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Will boiling water ruin green tea?
- tmtvl 4y agoTL;DR no, but it will make it bitter and astringent because more caffeine and catechins will be extracted.
- PuppyTailWags 4y agoIt depends on the green, though. Good-quality green tea from China can often withstand higher temperatures or long brewing, to the point where it's normal to just pinch some tea in a mug and refill with hot water throughout the day.
- zokier 4y agoI wouldn't say it is matter of quality; or rather lot of high-quality teas can still be quite sensitive to high temps. Gyokuros mentioned in the article are good example
- PuppyTailWags 4y agoPlease re-read my post that I said from China specifically. Gyokuro, a green tea primarily of japanese make and style, does not apply to what I said. I'm thinking of gan lu or mao jian style teas.
- dima55 4y agoThe article this thread is commenting on is about Japanese green tea, hence the confusion.
- archagon 4y agoIIRC, Chinese green tea is a completely different beast from Japanese green tea like sencha.
- jjulius 4y ago>TL;DR no, but it will make it bitter... See, that's where the "no" is actually a "yes" for me. For my palate, bitter tea = ruined tea.
- hnbad 4y agoJust do it like everyone else and drown it in sugar and milk.
- johnea 4y agoHN DDoS'd...
- andix 4y agoIt will make it taste bad (bitter). It’s similar to overcooked pasta. Not ruined, but not good either.
- cinbun8 4y agoI sorta knew this from experience, that high temperature would make the tea bitter. But why is this on HN?
- kwhitefoot 4y agoBecause coders drink tea?
- politelemon 4y agoCoders like <T>
- pacaro 4y agoExcept for the Marxist coders who only drink herbal infusions Because proper tea is theft
- mudita 4y agoAre you familiar with the Hacker News Guidelines (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)? “What to Submit On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity."
- triyambakam 4y agoWouldn't you have this reaction to at minimum 50% of all HN submissions?
- kayodelycaon 4y agoAll teas have "optimal" temperatures and brew times. A lot of green teas do not work well being boiled into bitter disappointment. Before I had to give up caffeine, I recall Gunpowder green tea being less tricky to get right. :)
- taraparo 4y agothe german tea expert Ernst Janssen recommends to also use boiling water to prepare green tea as most of the teas are contaminated with germs and other things. different green tea brands including organic tea brands were tested by the renowned German test.de magazine and they confirmed that, also most of organic teas are contaminated. and since this is nothing you can easily check at home, better use boiling water. https://www.ernst-janssen.com/tee-almanach https://www.ernst-janssen.com/tee-almanach https://www.n-tv.de/ratgeber/Stiftung-Warentest-bewertet-gruenen-Tee-Nur-zwei-Sorten-sind-gut-article23213999.html https://www.n-tv.de/ratgeber/Stiftung-Warentest-bewertet-gru...
- zokier 4y agoThat seems paranoid considering that I have never heard anyone getting food poisoning from tea, no matter how it was brewed. edit: Reading the linked article, it seems mostly concerned about contaminants and not germs. Intuitively thinking, I'd imagine higher temps would end up extracting more of those from leaves to the drink than lower temps?
- StrangeATractor 4y agoYeah it seems so dried out you wouldn't have too much to worry about. As for boiling tea for sanitation, I took a wilderness first responder class and they taught us that you could bring water to a boil at any altitude a human can breath at (without holding it at a boil for 15 minutes as some claim) and it's considered sterilized. In Cusco, that would be around 191F/89C (humans can breathe quite a bit higher up than Cusco). Not a bad tea-brewing temp! Also, I suggest trying kukicha. It's high in l-theanine and lower in caffeine. Tasty too.
- brianwawok 4y ago> Yeah it seems so dried out you wouldn't have too much to worry about. How about the people touching / sneezing on it in the packaging factory?
- 4y ago
- prophesi 4y agoThere's a lot of factors to it. The way the leaves are processed, the quality/freshness of the leaves, ratio of leaf to water, steeping time. I think in general it's safest to brew green teas at 175f. But I'm doing quick gongfu brewing sessions with a late-march sichuan green tea, and it tastes great at 205f. Less intense at the usual 175f, but picks up more subtle flavors.
- triyambakam 4y agoI appreciate the connoisseur vernacular
- prophesi 4y agoBecoming a tea snob helped me stay away from alcohol during quarantine :/
- InitialLastName 4y agoBecoming a whiskey snob just made me wish I could abide cigar smoking.
- brewdad 4y agoHow do you get to sleep? I’ve tried tea at various times as a substitute for an evening alcoholic beverage but the caffeine hinders my sleep. I already drink too much coffee before 10am, so adding more caffeine later in the evening has been a problem when I’ve tried it.
