Brewing guides
Some teas are unforgiving of boiling water
Two methods, one temperature chart, and the five mistakes that ruin good leaf.
Pick a method
Gongfu or Western — both are correct
Gongfu gets more out of a leaf and asks for more attention. Western gets you a good cup on a weekday morning. Every tea we sell ships with parameters for both, printed on the pouch and listed on its product page.
Gongfu
A high ratio of leaf to a small vessel, steeped for seconds rather than minutes, over and over. You are not making one cup — you are watching a tea change across six to eight of them. This is how the teas on this site were tasted when we bought them.
Western
One mug, one steep, done properly. Lower leaf ratio, longer contact time, and a second infusion if the tea has it in them. Most oolongs here will give you two; the roasted ones will give you three.
Water temperature
The key to western style brewing
A kettle that only does “boil” will flatten a high-mountain oolong and turn a yellow tea bitter. If you buy one piece of equipment this year, buy a variable-temperature kettle.
No kettle? Boil, then let it stand: roughly 30 seconds off the boil per 5°C you need to lose, in a room-temperature vessel.
By tea
Parameters for everything we sell
The same numbers appear in the “How to brew it” block on each product page. Print this one and keep it near the kettle.
| Tea | Gongfu | Western | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Leaf & time | Temp | Infusions | Leaf & time | Temp | Infusions | |
| Qing Xin “Legacy Cultivar” | 5 g / 100 ml · 20s+ | 90°C | 6–8 | 3 g / 250 ml · 3 min | 85°C | 2–3 |
| Jin Xuan “Gold Standard” | 5 g / 100 ml · 20s+ | 90°C | 5–7 | 3 g / 250 ml · 3 min | 85°C | 2–3 |
| Frozen Summit “Dong Ding” | 6 g / 100 ml · 15s+ | 95°C | 6–8 | 3 g / 250 ml · 3 min | 90°C | 2–3 |
| Bug Bitten Wuyi “Golden Nectar” | 5 g / 100 ml · 15s+ | 95°C | 6–8 | 3 g / 250 ml · 3 min | 90°C | 2–3 |
| Cui Yu “Green Jade” | 5 g / 100 ml · 20s+ | 90°C | 5–6 | 3 g / 250 ml · 2.5 min | 85°C | 2 |
| “Yunnan Imperial” Yellow | 4 g / 100 ml · 25s+ | 75°C | 4–5 | 3 g / 250 ml · 2 min | 70°C | 2 |
| Purple Yunnan Black | 5 g / 100 ml · 10s+ | 95°C | 4–6 | 3 g / 250 ml · 3.5 min | 90°C | 2–3 |
Scroll the table sideways on a narrow screen to see the Western columns.
Troubleshooting
Five ways a good tea goes wrong
It tastes bitter and thin
Water too hot. Bitterness in a light oolong is almost always temperature, not steep time. Drop to 90°C before you shorten anything.
It tastes like nothing
Not enough leaf. A rolled oolong looks like more than it is. Weigh it once — 5 g is a surprising volume — and you will not need to weigh it again.
The first cup is great, the second is empty
First steep ran too long. Gongfu steeps should climb: 15s, 20s, 25s. If you start at a minute you have spent the tea in one go.
It tastes flat and slightly stale
Water, not tea. Distilled and heavily softened water strips the body out of a cup. Filtered tap or a low-mineral spring water is what you want.
It was good last month, not now
Storage. Air, light, and kitchen smells. Keep it sealed, opaque, and away from the spice shelf; a green oolong is at its best within a year.
