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I have a question for you as a Brit. I live in an Asian household (my wife is Asian). We have a hot water boiler, as most Asian households do. It keeps 4L of
by jedberg 3y ago
I have a question for you as a Brit. I live in an Asian household (my wife is Asian). We have a hot water boiler, as most Asian households do. It keeps 4L of water at "tea" temperature at all times (after boiling it).
When we want tea, we just fill up the cup with the already boiled and ready water. It's super efficient because it's super insulated so it barely takes any energy to keep it hot after it's been boiled.
Why don't Brits (and other tea drinking cultures in Europe) do this?
- porbelm 3y agoLegionella I kid, but there's something about "fresh" water probably?
- jedberg 3y agoThe water stays way above the temp for legionella. And the water is still pretty fresh, it ends up getting replaced every other day or so in winter. And in summer we just replace it once in a while anyway. Also it will reboil after a certain amount of time.
- davnn 3y agoAt least in the German-speaking market there exist said solutions, but they are not very common (yet?). I believe keeping 4L at near boiling temperature is still less efficient than individually heating and it takes less than a minute with 3kW.
- L_226 3y agoNow all the German speaking market needs is tea that actually tastes good.
- mhandley 3y agoAccording to Twinings tea: Always use freshly drawn (filtered if possible) cold water in the kettle. Tea loves oxygen as it helps the flavour develop. Most of us are guilty of the following... looking at the kettle seeing there is some old, used water in there and simply re-boiling. If you keep re-boiling the water in the kettle, it loses all of its oxygen and you’ll be left with a really flat cup of tea. If you boil the kettle with fresh water, you’ll have a delicious cup of oxygenated tea that tastes divine. https://twinings.co.uk/blogs/news/how-to-make-a-cup-of-tea-perfectly https://twinings.co.uk/blogs/news/how-to-make-a-cup-of-tea-p... I'm not sure how much difference this makes, but when I use the hot water boiler at work, the tea definitely tastes slightly off compared to using a kettle at home. But it's also possible the hot water boiler at work is not producing hot enough water.
- Astronaut3315 3y agoAn Asian style water boiler maintains the temp just below boiling, so there isn’t any reboiling throughout the day. Think of it as a water boiling thermos. You’re meant to replace the water daily. Not sure how many follow that guideline. ETA: Only the so-called “hybrid” models have vacuum insulation. It’s worth the extra charge.
- scotty79 3y agoWarmer water loses dissolved gasses faster.
- jedberg 3y agoBut as it cools the gasses reintegrate. So I'm not sure the science backs this up. Water at the same temp should have the same amount of dissolved gas regardless of how it got to that temp (given enough time for the gas to reintegrate).
- mindslight 3y agoI think you're incorrectly discounting that time aspect. If you leave a glass of tap water sitting out, eventually there will be a bunch of bubbles clinging to the sides of the glass. This doesn't happen immediately, but rather over many hours. Similarly, I would think that boiling water won't reach its gas equilibrium during the course of making tea, but hot water sitting around waiting to be used will.
- jrockway 3y agoI agree with this. I develop my own film and the way I manage water is to boil it, put it into sealed bottles, and store those in the fridge. This avoids bubbles more readily than just using tap water (which is over 20C in the summer anyway, which is why I do the refrigeration thing). No, I don't have an aerator on my tap either. Obviously that introduces a lot of bubbles.
- 3y ago
- Astronaut3315 3y agoI’ve had a 4L Zojirushi boiler in the US for about 15 years now. This is the best solution for those who complain about 120V kettles.
- walthamstow 3y agoSome do. It's become a popular addition to a middle class kitchen. All offices have them. As to why Asian households have it and we don't, I think it's simply that we have been boiling water in kettles since the stoves ran on coal, and the electric kettle is just an upgrade of that same old system Not to mention the age of our housing stock. The Asian households you refer to, when were their homes built? I'm guessing much more recently, comparatively speaking.
- fragmede 3y agoWhy is the age of the housing stock relevant here? An Japanese-style water boiler is an add-on kitchen appliance, like the Instapot or an air-fryer, so, cultural differences aside, you'd expect similar adoption rates. Given that we haven't, there must be some cultural component as to why.
- desas 3y agoSome people have instant boiling water taps with tanks, they're not unknown but rare and becoming increasingly less so. I think this is because a) they're relatively new here and b) last time I looked they cost about £1k plus fitting. The Japanese water boilers look like they cost £200ish (vs £15 for a kettle) and are bulkier than a kettle. They will save practically no time - kettles boil fast here and while they're boiling it gives you time to put the tea in and any other preparations.
- jedberg 3y agoIt just occurred to me that Japan also uses 120V (actually I think they use 100V), so it may be just a matter of speed. You can boil water a lot quicker with your 240V outlets than we can with our 100-120V.
- wheels 3y agoYou're not taking the amps into account. Voltage without the amps on the circuit breaker is pretty useless. Quickly Googling indicates that a standard residential circuit breaker in Japan is 30A (3000 watt max), meaning you'd get more power than you would in the US with 120v / 15A (1800 watt max), and much less than where I live in Germany with 230v / 16A (3680 watt max).
- laurencerowe 3y agoWhat is tea temperature for you? As I understand it black tea which Brits drink should be made with water at close to boiling (100 C) while green tea should be made with water at 80 C. My pet peeve in the US is ordering a cup of tea and getting a cup of cooling water and a teabag by the side. Fine for herbal or green tea but terrible for black tea.
- jedberg 3y agoMy boiler lets me set the hold temp at 208f(97.8C), 195F(90.5C), and 175F(79.4C). So basically you can do all the different "ideal" temps depending on which tea you make the most. We keep it at 195 since we don't make black teas, and then we can let it cool down to whichever tea we want or just mix it with some filtered cold to get it to temp.
- hot_gril 3y agoMy pet peeve is ordering hot tea and finding out they only have coffee or iced tea. I've also gotten hot tea in a plastic melting cup a few times.
- psd1 3y agoThe hot urn cannot be more efficient than boiling the correct amount of water each time. The limiting factor is the specific heat capacity of water. If daily consumption is 2l, you have to put in the joules to raise 2l to boiling, either way. If you have heat losses during the day, there's your inefficiency.
- jedberg 3y agoIt is of course less efficient. I never said it was more efficient. But it's more convenient.
- HDThoreaun 3y agoHow many people are boiling the correct amount each time though? I fill my jug up all the way and then keep reboiling which seems less efficient as the boiled water keeps cooling down.
- bjornasm 3y ago>Why don't Brits (and other tea drinking cultures in Europe) do this? Because it is better to boil the right amount of water to the precise temperature when you need it, as it takes virtually no time.
- bombcar 3y agoI can boil enough for a cuppa in my weak US electric kettle in no time at all, so I have to assume a UK super kettle is nearly instantaneous.