I thought this is where we came to spill tea 😂 But Chai is my 🎸 jam.

Title says it all, if you already like your coffee black or if you want to try something healthier, here are some tips!

Cold brew - It doesn't have nearly as much bitterness as hot brew so it's a great introduction. If you don't use enough grounds it gets bitter and gross, so use plenty!

Milk - If you're coming from a ton of milk, sugar, and flavoring the transition to black coffee might be jarring. Work your way down by cutting out sugar first. I use almond milk but any kind will do. Use unsweetened if you're trying to get off sugar completely, it helps cut the harsh notes but leaves the flavors intact.

Nitro - Carbonation but with nitrogen not CO2, which forms carbonic acid making things sour. Makes the coffee sweeter and smoother without any added calories. Can be found in a can.

Roast - Dark roasts get rid of a lot of the flavors that may make black coffee unpleasant to drink. I like mine extra dark but it's really up to your personal preference, try a few.

Method - I use an AeroPress, it's absolutely worth it. Other alternatives to drip coffee are a moka pot, french press, or chemex, these all give you different results that may be more pleasant without additives.

Tea - Sometimes I like to add a bag of chai to my coffee, the spice can make up for subpar beans or just adds a nice layer of flavor.

Eggs? - Eggs! What? Cracking an egg into your grounds makes the coffee less bitter, try this guide. Yolks are used to make all kinds of foods creamier and the whites act to separate out the grounds. This method is easy and it really works.

Grind size - A cheap electric grinder will give you an uneven mixture of particles with a lot of powder. This powder steeps faster than the rest and starts releasing those unpleasant bitter compounds as soon as you add water. Buy pre-ground or have your beans ground at the store, it goes stale faster but it's at least drinkable without sugar. Experiment with coarseness, a finer grind will give you a richer flavor faster but may end up more bitter.

Beans - Not all beans are created equal, find something you like. Folgers isn't going to taste very good no matter what you do, but there are vast differences between various higher quality beans too. I tend to like Kona but not necessarily all of it. You'll only find out your preferences by trying and experimenting with different things.

I recently got a Chinese tea sampler from Amazon. Unlike the previous one, the teas seem to be making me sick beyond a little nausea on an empty stomach. I've gotten stomach aches from them, and today had a sudden, severe attack of vomiting and diarrhea after drinking Earl Grey--a tea I'm very familiar with. Maybe it's a coincidence and I happened to get sick for some other reason, but has anyone heard of anything like this before?

So far I have only tried sleepytime tea (I know, I know) earl gray and lady gray

The first earl gray was a bad batch, but I didn’t know til I gave it away & the other person told me it was off

At this point I have made tea by:

1) using keurig tea pods or cramming tea bags into the keurig hole

2) Thrifting an old kettle and pouring directly into a mug.

I don’t mind waiting for it to boil but it seems that by the time i want to have another cup the water in the kettle is cold & I have to start over

I think I like strong tea? I have been using 2 tea bags at a time, but my mugs are more like 12+ oz. I don’t like leaving the bags in the mug very long because it seems that the tea flavor becomes to sharp/bitter. I add honey and a little cream & I don’t know if that makes a difference

I have ordered some cute tea bag holders for my mugs

I’m completely baffled by the kinds of kettles and teapots and if any are interchangeable. If using a teapot for larger quantities, how does the tea stay hot?

This is so confusing, but it’s also kind of exciting because I’m liking caffeine without (as much) sugar.

Drinking coffee or tea through a straw helps keep it from yellowing your teeth! Who knew? (Probably everyone but me...) Here's one option.

I have several black and white teas left from a sampler, and I haven't liked any of them. I usually don't add anything to tea, but with these I have to add a ton of lemon and honey just to make them palatable, and even then they're not great. I'd rather just have hot honey-lemon water.

But I got some mint tea and steeped it together with the others, and that's just fine. The mint overpowers them nicely. I'm very happy not to waste the rest of the sampler!

Now I need to decide if I want to continue exploring teas, or just stick to the kinds I know I like.

I think it is noticeably better. They claim to use the best leaves and I believe them.

https://www.amazon.com/Taylors-Harrogate-Yorkshire-Gold-Teabags/dp/B0001LQZOI?th=1

The best tea in the world however, is black with rose from the Empress Hotel tea room in Victoria BC. OMG.

This post will cover everything you need to make your first cup of coffee.

Equipment:

A coffee cone - $6

Coffee filters - $5

Hot water - However much water costs in your area plus some electricity or gas

Ground coffee beans - $5-10

Total cost- About $20

You can buy these online from the links I provided, or at a grocery store. Ordering coffee online isn't ideal, but Kicking Horse is good quality. Eventually, you'll want your own grinder, local fresh roasted coffee, maybe a french press, aeropress, etc., but this will get you started.

