And no, the microwave is not a valid option.
I put the teabag in first so the hot water will hit it and move it around and release the flavour.
This is the way!
This is the way
That’s a great way to make the air inside the teabag expand but not be able to escape through the wet paper, making the teabag float on top of the water like a confused little fish that just escaped a dentist’s aquarium.
That’s why you dunk it a few times until it sinks!
I usually drink coffee so the water goes in before the teabag, although to be fair the teabag never goes in.
Tea bag first, then freshly boiled hot water.
This is how you scold the tea
Perfect
This is the only answer
Take your hatchet and slash some leaves in the misty fields of Kerala. Make sure it’s monsoon flush, so roughly july to september. Then, chop up an old Ginkgo Biloba that looks wise. Leave it to dry in a Kenyan plain for three years, and head for Nepal. There, you will gather the purest glacier water there is. By then, your tea leaves will be dust. Go buy some Lipton and microwave tap water, it’s all you can do at this point. And, uh, teabag first
First step is to gather sticks under the bushes.
Start a fire using paper, newspaper, cardboard, then add sticks and make a larger fire.
Heat up water until boiling.
Add tea bags to thermos and pour the water inside. Now we have 2 days worth of hot tea.
Optional delicious step: pop popcorn
Thankyou for preventing microwave comments. Its an abomination
You will be deported from Ireland for putting the water in first.
They’re designed to deliver the maximum amount of flavour in ~20 seconds.
So: bag first, then just-boiled water. Wait/steep for 20-60 seconds, fish out the bag with a teaspoon and squeeze against the cup, and then milk.
How do you milk your teabag?
Nice. :)
But next you’ll be saying you don’t know how to use the 3 seashells…
I’m not sure why the hate for microwaves exist. It’s literally just another method for making water move fast. It has absolutely no impact on the final product, as hot water is hot water no matter the heat source.
Heating water in the mike is fine. Heating already-made tea in the mike is fine. Heating water with a teabag in it in the microwave is the vilest act.
Yes, this is one of the more bizarre cultural differences. I have seen people from the UK object strongly to Microwaving water.
Microwaving food definitely affects the way it tastes because it heats unevenly. Cooking foods different ways affects the outer browning, moisture levels, etc.
Heating water in a kettle on the stove, an electric kettle, a sauce pan, or a microwave doesn’t change the water! If you don’t want to seep tea in boiling water, then let it cool slightly first.
True, but also disgusting and you should be ashamed.
I live in the US and I strongly object to microwaving water. But I am also /really/ into tea so I avoid tea bags as much as possible.
Part of the cultural difference is that US is largely 110 and the UK is 220. It’s faster and easier to use an electric kettle. In the US, the microwave heats up the water “faster” vs the stove or an electric kettle
It is not simply ‘just another method to heat water’. There is a significant difference between microwaving and kettle/stovetop. Microwaving risks superheating resulting in flash boiling causing an explosion of steam and boiling water. This is also why microwaved water has foam appear when inserting anything into it. Bubbles that ‘should’ have formed didn’t and are now doing so at the nucleation points whatever you inserted provided.
That foam, while an indication the water was close to erupting, is otherwise harmless but ruins the tea/coffee for me and I’m sure others too.
You know you can wait like 15 seconds before opening the microwave and putting something in, right? Even with my electric kettle I give it a few seconds before doing anything.
Thx Tips. Waiting 15 seconds is no guarantee the water isn’t superheated. If you actually want to ensure microwaved water won’t erupt put a wooden toothpick or spoon in it while nuking.
Do you have any statistics regarding how likely a water eruption is? Because I microwaved water daily for nearly a decade without issue.
The turnstile removes most of the risk because super heating is a lot more difficult with moving water. Plus, most glasses aren’t perfectly smooth and have plenty of imperfections to provide nucleation points.
Explain to me how lab statistics would help? Then explain how you could generate useful statistics using the extremely non-standardized settings of every unique household in the world?
Now that the absurdity of wanting statistics is set aside… Microwave caused superheating of water is a well studied and understood phenomenon. There are things that reduce the likelihood, sure: air bubbles created by modern low-flow taps, general impurity of tap water, and scratches in used containers all provide nucleation points and reduce the likelihood of superheating.
All it takes is jossling a new mug so the air bubbles all float out, with a particularly clean supply of city water (or filtered is a common culprit) and that thing you’ve been doing for years blows up in your face at 105oC.
Not previous poster. A helpful statistic would be recorded medical incidents. Treatment sought for burns from microwaved superheated water could be used as an indicator of how much of a danger using a microwave oven to boil water is. Full disclosure, electric kettle user, bag before water.
Tea bags got many microplastics…
Those that are made from this mesh-stuff like that „premium“ Lipton shit? Yeah, I wouldn’t use them. Afaik, paper-teabags are safe?
Who knows, they might soak the paper in arsenic or some shit
Neither. Tea bags are for chumps. It’s so much tastier to use fresher loose tea leaves of whatever mix you prefer (and you can control how strong you make it, plus you end up with less waste). I just boil the water in the microwave then when it’s hot I take it out and add the tea.
unfortunately, i believe the microwave was not an option.
Does it make a difference that the tea is never in the microwave? It’s only the method for heating a single cup of water, not of heating the water+tea set.
The teabag. Otherwise it would float on top, similarly to why you put cerial in before milk.
You use so much milk and so little cereal that the cereal would float?
You don’t?
I like milk being just at or below cereal height, myself.
Microwave the water on high for ten minutes, drop the teabag in, and run for my life
