Serve a great cup of tea even if you aren't a tea drinker yourself

Lots of people enjoy a cup of tea instead of coffee at the end of dinner. If you don’t drink tea yourself, don’t worry. It’s simple to offer a great cup of tea.

Types of tea
If you look into”real” tea you’ll find that there is black tea (fermented), oolang (half fermented) and green tea(unfermented). In North America “real” tea usually means black tea, although green tea is becoming more popular.

Herbal tea is just boiling water poured over dried fruit, flowers or herbs. Sometimes this is called a tisane, or an infusion. There is no caffeine in herbal tea. Don’t get hung up on all the classifications and types.

Two choices are enough, and they keep!
Don’t get hung up on all the classifications and types. Remember, you’re not a restaurant and you don’t need to have lots of choices on hand. Just offer a choice of “real” tea or herbal tea. You’ll find plenty of both on your supermarket shelves. They last a long time, so even if you don’t use them too often they will keep. Loose tea will last about two years, and teabags are good for six months or more. So you don’t need to worry about the tea becoming stale the way you do with coffee beans.

Storing Tea
Keep your tea in a cool dry place, in the dark. Don’t put it in the frig or in a clear container.

Tea leaves vs tea bags
If you’re a tea lover yourself, you may prefer to purchase tea leaves instead of tea bags. The tea in teabags is usually broken, smaller pieces of lesser quality leaves. But if you prefer the convenience of teabags, just go ahead and use them.

If you use tea leaves you probably already have a tea ball or strainer to put the tea leaves in. If you’re buying a tea ball, buy larger rather than smaller. This gives the tea leaves room to float around.

Brewing a good cup of tea
Use fresh tap or bottled water (not distilled). Don’t re-use water that has been heated already, it is oxygen poor and won’t make as good a cup of tea.

Heat the water just to boiling and pour it into your teapot to heat it.

Empty the teapot and put in your tea. Use about a bag per cup or a tablespoon of tea leaves per cup.

Pour boiling water over the tea and let it steep for a few minutes. Green tea should steep for about 3 minutes, black tea can steep a little longer, not more than about 5 minutes. Remove the teabags if you used them. If you used loose tea it will settle to the bottom of the teapot.

Serve with milk and sugar on the side so guests can choose what they like.

Serving tip

I like to use a real teapot at a dinner party. I also choose cups with a built in base. Mugs seem a little informal for a special dinner party, and cups and saucers can be a bit of a nuisance. So I compromise with the built in base.

Enjoy this ending to your dinner!

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