Tea

[owlfish]

For various reasons, I've been thinking about tea this week. I went through a whole box of Lemon-Ginger while working through my ear infection last week. (Now all gone, I'm happy to report.) Lemon-Ginger is an herbal tea, more strictly an infusion, for tea plants are not involved in its production. It's my favorite tea - I like both the Twinings and the Yogi Tea versions. Any variant of lemon or ginger tea involving rosehips is, however, Right Out. The rosehips dominate, and that's not the flavor I'm after.


"Fruity" and "Herbal" tea in the sense of infusion only - that's why "Flavored Tea", meaning flavored tea-plant tea, is listed separately.

[Poll #857897]

Comments

[makyo.livejournal.com]

I particularly like lemon and ginger with a dash of lemon juice and a bit of honey.

[owlfish]

Have you ever made lemon and ginger tea fresh? (i.e. fresh lemon, fresh ginger) It's much stronger than the version in tea bags, and much more invigorating. For relaxation, the teabags are really better.

[purplecthulhu.livejournal.com]

I've never really bothered with herb/fruit teas (OK, infusions) until a recent meeting in Austria. We were too high up for real tea to brew properly - the water doesn't get hot enough before it boils - but there was no problem for infusions, and the ones I had were really quite nice.

[owlfish]

I'm more than happy to call infusions teas, but some people are picky about it, so I tried to dodge potential pedantic complications with the poll by a bit of prepedantry.

One advantage of some kinds of infusions is that some of them aren't harmed by leaving the leaves/bags in the mug/pot for long periods of time. It's obviously more elegant to remove them, but if I'm being lazy, I can leave my freshly boiled mug of lemon-ginger on the counter for twenty minutes before wandering back to drink it, with no harm done to the resulting flavor.

If you'd needed caffeine and had green tea handy, green tea is usually brewed at cooler temperatures than black tea is.

[ancrenewiseasse.livejournal.com]

Hee. I like the word "prepedantry."

[a-d-medievalist.livejournal.com]

OF course, on really cold days when one doesn't have to drive, Glühwein is very nice ...

[owlfish]

Good point! I knew I was overlooking good warm drinks.

I may need to look up Glühwein recipes in the near future, since it'll be another month before the usual sources of it appear.

[owlfish]

Mulled cider! I would choose that over all the options thus far.

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

I would choose hot water on a cold day if I were only allowed to drink one thing all day. If it were only one drink on said day, I might choose tea or hot chocolate instead if I felt like the caffeine (okay, theine, technically) and sugar wouldn't do me any harm.

Incidentally my body responds much differently to green tea than to black tea, so I might drink that all day if it were a permitted option, or some herbal infusion. I took 'tea' to mean 'black tea' in the question.

No idea whether this makes sense, I seem to have lost most of my brain into tissues today.

[owlfish]

As someone who now wants to put "mulled cider" as her answer to the fourth question, I can attest that it's a poorly put together one. By "tea" in that question, I meant "all kinds of teas and infusions"; but I didn't actually spell that out.

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

Also: apple juice, heated up in the microwave or stovetop with some cinnamon in it.

[snowdrifted.livejournal.com]

I used to be a strictly black-tea gal until the last few years, but now I enjoy some nice chamomile in the evenings. Now that I have more interesting blended options it's more a matter of remembering to drink them than anything else.

My cold day choice surprised me a little, but since this fall, I realize hot chocolate really is my first choice. Something about holding a cup of it in cold hands that's comforting.

[ancrenewiseasse.livejournal.com]

If I had only one choice of drink on a cold day when I was sick or on a really cold night when I couldn't warm up, it'd be a hot whiskey. Whiskey, hot water, lemon slice with cloves, and cinnamon: it just doesn't get nicer than that.

But for most days (hot or cold), yeah, it's tea all the way.

[justinsomnia.livejournal.com]

I love the idea of tea, but I only ever drink tea when I'm sick (and then I practically drown myself in it). I always tell myself I should get more into tea, but it never happens ... mostly because I think everything I drink should taste like candy, and the teas that are good for you don't lend themselves to such things.

On a cold day, if it was early enough in the day for caffeine, I'd want a chai "latte" (in quote marks because that's a silly name for it). I do think there are not enough good warm drinks though. There also needs to be a hot equivalent to ice cream (i.e. a smooth creamy hot desert).

[littleowl.livejournal.com]

"There also needs to be a hot equivalent to ice cream (i.e. a smooth creamy hot desert)."

Warm pudding is like that :) Lovely stuff.

[littleowl.livejournal.com]

I had a really hard time answering the cold day question. I'm a hot chocolate fiend, but when I think about my ideal way to spend a relaxing cold day at home, it's cup of tea, quilt and a book that springs to mind, not hot cocoa.

Hot cocoa is more for breakfast in winter or coming in from the snow after spending the day making snowmen and sledding.

I also adore hot cider, but only drink it in the fall/winter, whereas I'll have tea year 'round.

I usually do put milk in my tea, but I'm also happy with just a bit of honey for sweetness, I don't usually combine milk and honey though. I don't really like sugar in my tea, cold or hot. If I were having tea at a tea room or in company, I'd want it strong, with a splash of milk and no lumps.

I love chai, but I only really get it when I'm going to Starbucks. I just ... really like their chai. I also like to make my own chai, but that doesn't happen often.