Does anybody wash their loose leaf tea before steeping?

I rinse or “reawaken” my leaves by using the same temperature water in which I’d steep the leaves. I give them a quick rinse for about 10 to 15 seconds (pour the hot water over the leaves as if I were going to steep them, wait 10 – 15 seconds, and then pour off the liquid), and then start the steeping process. Generally, I only do this for Oolong, Yellow or Pu-erh teas mostly because I steep these in my gaiwan, and it’s easier to do the rinse with my gaiwan than it is to rinse with my Breville.

I also was my loose leaf teas before steeping, particularly with oolongs and pu-erhs. It helps awaken, as mentioned by LiberTEAS, but also to get rid of any possible dusts that may have settled on the tea for whatever reason. For the same reason, I try to do a quick rinse of any type of loose leaf teas I drink. I’m also a little bit of a germophobe. I use hot water, ensuring all of the leafs have been touched by it, wait about 10-15 seconds and then pour it out.

No, but I buy a lot of flavored black teas. Honestly, rinsing them would probably ruin the experience a little. Plus, with black teas, since you’re steeping them in almost-boiling water, most biological agents are going to get wiped out.

If I was making a more ‘pure’ leaf tea, and it was something that steeped at a less-sanitizing 160 degrees or so, I’d get more paranoid I think.

yes, and if you’re buying good quality loose leaf, have the time and want a better taste, you can too. Although tea is not really ‘dirty’, it’s never cleaned and there’s some dust which settles on it when

- it’s drying on the floor of the farm/processing factory - as it’s being processed (in vats or in ovens) - smoke/charcoal dust when it’s roasted/fired - dust from roots/other leaves - dirt in the packaging location

If you’re buying good tea, I wouldn’t say there’s a hygiene reason necessarily, but if you make it a ritual to wash the leaves first, then it will benefit the end brew a bit. Hope that helps!

I’ve noticed with green teas (especially gyokuro) a quick rinse of the leaves really helps the overall flavor significantly. I don’t leave the water on as long as the other posters though, only 3 seconds maybe.

In the Chinese brewing style, we usually rinse the tea before brewing. The most purpose to rinse the tea is to wake up the tea to make the active ingredients contain in the tea can be easily to dip out, this is the fundamental purpose of rinsing tea.

When rinsing the tea, we should do not rinse the tea for a long time. Because the first brewed tea contain more active ingredients, which are not only beneficial to human’s health, but also taste good. Therefore, the first brewing, also means rinsing tea, the liquor should be poured out less than 3 seconds. If the time lasts too long, the active ingredients in the tea will be lost in large amount. The water temperature should be the same as that you will use to brew the teas. For green teas and white teas, the rinsing temperature should not to be too high because of the tender buds which picked in early spring. Even, it will affect the taste of the tea. For the ripened puerh tea I usually rinse for twice because it has a pilling process which may cause some impurities.

To me it depends on the tea. Pu-erh I always wash. Sometimes I wash oolongs and greens but hardly wash black.

I rinse oolong, and drink the rinse water (I’m not encouraging all people to do so…)
I rinse puerh, and don’t drink the rinse water (I would discourage all people from drinking it…)
I never rinse green tea or most of the other teas.
Actually I’m thinking of making two more labels for my teas –
One for green tea: “Please, please do NOT rinse.”
One for black tea: “Please, please re-steep.”
:-D

I am curious as to how people rinse their leaves. If I am concerned about dust or pesticide residue, these may not rinse away through my fine mesh strainer. If I use a bigger strainer, I may lose leaves from smaller tea leaves like Keemun and such.