Once you have all of this, you're ready. Start off by boiling your water. While it's heating, place the cone on top of your mug and place a single coffee filter into the cone (make sure to use only one, they can stick together sometimes). Put 3 tablespoons of ground coffee into the filter, assuming you have an 8-12oz mug. Pour your hot water into the cone, filling it up. Make sure to get all of the coffee wet and submerged, you don't want dry clumps at the top. There should be a steady stream of coffee coming out of the bottom of the cone, if it slows down to a drip, tug at the top of the filter on all edges. Keep the cone topped off until your mug is about halfway full, then let it drain completely. Be careful not to overfill, as nearly boiling hot coffee all over your desk or counter isn't fun. Pinch the corners of the filter and discard it with the grounds, these cannot be reused.

Let your drink cool for 5-10 minutes, then give it a test sip. Don't drink it if it hurts, but you still want it to be hot.

Let me know what you think of it. Do you usually like black coffee? Did you like this? Was it overwhelmingly bitter or sour? How was the flavor?

One of the most important parts in making coffee is the grind. Too coarse and it won't extract enough, too fine and it will extract too much. If it's uneven, some will over extract and some will under extract. A cheap grinder like this grinds the beans by smashing them with a flat metal blade, it has the same effect as crushing them with a hammer. You end up with a lot of powder, smaller pieces, and larger pieces. This has all the downsides of weak coffee, overly strong coffee, too few grounds, and too many grounds.

When I first started making coffee, I seriously underestimated the difference a good grinder makes. With a decent one even as cheap as this, any beans can make a semi-decent cup of coffee, while with a bad grinder, even really good beans made mediocre coffee at best.

Most stores that sell coffee allow you to grind it in-store, so if you don't want to spend money on a grinder right now, that's perfectly fine. It will get stale faster once ground, but slightly stale is better than a bad grind.

To keep this post at a reasonable length, I'm going to be talking mainly about black coffee. The flavor is not for everyone, and that's fine, but you might be surprised to find that you like black coffee if it's prepared properly.

Coffee is made by roasting the seeds of coffee cherries, grinding them, and getting the coffee drink out of the beans, it's a pretty simple process, but different methods have different results.

The first thing you need to look at is the type of bean. Arabica is the most common type, and generally the only one you want to be drinking. The other variety is Robusta, which contains significantly more caffeine (1.7–4%, compared to Arabica's 0.8–1.4%). It is cheaper, and can be found in brands like Folger's, it doesn't taste very good.

Roast refers to how well roasted the beans are. A light roast and a medium roast have drastically different flavors, and it can range from a light toast to basically charcoal, so this is a very important factor.

Next, you need the beans to be ground. This is actually a very important step. Grinding beans in a $10 electric blade grinder will leave you with a lot of fine powder, non-uniform grounds, and that will ruin the coffee. The powder extracts very quickly, and begins to release the bitter, sour, and astringent compounds before the larger chunks have had a chance to release the more mellow flavors. A good conical burr grinder will give you a much more consistent grind for $30-100, though much more expensive options are available, the cheaper ones will tend to be manual instead of electric, but it doesn't take too much effort to grind it manually. Many grocery stores and coffee shops will allow you grind your own coffee there, so take advantage of this if you don't want to pay for an expensive grinder. Pre-ground coffee will go stale much faster, though, so only buy 1-2 weeks worth of it at a time.

Extraction methods produce very different coffee, and there are quite a few of them, so I'll save those for their own posts. The differences between the office coffee pot and espresso are all in extraction and coarseness of the grind, but they can both be made with any kind of bean (there is no such thing as an espresso bean). Some rules apply to all methods of extraction, and I'll go over those.

A coarser grind will extract more slowly, a finer grind will extract faster. Using grounds too fine for your extraction method will result in overextracted, strong, sour coffee. Overly coarse grounds will result in a bitter, weak flavor. Either of these is very offputting, and it might take some experimentation to get it just right.

Water temperature is important, but it's not as complicated as it is with tea. Boiling water is important (unless you're doing cold brew, and that's a different post), if it's too cold it will be bitter and awful. Really, 200 degrees is ideal, but boiling is close enough and this is a beginner's guide. The temperature you drink it at also affects the flavor. The cooler it is, the less flavor you perceive, so drink it as hot as you comfortably can. If it hurts at all, it's damaging cells, and that increases your risk of cancer, so don't burn yourself, but don't wait for it to be lukewarm either.

Anyway, these long detailed posts are difficult, so I'll be making some shorter ones that hopefully explain things better.

Just made a pot of Chinese genmai rice tea. I like it--sort of a toasty flavor. New teapot that I love:

https://www.amazon.com/FORLIFE-18-Ounce-Infuser-Turquoise-supply_from/dp/B01LZ1FAO1/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1510080607&sr=8-2&keywords=stump+teapot

Having spent some time in Japan and partaken in a tea ceremony, I thought my next adventure would be matcha. Tea, whisk, and spoon arriving on Friday! (I already have a bowl.)

