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Some tea bags may shed billions of microplastics per cup

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Re: Some tea bags may shed billions of microplastics per cup

#251

Post by JCharante »

hdrujvw-4579 wrote: post #84
roboys wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My buddy used to work for Lipton. He explained that they use the cheapest grade of tea (dust) available. Also many tea companies mix non-tea additives (fillers) to their tea bags. After hearing this I decided, if it's not full loose leaf, I don't drink it. We found that companies like Elephant Chateau ( http://elephantchateau.com ) deliver the 3 highest grades of tea direct from Ceylon mountain estates with the optio…

pg tips used to sell a tea that came in a brown/oragne box. It was rich and tasty but somehow they discontinued it. Lipton and many teas in the US taste of cardboard. It baffles me how people find anything in it to keep buying it.

I just bought a 320 pack of Lipton black tea. I don't drink it for the caffeine. To me the black tea tastes good, but I know that better tea exists. I'll have "good tea" when I visit friends but I'm just not personally interested in hunting down the store in Dalat that my friend likes to get her tea from. Lipton still tastes good to me.

Re: Some tea bags may shed billions of microplastics per cup

#252

Post by mumblemumble »

ozzmotik wrote: post #209
mumblemumble wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW, I'm personally fond of tea dust for cold brew, too. This summer I've been very much enjoying gyokuro dust steeped overnight in the fridge as my morning beverage. Not only is it less expensive than the whole leaf stuff (essentially free vs. some of the most expensive tea I own), but I think that works better with that brewing method, too. Probably the main reason I don't use Lipton instead of the good stuff when…

where do you get your gyokuro from? the last time I had it was literally almost a decade ago and I absolutely loved it but I haven't been able to really find it except for expensive online retailers that strike me more as vanity brands than anything. but if you know of any good sources, id love to check them out

I get it from a local tea place that specializes in chinese and japanese teas. It looks like the price I'm paying is a bit higher than what I'm seeing from a cursory look on the Internet. No idea how the quality compares.

Re: Some tea bags may shed billions of microplastics per cup

#253

Post by pndy »

roboys wrote: post #53
simias wrote: post #7

Loose tea is often cheaper and of better quality in my experience. If you brew tea a lot using a reusable strainer seems like a much better choice. I'm also entirely convinced that these plastic pyramid-shaped bags are pure marketing. Then again, I find Lipton tea absolutely terrible regardless of the shape of the bag.

My buddy used to work for Lipton. He explained that they use the cheapest grade of tea (dust) available. Also many tea companies mix non-tea additives (fillers) to their tea bags. After hearing this I decided, if it's not full loose leaf, I don't drink it. We found that companies like Elephant Chateau ( http://elephantchateau.com ) deliver the 3 highest grades of tea direct from Ceylon mountain estates with the optio…

I've switch 10 years ago from bags to loose tea and since that moment I can't drink tea with sugar anymore - maybe all that bagged dust stuff was more palatable sweetened back then? No idea. But one thing is sure, I can't switch back to bags and each time I have to drink such, it's a nightmare - esp. the occasional Lipton cup tastes like worst thing under the sun.

Re: Some tea bags may shed billions of microplastics per cup

#254

Post by sharadov »

limograf wrote: post #232
sharadov wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Try PG Tips, it's the best tea you can get in a bag. Lipton is shit, I agree!

Hm I'd say Yorkshire Gold is the best tea bag. Second tier are Williamson Afternoon and Ringtons Breakfast, Yorkshire Red. Third tier, Twinings etc, acceptable but not lovely. PG Tips is on the third or fourth tier, at least.

Am gonna have to try it!

Re: Some tea bags may shed billions of microplastics per cup

#255

Post by Bartweiss »

sandworm101 wrote: post #154
comtn wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Celestial Seasons uses high quality ingredients, offering tours for anyone in the Boulder, Colorado area. They also use a patented pillow bag according to their FAQ: unique pillow-style tea bag that doesn't need a string, tag, staple or individual wrapper—and as a result, we save 3.5 million pounds of waste from entering landfills every year.