- Avshalom 4y agoI took the simple precaution of moving a mile above sea level.
- colordrops 4y agoAs I get older I notice my senses get less refined and weaker, especially smell and taste, and especially after a couple covid infections. This on top off constant distraction and stress makes it nearly impossible for me to taste any subtlety in things like coffee and tea and wine. To be frank I'm jealous of these people that can dedicate all this time and passion to various techniques and flavors.
- kayodelycaon 4y agoFrom experience, if it’s not a passion or priority, it helps externalize the decision process. Have a friend (or online service) who does the research for you. Then you buy the minimum equipment (a temperature controlled kettle and a strainer) and a few teas. When you get time, brew them to the instructions. If you have some free time, you can start it with a cup of tea. There no need to get massively invested. This is how I learned to paint minis. All I did was buy some unpainted ones and drop by a friend’s place. He has all of the supplies and equipment. All of my unpainted minis are in his closet. :) Edit: By having a friend, I mean if you have a friend who is into tea/coffee/wine/etc. I enjoy hanging out with people who have hobbies I wouldn’t pick up on my own.
- hot_gril 4y agoYep. There's one guy at work who's kinda quiet, but one day he noticed me drinking tea. Turns out he knows a lot about Chinese tea and buys it online (helps that he's from China and familiar with the provinces), so he's given me a lot of recommendations and it's become a fun topic to discuss.
- brnt 4y agoJust be cognisant that it is entirely optional to care. And it is a free choice to care in whichever way you want (you might simply have a preferred supermarket tea brand).
- kayodelycaon 4y agoDefinitely. I don’t bake and even through I have the skills to. Cooking is an occasional thing done for purely utilitarian purposes, even through I could and have done a lot more.
- sva_ 4y agoSadly, boiling water will absolutely ruin matcha. But I'm too hooked.
- FartyMcFarter 4y agoIf you like it so much, it's probably worth buying a kettle with temperature control.
- sva_ 4y agoOh I don't need it, I have an eye for it. I meant that the matcha powder probably has pollutants which might get decreased by boiling it, as the article suggests, but that would ruin the flavor.
- drooopy 4y agoI can confirm. Matcha tastes like crap when made with boiling water.
- olivermarks 4y agoI drink ridiculous amounts of English Breakfast tea with 1% milk every day. The water HAS to be boiling when it hits the tea. You cn really tell the difference if the water is less than boiling. Same but more subtle with green tea imo
- dima55 4y agoDo you actually drink not-bottom-of-the-barrel sencha? If not, your experience is not applicable, respectfully. With even middle-of-the-road sencha the difference is far from subtle.
- olivermarks 4y agoI always thought Sencha was different to green tea, steamed leaves, more subtle?
- elif 4y ago"green tea" is an English term which essentializes Asamushi, Chumushi, and Fukamushi versions of Sencha, Gyokuro, Matcha, Bancha, Genmaicha, Hojicha, Kukicha, Shincha, Tamaryokucha, Kamairicha, Konacha, Mecha, Guricha, Hentaigama, Batabatacha, Wakocha, Karigane, Tencha, Aracha, Yanagi, not to mention the regional specializations.
- ihadtosaythis 4y agoNot to mention the many other varieties of green tea available outside of Japan!
- 3np 4y agoAside from matcha (powdered), konacha (powdered), hojicha (brown) and perhaps kukicha (twigs), most (all?) of the other ones are also just sencha, or loose-leaf green tea. Shincha would just refer to freshly picked sencha, for one. "Green tea" would be 緑茶 (ryokucha). Hojicha is not ryokucha nor green.
- fatfingerd 4y agoI don't think their analysis about caffeine is correct and doesn't cite sources. I've seen a lower temperature for a longer time more often being ideal for maximizing caffeine vs other components in pubmed research on teas, I.e.: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21339166/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21339166/ If one does a lower temperature for a longer time it is often also equivalent to boiling for a very short time a.f.a pathogens. I think the relative bitterness is probably higher for higher temperature brews after normalizing on caffeine.
- calebm 4y agoYes. I've tried it - makes it obviously more bitter.
- voytec 4y agoL-theanine is a hell of a drug! And 65-75°C is a safe bet for almost all greens. Germs won't survive on dried herbs with no access to water. Bacterial spores can survive on dry stuff and these can be inactivated by high temperatures, but 65°C should do. Also, we humans have this cool ability to raise body temperature to kill unwelcome stuff, so we're good until cordyceps evolves. Toxins on the other hand, may be able to survive even boiling. Go for 65-75°C and don't ever taste bitter green tea.