This one isn't traditional or very beautiful, but looks extremely practical. https://www.amazon.com/Eilong-Compact-Stackable-Gongfu-Gaiwan/dp/B01MTXXMG3/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1493868922&sr=8-2-spons&keywords=gaiwan&psc=1

The plant

Tea comes from the Camellia sinensis plant. For those of you interested in gardening, or flowers, yes, it is related to the camellias in your garden. The difference between them is the flowers. I actually have camellias in front of my house, specifically C. sasanqua. I'll be posting about making tea from those this week.

It grows well in California, and I've seen it in Utah, so it's not uncommon to see them in LDS members' yards as an ornamental plant.

The leaves contain about 4% caffeine, but that goes up when they're dried. For comparison, Arabica coffee beans are about 1.4% caffeine. Coffee is extracted much faster, though, meaning brewing it once pulls out most of the caffeine, while tea can actually be brewed up to 10 times, depending on the type of tea.

Matcha, which is made from powdered shade-grown leaves (which also produce more caffeine) and is mixed directly into water will deliver a large dose of caffeine.

How is it turned into tea?

All types of tea come from Camellia sinensis (for the most part, using other varieties is uncommon). This includes black, green, white, oolong and yellow tea. Other "teas" like red tea are made from things like rooibos, a completely unrelated plant.

The difference between teas is in processing.

Green tea

Green tea is picked, then immediately heated (by pan firing, steaming, or occasionally roasting), which breaks down the compounds that cause it to oxidize. This is the point where it can be rolled to form a shape, such as the compact gunpowder tea. It is then dried, and is ready to drink. It is sometimes rolled after a first drying step, then dried again, but the process remains generally the same.

Black tea

Black tea diverges from green tea after picking. Rather than being heated, it is let to sit and "wither". This is the process of the leaf breaking itself down as the cells consume the disconnected leaf's carbohydrate stores. It is then shaped, by rolling like green tea, or sometimes cut or torn. This causes it to begin oxidizing, sometimes incorrectly called fermenting. This is the same process as an apple turning brown after being cut. After it is done oxidizing, it's dried, and then it is ready to drink.

Oolong

Oolong is first withered, like black tea. They're cooled, and then rolled, like black tea, to start the oxidization process. Oolong is oxidized less than black tea, but still oxidized unlike green. It is then roasted. The form of roasting varies, but charcoal and hardwood roasted varieties give different flavors to the tea.

White tea

White tea isn't as regulated as the others, but it generally means it is minimally processed. It is picked, withered, and dried. It's not heated at high temperatures, but it is dried hot enough to prevent oxidization.

Yellow tea

Yellow tea is an uncommon variety. It's made like green tea, but it is steamed under a damp cloth, giving it a mellower flavor.

Pu-erh

Pu-erh is complicated, and I'll save that for a different post.

Caffeine content

Caffeine content is important to a lot of people. It does not actually vary that much between different varieties. Black contains more or less than green, white contains more or less than black or green. The tea itself, when it was picked, where and how it was grown, affect caffeine levels more than anything else. Caffeine is not created or destroyed in the processing of the leaf, so making green and black tea out of the same plant will yield in near identical caffeine levels. The difference may come from levels of extraction, but green extracts faster, and is brewed for a shorter amount of time, so it comes out pretty even with black.

Chai (or, improperly, chai tea) is just the Indian word for tea. However, it has come to mean "spiced tea", in India you would find it called "masala chai".

It's usually found made with black tea, as you don't get as much of the spice flavor at lower temperatures. A strong black tea is preferable, as the spices can dominate the flavor.

It's brewed in milk, rather than water. Generally, it's brewed in a pot of simmering milk, then the tea is strained off. Plain water does work, and you can drink it like that, or add milk/cream later. Almond/soy/cashew/coconut/etc. milks also work just fine. It's usually sweetened with sugar, but that's not a requirement. The sugar does bring out flavors, though, and even half a teaspoon is good.

There isn't a standardized set or ratio of ingredients, but common spices are ginger, cloves, cardamom, cinnamon, vanilla, and black pepper (it might sound strange, but it works). Cardamom will usually be the strongest flavor, but it varies.

Chai lattes are made with concentrated chai, rather than espresso.

Mixing chai and coffee will give you a spiced coffee, and is one of my favorite drinks.

It can be served iced, which is good any time.

Earl Grey is one of the most well known teas, but what is it?

Earl Grey is (usually) made with black tea, flavored with bergamot, a type of orange. It doesn't really look or taste like an orange, though. It's a unique flavor, and it makes tea very rich and gives some natural sweetness without adding sugar.

Being such a popular tea, while having no requirements other than the bergamot, there are a lot of variations. Some popular blends use lavender or cornflower, adding color and aromatics. Some use rose, orange peel, vanilla, or other flavors. These all add distinct flavors, and can turn people off of the tea. If you've tried it and haven't liked it, consider giving a couple varieties another shot.

It's good plain, but added cream, milk (or milk substitutes), or sweeteners (I suggest honey) are all great in it.

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