most restaurant buy whole lots of it with the lowest quality, so the Puerh served by restaurants in general are tasteless (even though the tea is blacker than your hair) and we more often order green tea like Ti Guan Yim and Jasmine, or white tea like Shou Mei now (they aren't good ones either, but are at least better than the tasteless black water). Puerh tea disks have a market actually. Old and high quality ones could cost a fortune.

[Barricus]

They've actually started packaging Puerh with hologram foil in it, because there's a bunch of counterfeit Puerh on the market. 

[Ali]

I drink loose-leaf fair trade tea at every opportunity. No milk, because I'm a vegan. While I do like a variety of teas, particularly variants on green/jasmine tea, this is the only one I drink regularly because it's fair trade.

EDIT: You have to admire the way China has taken counterfeiting further than could have been imagined.

[Barricus]

I drink loose-leaf fair trade tea at every opportunity. No milk, because I'm a vegan. While I do like a variety of teas, particularly variants on green/jasmine tea, this is the only one I drink regularly because it's fair trade.

EDIT: You have to admire the way China has taken counterfeiting further than could have been imagined.

I don't use milk or sugar in hot tea either.  Studies have shown that adding milk to tea neutralizes the polyphenols.  Plus, I think good tea doesn't need anything in it.  If you dig jasmine tea, there's a jasmine variety of almost every type of tea (except for yellow, but that's because yellow tea is so rare).

[Ali]

Studies have shown that adding milk to tea neutralizes the polyphenols.

For some reason that quote sounds very right next to your avatar.

[Calin Leafshade]

So you're a tea drinking, vegan socialist who is studying for an MA?

How do you sleep at night?

[Gilbert]

They've actually started packaging Puerh with hologram foil in it, because there's a bunch of counterfeit Puerh on the market. 

There ARE counterfeits with hologram foils on them.

Anyway, a few years ago some of my colleagues won a box of "quality ancient" Puerh in the Lucky Draw of the Annual Dinner and, the production date written on it was early that year. 

[giochi]

I've been drinking tea since I was born! I went to a tea exhibition in london and fell in love with chinese imperial green tea. Keemun is a good one for those who can have milk. It's one of the few black teas that are drinkable without the white stuff.

[Barricus]

Studies have shown that adding milk to tea neutralizes the polyphenols.

For some reason that quote sounds very right next to your avatar.

Would you like a jelly baby?

[Ali]

So you're a tea drinking, vegan socialist who is studying for an MA?

How do you sleep at night?

Very badly, it's the caffeine.

[Barricus]

Caffeine makes me tired, it's kind of weird.  I can drink an energy drink and take a nap without any problems.  Caffiene and alcohol have opposite effects on me, although it's kind of hard to use beer as a stimulant, because I get too drunk to do anything.  I'm on three medications right now that intensify alcohols effects on me, so two drinks and I can't balance 

[Phemar]

The only tea I drink is a local tea called Rooibos tea (Afrikaans: Red Bush tea). It's delicious and awesome. Also it's caffeine-free.

[PatientRock]

No tea, COFFEE!

[giochi]

Warning. Don't try and ride a bike you're not used to with a hot cup of tea in one hand. I speak from experience, and it HURTS.