- foobarian 4y agoFunny thing, botulism toxin does not survive boiling temps, but its spores do.
- martinjacobd 4y agoDon't the spores only matter for babies and the severely immunocompromised?
- devilsabvocate 4y agoJust in case you wanted to optimize your extraction technique: "The optimal conditions for extracting theanine from green tea using water were found to be extraction at 80 °C for 30 min with a water-to-tea ratio of 20:1 mL/g and a tea particle size of 0.5-1 mm." https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21735551/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21735551/
- hot_gril 4y ago> A common myth regarding green tea is that it shouldn’t be prepared with boiling water. This is absolutely false[...] Seems to contradict the rest of the article... > So the best way to prepare gyokuro, a green tea with a high amino acid content, is with lukewarm or even cold water. > Sencha can be prepared with hot water for best results. Using boiling water would make it too bitter and astringent. > Lower grade teas like bancha, genmaicha and houjicha, have a light taste and don’t have much amino acids anyway. Thus, they can be prepared with boiling water. I guess it's saying that this isn't always true, but the headline would probably mislead people into ruining high-end tea with boiling water. And I don't see any upside to using it for low-end green tea.
- benatkin 4y agoNo, it's absolutely false because those teas are completely legit because in this case lower grade doesn't mean crappy. If it did that would be reasonable advice to give. If you tell someone never to drink those lower grade teas you're doing them a disservice and that's the only situation in which the advice about never using boiling water would apply.
- hot_gril 4y agoBut does non-boiling water not work well with lower-grade tea? I drink that stuff all the time and find it best with ~180˚F water. Seems like it's reasonable to just never use boiling water for green tea.
- 4y ago
- bsick7 4y agoThis is neat. I always knew that hot water made my green tea taste too bitter for me, but never knew why.
- Groxx 4y agotl;dr: YES. Mostly. A few varieties are alright or maybe even good with boiling water. Houjicha is one that you're fairly likely to encounter (the kinda-roasty / toasted tasting tea you get in many restaurants). But for the vast majority of green teas: heck no, it'll taste awful.
- damontal 4y agoThere was someone on YouTube showing elevated radiation levels in Japanese green tea after the Fukushima incident.
- bhl 4y agoFor all lazy matcha makers, I’d recommend getting a milk frother: it heats up water and also mixes matcha powder. For those who like matcha lattes, I think it’s even more essential as frothing milk makes it more sweet and fluffy.
- eimrine 4y agoI am a tea worm, I use to consume several kg of tea annually. I have often saw recommendation to not overheat tea over some degree of Celsius but when I try this I found the tea not ready. In fact I use to do opposite: I preheat the cup or teapot before throw some tea in it for making the tea even hotter.
- hinkley 4y agoWhen I’ve had loose leaf tea poured for me, the first steep went down the drain. That achieves much the same thing, also gets rid of the little bits that can get stuck in your teeth.
- masklinn 4y agoJapanese green teas are not usually steeped multiple times (though most will allow for a few steepings, and a few are designed for that). This sounds a lot more like chinese teas, which are designed for multiple short steepings (gongfu ceremony) and more or less require a rinsing first steep.
- hinkley 4y agoYou know it’s the same plant right? There’s only so many ways you can prepare and handle wine. The real variety comes from using other plants for the fermentation.
- masklinn 4y ago> You know it’s the same plant right? Yes, exactly like "potato" or "apple" is always the same plant, and they don't each have literally thousands of different cultivars bred for different purposes and use cases. Oh wait. > There’s only so many ways you can prepare and handle wine. The real variety comes from using other plants for the fermentation. Ignoring that neither of these is true, you have hardly given any hint at any sort of knowledge and understanding of the "only so many ways" of preparing and handling anything, be it wine, potatoes, or tea.
- 4y ago
- chunksthree 4y agoIt definitely will. After a couple years of experimentation and testing I've found anything over ~200F is basically undrinkable. It took me so long to figure this out because there were a lot of confounders -- I drank a lot of tea over the holidays back home, and while my parents' town is on the same water source I swear their florination is different, in a way that changes the mouth feel of the tea. I also had a new faucet installed and the galvanization in the new fixture left a strange aftertaste that took some time to track down. It was so bad that I seriously wonder how people can drink things that come out of Kohler faucets. Finally, I had some new mugs that were also causing problems...turns out the were only fired once? I'm not really sure how to describe it but it was kind of like drinking tea out of a soda can. Anyway, I eventually controlled for all this stuff and about 190F is the sweet spot. It's kind of embarrassing how much of an odyssey this all turned out to be, What works for other HNers?
