April 8th, 2010 §
Making tea is not just a thing of utility it is an art form. The capacity to perfectly blend the tea with other flavors to create a tasty beverage is a thing of skill and beauty. One thing that people often overlook is the simple necessity of a tea strainer. These individuals will make this drink using pre-bagged tea and forget that even doing such as that will not prevent grains from getting into the tea as it is steeped.
To make this drink at its finest the use of a tea strainer to capture all the excess grains is vital. Grains in the tea can ruin the flavor and make the entire batch into a mess that no one wants to drink. This is true of any type of tea made whether it be sweetened, unsweetened, hot, or iced.
A tea strainer can come in a variety of sizes, shapes, and construction. The most prolific ones are made from wire mesh and plastic. The mesh will be very finely laced together to stop as much as the tea grains as possible from slipping through. Some individuals will strain their tea three or four times to get as many grains out of it as possible.
The primary use of a tea strainer is for individuals that prefer to use free floating leaves in their tea as opposed to pre-bagged versions. Tea of this type can come in many varieties from the green tea of the orient to the famous Earl Grey. Certain types of bark such as willow are commonly made into herbal teas with medicinal benefits. Willow bark tea, for instance, is an excellent aid for a headache due to the chemical make up of the tree bark.
The different types of tea strainer are all used for the purpose of straining tea. However, some are more useful that others. This usefulness largely depends on the style of brewing the individual follows though. Someone that prefers to prepare a large pot of tea might wish to use a large strainer so that it is all strained at once. Other individuals may wish to prepare and strain single cups at a time.
No matter which method is used the end result when using a tea strainer is a fine tasting brew that is good for the body, clears the mind, and cleanses the spirit. A proper cup of tea is just the thing to pass the time either in social settings or lost in though.
February 23rd, 2010 §
True tea lovers usually prefer bulk tea to a cup of tea that has been made with a tea bag. They do not hesitate to pour steaming water on a couple spoonfuls of broken tea leaves. They have no objection to any bits of tea that might later appear in their tea cup.
However, a sizeable number of adult tea lovers have children. As a rule, small children will not drink any beverage that has something strange floating in it. Hence, they will refuse to drink a cup of tea that has even a tiny remnant of the bulk tea. Therefore, those adults often choose to purchase a tea strainer.
Unlike tea, which can be green, gray, brown or black, tea strainers do not come in a range of colors. The most popular strainers have been crafted from silver. Some tea strainers are meant to go in a pot of tea, while others are intended for use in a single cup.
When a tea strainer resembles the shape of a ball, and when it has a small metal chain attached to its top, then that strainer is meant to be used for making a pot of tea. Such a strainer normally comes apart, forming two half spheres. The tea preparer packs into those half spheres the appropriate amount of bulk tea leaves.
When a tea drinker wants to strain just enough tea for a single cup, then that tea drinker needs a spoon shaped strainer. The spoon has a hinged cover. A tea lover can open that cover and place tea leaves in that spoon. Like the ball shaped strainer, the spoon shaped strainer has a large number of tiny holes.
Since most strainers are made out of silver, their constant exposure to tea causes their eventual discoloration. The tea stains the silver. Now that stain can be removed by placing the strainer in a dilute solution of bleach. However, anyone who cleans a strainer in that way had better rinse it thoroughly.
Even the cleanest strainer does not make a decent pot of tea, if it contains a detectable amount of bleach. A true tea lover can often note a change in the tea’s taste, if that tea was poured from a pot with a poorly rinsed strainer.
Another note of caution regarding tea strainers: They do not prevent emergence from them of tiny bits of tea. Sometimes those tiny bits can annoy a young child. Even after using a tea strainer, a parent might be asked to remove from a child’s tea cup a tiny speck of a tea leaf.
February 7th, 2010 §
These days, with the introduction of tea bags the extent of the use of tea strainers has reduced quite significantly. This is not to say that you can no longer get hold of a suitable tea strainer. You can. Only that as our lifestyles speed up we allow less and less time to enjoy some of the aspects of our life which used to be really important but have now largely been left by the wayside. An example of an activity that is becoming increasingly unusual is the formal tea making ceremony and the use of various tea making equipment, including the tea strainer.
The reason, as you will almost certainly know, that a tea strainer is required when making tea is that if you are going about the process of making tea that does not include a teabag then you will inevitably need a proper teapot, some real tea and of course something to gather the various soaked tea leaves into as you pour the infused tea drink into the cup. No body likes to drink a cup of tea only to find little bits and pieces floating around in their drink. Hence the need for tea strainers to undertake this particular task.
The different varieties of tea strainers include all sorts of delightful contraptions. They tend to separate however into two broad categories; tea strainers that prevent the tea leaves from spreading out and generally circulating unfettered within the pot; or those that remain external to the tea pot where the tea brews and are designed to collect the tea leaves as they are poured out of the tea pot and into the drinking cup.
The first type of tea strainer tends to be stainless steel, although they can also be glass or ceramic and are rather like detached infusers. The second type can be made of many different materials. Stainless steel is perhaps the most popular, but you can also get ones made from other materials, perhaps the most exotic being bamboo tea strainers.
In conclusion, although tea strainers are less relevant to everyday life than they use to be in the past, for those people who still love to enjoy a cup of tea complete with a more formal or studied way of making it will still want to use them. You will still be able to purchase tea strainers for some time to come, albeit that they may well soon only be obtainable from specialist tea vendors.
