Cast Iron Kettle

These kind of pots suck. In fact you can't even boil water in them, because of the lining. (That's what instructions on mine said, I think this applies to all of these pots). And they make terrible tea, it may be because the iron sucks out a lot of heat when you pour. I think I only had good results with one type of tea, but I don't remember which it was.

The only good thing about these is that you can't break it and it has a very nice, solid feel to it, you just know they're built to last.

If I was forced to use one I'd experiment with pre-heating the whole volume of the pot.

Infuser basket is so small that it's best not to use it at all and instead pour through a strainer into a second pot (or just the opposite - brew somewhere else, preheat entire volume of the pot and then strain tea into this pot).

I'm trying to remember which tea worked ok with it and I think it may have been a medium-grade pu-erh. If you get one or more teas to brew well in them please let us know! I really love how heavy this pot is, I just hate the tea I get.

[mike petro] Am I correct that these were really only meant to boil water and not actually to steep in? [corax] hi mike!

you may recall reading that marshaln does use his as a kettle: see at e.g.

and but his are not lined, i'm sure.

You hit the main points. You can think of Iron as a metallic tea cozy. Iron cools off boiling water fast but maintains a higher temperature ideal for 'cooking' Japanese thick teas or as you said perfect for brewing shu puer. I find them impractical more than anything else. I might bring my bookend Joyce Chen because you know everyone will bring their gongfu pots for the puer tasting event next weekend.

Jim

PS Noth> Mike Petro wrote:

...welcome back...