- camgunz 4y agoI got into green tea around 2014 (my how time flies) and I've had a lot of experiences. Depending on how sensitive you are everything can change the taste, but IMO the big three are: - water (huge, huge differences) - type of tea (cultivar, when/ where it was harvested, steam time) - brew temp and time I eventually settled on a system where I heat filtered water in a regular pot with a meat thermometer to the right temp (this is usually between 155-170F depending on the specific tea), pour over tea into a glass pot (through stainless steel basket), brew from 30-60 seconds (again depending on tea), serve. I also measure the water, and weigh the tea on a scale. It might sound convoluted and compared with like, brewing a kettle and dumping over a bag it is. I mostly drink earl grey now, probably as a result. In the summers it's a lot easier, I just dump tea in a pitcher of water and put it in the fridge overnight. Also, I wholeheartedly recommend o-cha.com for tea and peripherals.
- croo 4y agoI read that soft and low mineral water makes the best tea and tried to use water with such values bought from market. It was trash. Tap water where I live is very hard and have a good taste and the tea is much better with it - so my experience contradicts what I found about the topic on the net. Are there any objective parameters of water which makes a better green tea?
- tempodox 4y agoI've been making my mint tea with only-almost-boiling water since forever. Just tastes better, even if it may not technically count as “green tea”.
- suction 4y ago[dead]
- FlyingBears 4y agoI think I am loosing my taste buds - my preference is for gunpowder tannin flavor, which I get by pouring whatever the hottest water setting is on my pot ~208F.
- kriro 4y agoIt all depends so much on the tea. There are many, many varieties of green tea. My goto for an "average" green tea is a maximum of 70C and for most other teas (Oolong, Red etc.) it's 95C but the temperature is only one variable. Leaf to water ratio and steeping time are the other two. I usually brew Gongfu style (more leaf, shorter steeping times). For a nice Gyokuro on the low end of the temperature scale, I usually go with 50C and 6g/100ml of water/120 seconds steep and then increase the time in 30 second increments for the next two brews. After that I increase the temperature to about 70 degrees to squeeze out another brew or two but it's the first three that I'm really after :) My goto "lazy" green is a Long Jing which can take hotter water (I usually go to around 80C) and it's just my daily tea so I usually brew it "western" style 0.6g/100ml, 2min first brew, 3min second brew. It's a lot of fun to experiment with different teas and do comparison tastings (I did this quite a bit for white tea with the same tea brewed at different temperatures, steeping time etc.). But beware, it can turn into a bit of an obsession :) And don't forget to smell the tea and leaves after brewing. It's one of the nicest things about a good cup of tea.
- onethought 4y agoThat scene from fearless comes to mind: https://vimeo.com/15687220 https://vimeo.com/15687220 Enjoying tea is more to do with the individual, than the tea itself.
- teo_zero 4y agoThe title is misleading. It has nothing to do with boiling, but rather with temperature. Where I live, boiling water is well below 90°C and does not ruin green tea.
- lakomen 4y agoThere are so many blog posts about green tea being healthy. Every time I tried some its taste was revolting (like drinking dirty feet water), and it created a rough feeling in my throat. I usually drink peppermint and/or camomile. If not solo, the mix must be 50/50 or it also tastes like old socks. I also like various fruit teas, or blends like orange and curcuma, rose hip/hybiscus. As a European I don't understand the green tea hype.
- dotancohen 4y agoThis is why I've never drank dirty feet water or tasted old socks. Europeans have some strange food habits.
- code_duck 4y agoI’m not sure why that would have been your experience. Decent, well-prepared green tea should have a very mild grassy flavor and aroma. Possibly, as far as the rough feeling in your throat, the tea was prepared with too hot water or steeped too long, which releases astrigent chemicals as described in this fine article.
- Dowwie 4y agoNext question is whether the ritual washing of tea and warming of cups is necessary
- munchbunny 4y agoMaybe? It’s like blooming coffee, it makes a difference, but how much does that matter to the specific drinker? The same goes for water temp. I found that I could tell the difference but for tea I regularly drink I couldn’t be bothered to break out a thermometer. But if it’s the good stuff I totally would be doing more of the ritual.
- t3rra 4y agoAfaik not using boiling water is because it burns and that causes cancer
- hnbad 4y agoI think you're confusing boiling with searing. I guess anything could be a carcinogen at the right dosage but generally the advice is not to sear meat because that results in carinogenic particles. There is a similar process in deep frying. But boiling is a different process, especially with tea where even if the water is boiling when poured it will rapidly cool down below the boiling point. As the article explains, boiling water extracts different substances to different degrees than warm/hot water. Specifically it will extract more of the bitter-tasting compounds and can break down others.
