What are the Benefits of Loose Tea?

What are the Benefits of Loose Tea? Loose tea makes the best tea.

That’s a bold statement you say. Why? Well, I’ll tell you why. Loose tea is larger leaf and, if you choose large leaf teas, they are even better than standard loose leaf teas. The reason is this: large leaf teas have a larger volume compared to the surface area of the leaf. This is one of the key benefits of loose tea. So, when infusing they take longer to brew, giving time for the full balanced complexity to the tea to infuse. If you did this with a small leaf tea or the dust used in teabags the tea would become unbearably tannic and too bitter to drink.
Larger leaf teas also have the benefit of generally being made by the orthodox method, being carefully picked – two leaves and a bud, withered, rolled (not torn) and then fired. This gives an excellent flavour unlikely to be found in mass-market CTC teas (cut, tear curl).

My personal view about loose leaf tea

Many people believe that tea bags are more practical, especially when you are hurry in the morning. However, having tea with loose leaf need not be messy, just tap the used leaves into the bin! Actually, you can’t make a really good cup of tea with tea bags. The tea leaves need enough space and time to brew and reveal all their flavour components. In most cases, when you buy tea bags you only get dust. Thus, you can’t brew your tea for a long time because it becomes really bitter. Even the new style infusion bags, some of which are bio-degradable, do not make as good tea as using loose leaf.

So, the best way to make a good cup of tea is to use loose leaf! You will get a wider choice of teas, better quality and value. You could also brew loose green leaf twice or more often. Then you will discover all the complexity of the tea flavour cup after cup.

Some might think that it’s hard work making tea with loose leaf every day. In fact not! The only thing you need is a teapot or an infuser for a single cup of good loose leaf tea. Generally, you need to use one teaspoon per person and a teaspoon for the teapot. Be careful with bulkier teas as you may need to add a little extra tea. A black loose leaf tea usually needs to brew for 3 to 4 minutes. Then you can take the infuser out to stop brewing. Having said that, making loose leaf tea is not much mess don’t you think! Just drain the pot and tap into a bin – no dripping, soggy teabags to worry about – and it\’s all entirely bio-degradable!

Audrey

The benefits of loose tea in summary

More balanced flavour as larger leaf grades are used. Less tannin. More choice. Better value. Less mess with an infuser teapot. No dripping teabags. You can see the quality of the leaf. More environmentally friendly.

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