One 3-min infusion vs 3 1-min infusions?

One thing not in your equation: caffeine. The quantity of cafeine releases will not be the same one.

Each tea is different. I have more then 40 tea at home and for most of them I will not use the same quantity, time and temp of water. Some tea you can just do one batch and after that it lost the taste, and some you can do up to three batchs (and increasing the time of infusion). But for each batch, less caffeine will be involve and it will taste more and more less (will taste more water).

Best way to know it. Try it. That's what I do.

Michel Tea Amator spending around 1000-2000$ per year in tea Moscou, Russia

Good point. I guess I wasn't focused on the caffeine because (a) I don't think it affects the *taste* much if at all, (b) I was mainly interested in the bitterness, and (c) I seem to be almost completely immune to caffeine. ;-)

My main purpose was the bitterness that you get from steeping too long. It seemed odd to me that a tea would become bitter with one long steeping, but that same tea could be steeped over and over again without becoming bitter.

If a tea would become bitter if steeped for, say, 5 minutes, then I would expect that same tea to become bitter on the fifth 1-minute steeping (re-using the same leaves), assuming that the total amount of tea and water and the steeping temperature are constant.

But caffeine does affect the taste. Caffeine is quite bitter, acutally. I suspect that's one reason colas have so much sugar.

Aren't you assuming that your sensory response to bitter substances is linear with respect to their concentrations? And if you are, do you have evidence for that?

/Lew

You are correct. I should have checked that.

No, I don't think I am assuming that. In fact, I would think that a linear response (correlation) would make my argument stronger.

I have read in many tea discussions that over-steeping (longer steeping times) causes bitterness by increasing the tannins in the liquor. If this is true, and it certainly seems to be, then the tannins are not released until after some amounbt of time that varies by the type of tea.

Let's say I steep a green tea for 3 minutes and it becomes bitter. Then I steep another batch for 2 minutes (all other conditions the same) and it is not bitter. I conclude that the tannins are mostly released in that third minute.

Now what will happen if I were to resteep the leaves from the 2-minute batch for another minute? I would think that it would be very bitter.

But there is a problem. The two steepings (2 minutes + 1 minute) are not equivalent to the one 3-minute steeping. For one thing, the two steepings produced twice as much tea from the same amount of leaves.

I think to make it equivalent, I need to decrease the water in the two-step experiment. I am not sure if I should use half as much water for each steeping or 2/3 as much for the first, since it is 2/3 of the time.

I ran a few crude experiments with inconclusive results. I will trey again when I get some free time. I know everyone is waiting with bated breath for the results. ;-)

I think you are right on with the tannin theory. I seem to have a vague and unscientific understanding from different sources that the tannins may be released in larger amounts as the tea is steeped for longer. One good reason to make short steeps instead of one long one is if you mess up one of the steeps, you can still have another go at a decent cup of tea. If you over-steep your leaves in one long steep with more water you are stuck with a lot of undrinkable tea.

When I drink certain Chinese Oolong teas such as Wuyiyancha and Dancong, I find that fewer leaves in more water wont give me the same sort of flavour as using the same amount of water and making multiple infusions. This may be partly a water temperature problem, though. I ought to admit to my bias for small, multiple infusions, partly for aesthetic reasons.

If you do increase the temperature of the larger steeping, you may risk injuring your green tea.

The whole doesnt equal the sum of the parts. Tea solubles is much more complex than just tannins.

Jim

PS Brown tannins bad, red tannins good

Square Peg wrote: ...a weak cup of tea taster better than a good cup of coffee...

Probably not. I am trying to understand how it is different and what makes the difference.

No doubt. I am not saying that tannins are the whole story. I'm actually less interested in what the chemicals are, at this point, than in what the results are.