>> we save 3.5 million pounds of waste from entering landfills 3.5 million pounds? Of tiny strings and staples? Wouldn't that require literally billions of teabags to reach 3.5 million pounds saved?

That number looks about right for "because of this, every one of our teabags is recycled instead of thrown out", which is obviously not true. But it could also be a supply-chain stat, where the landfill mass of those strings and staples is measured from cotton and iron, instead of the finished products.

Re: Some tea bags may shed billions of microplastics per cup

#256

Post by Bartweiss »

Spivak wrote: post #244
AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IIRC (struggling to find a source), Thomas Lipton was the guy who formalized the tea-leaf grading process for Western Europe. The "legend" goes that back in the day, all of the imported tea would be dumped onto the floor of a particular room. The first round of tea producers would come and extract the full, unbroken tea leaves for top-shelf tea. The next round of producers would extract the broken leaves for mid-grad…

I guess my question as a non-serious tea drinker is whether the dust actually makes for worse tea or is just ugly.

There's a taste difference on two levels.

First, the higher surface area brews differently - faster, which is convenient, but changes the ratios of what's infused. That's not inherently bad, matcha is green tea specifically prepared to be served that way, but it's usually detrimental to a tea intended for larger leaf brewing.

Second, sitting around powdered in paper sachets means far more air exposure. This is basically the same type of difference as fresh-ground and powdered coffee, which isn't hard to taste.

If you drink tea with milk and sugar, I'm not sure it matters. But for straight tea, it matters at least as much as for straight coffee.

Re: Some tea bags may shed billions of microplastics per cup

#257

Post by gambiting »

dTal wrote: post #250
gambiting wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tea + lemon + sugar is the only way to drink it. True madness is milk in tea, those two liquids should just never go together. And coffee...I guess that's why the best most delicious coffee I buy is literally whatever is cheapest at Lidl - milk and sugar make all coffee taste acceptable. //obviously, I realize that people around the world have different tastes :P Where I am from literally no one drinks tea with milk,…

Logically, even if milk and sugar made all coffee taste acceptable (spoiler - they don't) that still wouldn't explain why specifically the coffee you buy from Lidl is "the best, most delicious coffee you buy". In point of fact, cheap Lidl coffee is actually weirdly really really good.

I was being facetious obviously, by trying to imply that even the cheapest coffee is "the best and most delicious" because the milk and sugar make it all taste the same regardless of coffee beans used. But yes, Lidl's coffee is actually weirdly good despite being unrealistically cheap.

Re: Some tea bags may shed billions of microplastics per cup

#258

Post by shanecleveland »

deeg wrote: post #202
shanecleveland wrote: post #121

I drink tea over coffee (for digestive reasons), and I assume I am missing out on really good tea. Any readily-available loose-leaf tea recommendations?

I drink a lot of tea and my dealer of choice is uptontea.com (by coincidence I ordered $80 of tea today). Pretty much everything they have is high quality. I prefer Darjeeling black teas; try one of the cheaper blends to see if you like it. Get a good $5 strainer and you'll be good to go.

Thanks! Placed an order today.

Re: Some tea bags may shed billions of microplastics per cup

#259

Post by uadjet »

ozzmotik wrote: post #209
mumblemumble wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW, I'm personally fond of tea dust for cold brew, too. This summer I've been very much enjoying gyokuro dust steeped overnight in the fridge as my morning beverage. Not only is it less expensive than the whole leaf stuff (essentially free vs. some of the most expensive tea I own), but I think that works better with that brewing method, too. Probably the main reason I don't use Lipton instead of the good stuff when…

where do you get your gyokuro from? the last time I had it was literally almost a decade ago and I absolutely loved it but I haven't been able to really find it except for expensive online retailers that strike me more as vanity brands than anything. but if you know of any good sources, id love to check them out

https://www.hibiki-an.com/sp/index.php/cPath/21

This is a farm I quite like. They're high quality and not a terrible price point since your buying directly from the farmer without a middleman.

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