Green Teas hate me and nearly always come out bitter. Is it my tap water?

DAVIDs has some nice teas; I wouldn’t worry about not being able to buy stuff online right away.

Could be your water. Does it have a lot of flavour when you drink it straight? Maybe try getting some filtered water and seeing if that makes a difference? (I think most grocery stores have jugs of filtered water for cheap, or you could get a filter pitcher for home.)

I wonder if you’re using too much leaf for the quantity of water and steep time? I’ve definitely had some unpleasantly bitter cups from doing that.

You might also do a quick pour on, pour off steep if you’re brewing gong fu style, and see if that improves it. This way you can also get multiple steeps from the same leaves and see if the flavour improves with subsequent steeps. It could be that even 25 seconds is just too long for those teas.

I hope you figure out it. It really sucks to feel like there’s a lot of potential in a tea but be unable to draw it out.

I brew a lot of Ashikubo, and you are brewing it too long for sure. I use a kyusu and pour in water that is cooler than boiling, and pour out the tea immediately, aka flash brewing. It will get bitter sitting longer than that.

This might be a silly question: are you brushing your teeth before drinking tea? Toothpaste activates the bitter receptors on your tongue (or something like that). It also makes drinking orange juice right after brushing a pretty nasty taste too. I’ve met some people that couldn’t stand tea (supposedly), but they tended to be the same people that brushed their teeth like 6-8x a day (which isn’t good for your teeth or gums, at all).

I’m not familiar with the greens that you’re brewing though, so perhaps they’re just hyper sensitive. Or they might be overleafed. Green tea can get a bit overwhelming if the leaf to water ratio is too high.

^THAT is an interesting question from Flyawaybirdie, and a good one.

I can give you my brewing parameters if you want to give them a shot. I have never had trouble with bitter tasting green teas this way. I brew Chinese and Japanese green teas a bit differently but it seems you are mostly brewing Japanese so I’ll give you those parameters. I do all my brewing gongfu style in a gaiwan. This should work in any vessel though, be it a kyusu or even an infuser mug.

I always use filtered or spring water. That’s a must for me, not only because the taste is more neutral but because it leads to less mineral buildup inside my kettle. I used to always use spring water, but I did a taste test with spring vs reverse osmosis filtered water and i preferred the taste from the filtered. It’s significantly cheaper, so I’ve been using it ever since.

For Japanese teas like sencha this has always worked well for me, but I don’t recommend it for Gyokuro, as I’ve never brewed it and from what I read online you need even lower temps. There’s a brewing guide for Gyokuro here if you’d like to see it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gyokuro

For Sencha/Bancha and the more usual Japanese green teas, I use 2g of leaf per each 100ml of water. I always weigh tea leaves, so I’m not entirely sure what this is like in scoops but I’d guess probably a level teaspoon or slightly more than that weighs about 2g. Leave the lid off as you are brewing, as steam can cause the water to heat up more if the lid is closed.

First Infusion – 1 minute at 70C/158F
Second Infusion – 20 seconds at 75C/167F
Third Infusion – 30 seconds at 80C/175F
Additional Infusions – Add 15 seconds to each, same temp. as third

I find that this method of slowly heating up the tea from one infusion to the next ensures that the tea stays rather hearty, creamy, and lacking astringency. There will be some bitterness for some teas. That’s just how some are, but I have never felt like it is overwhelming with this method, and many of the teas I brew this way produce no bitterness at all.

If you give that a shot, let me know how it worked out for you.

Hope you figure it out. Best of luck to you!

Thank you all for the suggestions! And the toothbrushing thing I knew about, but I never drink tea right after brushing my teeth, so its interesting but not the case :‘) I don’t know if we have hard water or anything

Overleafing is a possibility! I’ll try using less leaf next time. I ran out so I’ll pick up another 10g to practice with for sure! Its a bit weird though because I used the same amount of leaf for the ashikubo as I did the Japanese sencha, which turned out nice… So.. Weird.

I’ll try using bottled water after trying less leaf and seeing how that goes. I find my water tasty and fresh, I live in the greater Montreal area. In contrast, water in the US is awful (no of fence).

Are you using tap water directly? Or are you using a water filter like Zero Water? Unfiltered tap water has loads of dissolved solids in it and should not be used for tea. The Zero Water pitcher does a great job of filtering water and can be found in local stores or Amazon etc.

I would definitely take a look at your leaf amount as others have said. Five minutes can also be too long for most green teas. The Ashikubo Sencha is a higher grade and likely to be more sensitive. I worked there for about a month and would never brew it for more than a minute or two.

Keep practicing its all part of the learning process

I’ve had similar problems, and over time, I’ve found ways that work for me. I almost never follow brewing instructions. I’ve found them to use too much tea, and for too long a time.
For delicate greens, I use filtered tap water. (Mine is brown and bitter on its own, so I’m not putting that in my tea!). I usually start with just 1 tsp of tea leaf, and I steep no longer than 30 seconds the first time. Often 25 seconds is enough. I’ve had too many ruined at 40 seconds or higher. If the tea is too weak at 25-30 seconds, you know you can add a bit more tea next time. Mostly I found that cool and filtered water is a big key!