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Measuring how much leaf to use

As something of a newcomer to tea, one of the more puzzling aspects of making tea is measuring how much tea to use. Many teas come with no intructions at all. Those that do rarely mention weight.

From my reading of the tea faq, this ng, and various online sources, I have come to the conclusion that absent other instructions, the general recommendations are for one level teaspoon per cup, where a cup is 6 ounces.

Before I go further, is that a good starting point?

Measuring tea leaves by volume is at best imprecise. One teaspoon of a fairly dense tea, like a gunpowder, will weigh considerably more that a teaspoon of a large-leaf tea.

I decided to calculate the g/tsp value for each tea and use that, rather than tsps, to measure the tea. This is best done with a larger volume. So, when I get a new tea, I measure whatever amount I have by volume and weight. I then calculate g/ml, g/tsp, and g/cup values. These calculations are in a little Excel spreadsheet.

When I want to make a pot, I start with the g/tsp value for each 6 oz cup (180 ml) of water and adjust from there.

I had a 1/4 lb bag of the Sencha I mentioned in my previous post. I dumped the whole bag into a measuring cup and then weighed it. The numbers from my Tea spreadsheet are:

230 ml Volume 114 g Weight 0.496 Density (g/ml) [=weight/volume] 2.44 Density (g/tsp) [=(weight/volume}*4.928922]

These values are available to calculate how much leaf to use depending on how much tea I want to make.

The spreadsheet also has several rows where I can enter the amoumt of leaf I want to use (in g/cup) and the amount of water (in ml). The spreadsheet will calculate how much tea I will need and a few other parameters. If I want to use 2.5 g/cup, such as for that Sencha, here is some data various pot sizes.

Pot Size Oz Cups g/cup g/pot tsp/cup 180 ml 6 1.0 2.5 2.5 1.0 300 ml 10 1.7 2.5 4.2 1.0 500 ml 17 2.8 2.5 6.9 1.0 1,200 ml 41 6.7 2.5 16.7 1.0

If I decide to try a strong brew, say 4.0 g/cup, I get:

Pot Size Oz Cups g/cup g/pot tsp/cup 180 ml 6 1.0 4.0 4.0 1.6 300 ml 10 1.7 4.0 6.7 1.6 500 ml 17 2.8 4.0 11.1 1.6 1,200 ml 41 6.7 4.0 26.7 1.6

I realized that this is a lot more "meticulousness" than some here like to see. Whether or not you belive that this "engineering" approach to tea making will ruin the experience, can anyone comment on whether this approach is accurate?

Cheers

Reply to
Square Peg
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i weigh each time i make tea, 2.5-3g per cup, depending on the type and cup size. buy a 10$ pocket digitaltea from deal extreme, shipping included

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when you can estimate the weights per each tea with your eye, you can forgo the weighing. i like weighing, it is part of my ritual at work. i get paid by the hour at work, so i am being paid to weigh and drink tea, all is good. for your method you have to have sheets on each tea.

are you correcting for humidity? tea drying over time, adjusting the weight of the tea source ? tilt of the earth axis ? solar / moon cycle ? tides ? light photons impacting on the tea weight at a molecular level ? additional neutrons due to sunspots ? we are at a low sunspot period in time, this will lower the neutrons arriving, decreasing the weight if you weighed the mass at a high sunspot activity level.

if you are going to be so accurate, there is no limit to the intricacies of accuracies you can involve.

i hear some ppl just take two pinches and steep. now tell me, how can a person enjoy such a simple method. they must be missing out, without invoking these extensive, faulty spreadsheets of tea.

their tea enjoyment is so basic, it must be lacking, no ?

Reply to
sjones12

SP is an ISTJ personality type. His (her?) world is different from that of most of the rest of us. Toci

Reply to
toci

I think you need to work on your diagnostic skills. I am actually an INTJ. You did get 3/4 right, but you said it as if it were a fact.

You also need to work on your interpretation skills. What you said, that I am "world is different from that of most of the rest of us", is generally accurate, but misleading. First of all, none of the 16 types accounts for more than 14% of the general population. See

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So the world of even the most common type (ISFJ), is different from that of most of the rest of the population. Your "us" does not exist and/or is certainly not a majority unless by "us" you mean everyone who is not my type, but then that's also true fo your type.

In any case, the M-B is a lightweight instrument even by the rather loose standards of personality tests in general and of little use outside of social mixers, team-building workshops, and psychology graduate classrooms.

See, no topic is too trivial to be analyzed to death. ;-)

Reply to
Square Peg

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