- numpad0 4y agoI think one questions that people here might be having is how is the water of correct temperature is actually prepared. Do people just know how to heat water to 60C? That sounds unlikely, doesn't it? In traditional tea ceremony, known amount of tap water is added to boiling water. Comes out okay if protocol is punctually followed. In more casual situations, there are buttons and lamps on electric kettles to cycle through common temperatures. That works if you are going to serve dozen guests at once.
- throwaway1777 4y agoYeah my kettle as a 140F setting. Works for me. I also use 170F for Yerba mate.
- bamboozled 4y ago“Shit people who actually drink green tea don’t care about”
- nahnahg 4y agoYes. And so will following a strict recipe. You need to tune it yourself. Below boiling is better. Use. Your. Tounge. As if you need to be told, or can't tell.
- a_c 4y agoTemperature, length of brewing, water hardness all affect the taste. Boiling water gives the tea a bitter taste. Trying brewing gyokuro with boiling water in front of a Japanese. Both the Japanese and the tea grow bitter because of it. The effect is very prominent. Houjicha and bancha are low end tea. (Btw, are they even considered green tea?) Do whatever you want with them. It's like choosing the best glass for a table wine, it doesn't really matter. Black tea, on the other hand, is more forgiving in brewing. Tangentially, how popular is green tea in the UK? It seems quite niche?
- leidenfrost 4y agoSometimes native doesn't mean right. Try brewing yerba mate in front of an Argentinean/Paraguayam, using using a thermal bottle. Also, boil the water in an electric kettle and pour a bit of cold water on the bottle to bring back the temperature to 80°C They'll go bananas on how mate isn't served like that, on how you ruined it, etc. But you can do it like that just fine. And it can be perfectly brewed like that and the taste will be the same. People just like treating their ceremonies like shaolin kung fu.
- bb123 4y agoGreen tea in the UK isn’t a staple like black tea is but it is still quite common. All supermarkets tend to carry a good range of teas including green, jasmine, mint and chamomile.
- aww_dang 4y agoI've always enjoyed the bite of bitter, astringent green tea. The tannin flavor just grabs my palate. Probably not for everyone, but it doesn't ruin it for me.
- korginator 4y agoThe article misses the other very important points - brewing time, and water:leaf ratio. The taste of your tea depends a lot on the quality of the leaves. I've used a wide range of Sencha leaves, some of them absolutely hate high temperatures beyond 70℃ while some others happily brew in 85℃. Brewing times can drastically affect the bitterness of the tea even at lower temperatures because of how the catechins are extracted. In my experience, the first 30-60 seconds can make or break the taste - this is when the temperature must be just right. I've got a variation to tweak my tea's taste by starting to brew at a slightly lower temperature for about 60-90 seconds and then adding some water at 85-90℃ at this point and letting it brew a bit longer. Some types of sencha teas respond well to this approach, and I feel this brings out a little more of its caffeine content and a hint of bitter / astringent flavours while not overwhelming the overall taste. It also depends on what you're trying to achieve with the tea. Using the exact same leaves, I sometimes like to brew a very mild warm tea, and at other times the same leaves can be brewed at a higher temperature for a more full bodied tea. My approach is to experiment with a new batch of leaves to quickly identify its boundaries re: temperature and time, and that gives me a lot of room to play with and experiment :)
- scns 4y agoI once read about a japanese method for green tea. The first cup is for the enemy, brewed with boiling water for a few seconds to pull out the bitterness and discarded. The second is for a good friend and the third is for you. My brother once told me, that a japanese professor measured how much of the healthy substances gets drawn out at all temperatures. He found 60°C to be optimal. I used 80°C for 2nd & 3rd brewing though, since i really dislike the taste at 70°C and lower.
- onebigmob 4y agoI've always read that you don't use boiling water because it destroys the catechins which provide the majority of the health benefits of drinking green tea.
- awesome_dude 4y agoI am EXTREMELY disappoint that the Caffeine produced by the plant to defend itself from pests, and also alters my brain chemistry such that hormones emitted by tired neurons are ignored... doesn't kill the bacteria :'(
- randomcarbloke 4y agoI tried this over the weekend, different temperatures worked better for different teas which is frustrating, also I found the best tea was to prepare two pots, one boiled and one on the cooler side of lukewarm and then mix together the results, favouring slightly the cooler prepared tea.