Airing out tea?
Howdy!
So I bought some flavored black tea, and it has a strange taste to it. I guess I’d describe it as musty? It’s more of an after taste… hopefully nothing bad… I was told it’s do to how some places flavor the tea.
Anyways, I talked to one of my friends, and they said I should probably try airing it out (leave the tea tin open overnight).
So I was wondering, do some flavored black teas have an after taste, and does airing out tea really help?
What is the brand and flavor exactly?
Well I have never heard of airing out tea. As far as I know tea and air are not a good mix! However I will say that I have found problems with A LOT of Adagios tea flavorings!
Yeah, I was skeptical when my friend told me to try airing it out…
I was weary of flavored teas, but like Adagio’s normal(?) teas, so decided to give it a try.
While I prefer the flavors of unflavored tea – natural tea that is – straight teas – however one wants to say it – don’t give up on flavored teas like this! There are some extremely wonderfully flavored teas to be tasted! Butiki Teas for example are artesian crafted delicious teas to be cherished! Such as Butiki Teas Cantaloupe and Cream – delightful. Lupicia Tea has wonderfully mastered flavored teas, as well as many others. My favorites will always be teas that are just that – TEA that evoke flavors all of their own NATURALLY but please do not let this experience with Adagio to jade you from trying more! :)
Air is one of the four elements that you should avoid when storing tea – the other three are moisture, heat, and light – these will make the tea stale.
Some teas have a musty character, so if this is part of the tea’s character, I don’t believe you’re going to rid the tea of the mustiness by airing it out.
Many of Adagio’s teas have a harshness to them, I think that certain flavors bring it out more than others, and I find that the custom blends tend to have less harshness to them, and I don’t know why that is. But I don’t think that airing out the tea will solve your issue.
I think you should try other teas out there, Adagio is not the best source (in my opinion) for flavored teas. Butiki Teas has some wonderful flavors out there. I love 52Teas. Kally Teas has some nice flavors as well. There are a lot of companies out there to choose from that you might find more to your liking.
I’ve also had issues with Adagio’s flavored blends, they’re bitter and a little… weird tasting. I think brewing them at a lower temperature and for less time really helps.
You could try airing out a small portion of the tea and see if it makes it better or worse. It’s generally advised that you limit tea’s exposure to air since it causes quicker degradation in quality.
Good luck!
I am speculating here but it could be that your tea is old. If this is the case you could try “washing” your tea. Just pour hot water over the tea and immediately drain it, then pour hot water over it and let is steep as you normally would. I have tried this with some fairly old teas that tasted dead when brewed, and it livened them up a little. I have no experience with Adagio teas but it could be that they are mixing flavored elements with older teas in order to get rid of old stock and assuming that the flavoring would cover up the age of the tea.
I’ve found most of the flavored blacks offered by Adagio to be rather harsh. A lower steep time/temp improves them, but I haven’t yet had one that’s palatable without milk and sugar.
I’m going to play devil’s advocate a bit, and say that airing it out might help.
Follow Mercuryhime’s advice, leave a little bit out overnight and try it.
Everyone above is 100% correct: you normally want to expose tea to as little air/light/heat/moisture as possible. All of those will degrade the flavor of tea.
However, this tea already has a strong flavor that you do not enjoy. There is a chance (small or otherwise) that letting the flavor of this tea degrade will make it taste better to you. Why? Because as you leave it exposed, the hope is that the bad flavor erodes quickly, and the tea flavor that’s left is still enjoyable.
It’s a crapshoot at best. But if it takes tea that’s strong and bad and turns it into tea that’s weak but drinkable, I’d call that a success.
Also, is there a chance that you oversteeped it? I know a lot of places recommend 4-7 minutes for blacks… and I find 3 to really be the sweet spot, especially with more middle-of-the-road blacks, as I’m expecting the adagio to be. :)
I have aired out fishy smelling shu puerh mini tuo cha in the past, but I wouldn’t air anything else.
Airing out if some puerhs will for sure help but I’ve never aired out any others.
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