A bench of glass pots and cups holding the same leaf at successive infusions, each a deeper gold

The brewing guide

Grams, degrees, minutes

Every tea we sell has four numbers: how much leaf a cup takes, how hot the water should be, how long it sits, and how many times you can do it again. Here they are for all six types.

Shop twelve teas

An opened lidded bowl of leaf, the lid tipped back to show the colour

A wooden bowl of loose green leaf waiting on the bench beside the scale

Why weigh it

A teaspoon is not a unit.

A level teaspoon of broken black leaf is about 3 g. The same spoon of rolled oolong is 2 g, and of a bulky white tea barely 1 g. So the same spoon makes a strong black tea, a thin oolong and a cup of hot water that tastes of nothing — and people conclude they do not like white tea.

Weigh it once with a kitchen scale and you will know what your own spoon holds for that leaf. After that the spoon is fine. We put a 5 g scoop in every first order for exactly this reason.

See one tea worked through

Six types, in numbers

3 g

Black

250 ml of water95 °C, just off the boil3 minutes, once1 or 2 infusions

Over four minutes it turns bitter rather than stronger. Add more leaf, not more time.

4 g

Green

250 ml of water75 °C, boiled then rested 5 min90 seconds3 infusions

Boiling water scalds green leaf and the cup comes out savoury. This is the one temperature worth being fussy about.

5 g

Oolong

200 ml of water95 °C45 seconds, then add 15 each time6 infusions

More leaf, far less time. Pour every drop off the leaf between infusions or the next one stews.

4 g

White

250 ml of water80 °C3 minutes3 infusions

Bulky buds take up four times the volume of black leaf, so 4 g looks like a handful. It is not too much.

5 g

Fermented

200 ml of water100 °C, full boil20 seconds, then add 10 each time8 infusions

Rinse the leaf with boiling water for five seconds and throw that away. The cup after it is cleaner.

3 g

Caffeine-free

250 ml of water100 °C, full boil6 minutes, covered1 infusion

Flowers and fruit need long and hot, and there is no tannin to go bitter. Cover the cup so the aroma stays in it.

Find a tea for a method

One cup, four moves

Worked through at the counter with 5 g of the Iron Bell.

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Step one
Heat the pot, then the leaf
Swirl boiling water around the empty pot and tip it out. A cold pot drops 95 °C water to about 80 °C and the first infusion comes out thin.
Step two
Forty-five seconds, then pour it all off
Into a jug, not into the cup, so every drop leaves the leaf at the same moment. Water left sitting on the leaf keeps extracting and ruins the next steep.
Step three
Add fifteen seconds each time
Forty-five, sixty, seventy-five, ninety. The leaf gives up less with every pass, so the clock has to make up for it. Six infusions from one measure.
Step four
Stop when the colour goes
When a ninety-second steep comes out pale, the leaf is done. Tip it onto the garden. A session of six cups has used 5 g, which is a quarter of a dollar's worth.

Tea bushes on a hillside at the flush, the new leaf paler than the old growth

Asked at the counter

The rest of it

How do I get 75 °C without a thermometer?

Boil the kettle, pour the water into the cup you will drink from, and leave it five minutes in a warm kitchen. That lands between 72 and 78 °C. Then pour it onto the leaf. Adding cold tap water works too and costs you nothing in flavour.

Does a second infusion have less caffeine?

Yes, noticeably. Most of the caffeine leaves in the first minute of contact with hot water, so a third or fourth infusion is mild. The old advice to rinse the leaf for ten seconds and throw it away does not remove most of it, though — it removes dust.

What water should I use?

Fresh from the tap is fine in most of the country. If your water is hard, a filter jug is worth more to the cup than a better tea. Never reboil water that has sat in the kettle all morning — it is flat and the tea tastes flat with it.

Do I need a gaiwan or a special pot?

No. A small teapot with a wide basket works, and so does a heatproof jug with a strainer held over the cup. What matters is that the leaf has room to open and that you can get all the water off it quickly. A cramped tea ball defeats both.

Can I brew these cold?

Greens and lighter oolongs, yes: 10 g to a litre of cold water, in the fridge overnight, strained in the morning. It is sweeter and has almost no bitterness. Black and fermented teas go dull cold-brewed and are better made hot and chilled afterwards.