Simple tips to enjoy a nice cup of tea at office

At our hectic and busy work place, many of us would love to enjoy a few cups of nice tea to get through our day. Some of us may prepare tea at home, fill it in a thermos and bring it to work. Long time ago, I had the same practice before when I was working for someone. I recalled when I was drinking tea from the thermos, I had nothing but surprise. I thought I prepared green tea; yet, it turned out to be so brown in colour, plus, the flavour was completely different from the fresh green tea I’d prepared at home in the morning.

Tea kept in a thermos is oxidized by heat

Tea contains antioxidant. Usually, antioxydantss are easily oxidized. The antioxidant acts as a shield that gets oxidized before other substances in the tea. This is why it is called antioxidant. In a way, the constituents in tea have a property that is so much easier to get oxidized. Therefore, if you keep the warm green tea in a thermos, oxidation will occur, resulting in a brown colour tea like the black tea, and the tea taste becoming astringent. In chemistry explanation, the catechin in tea conjugates each other, forming a substance called tannin. This tannin is the substance that appears in brown and causes dryness/astringency. The formation of tannin is an irreversible reaction; once the tannin is formed, we cannot change it back.

How to prepare a nice cup of tea at work without consuming time

As mentioned, tea will turn brown in colour when kept warm. However, its freshness would remain if it is kept in a cold condition. Considering this fact, we can prepare a very thick tea, let it cool at once, and then bring it to work. Using this thick tea as an undiluted solution, we can then add-in boiling water before serving. Usually, I use about 20% of undiluted tea with 80% of boiling water. As a result, the tea is hot enough and it remains fresh just like a freshly prepared cup of tea.

There are a few important points to take note when you prepare the tea.

1. Use less water. I normally use 5g of tea leaves in 200ml of boiling water.
2. Infuse the leaves for about 10 minutes and extract the taste and flavour as much as you can.
3. Once tea is ready, get it to cool as fast as you can

Infuse tea for more than 10mins

The preparation method

With any tea, this method can be followed.
Preheat the teapot with boiling water. Leave it for about 10 seconds and discard the hot water.
Place 5g of tea leaves and pour in 200ml of boiling water.
Infuse it for at least 10 minutes. For the less heat sensitive tea such as deeply fermented oolong, black tea or pu-erh ripe tea, you can even infuse up to 20-30 minutes.
The main requirement is to get a very highly concentrated tea. Later at our work place, we can then dilute this thick tea solution for up to 5 times. Moreover, from a 200ml undiluted solution, about 1 liter of tea can be prepared. All you need to obtain is the boiling water in order to enjoy a nice cup of tea at work.
Another tip: It is not necessary to prepare the crude tea in the morning. You can prepare the tea one day before and keep the undiluted solution in the fridge.

I brewed green tea in the glass teapot so as to show the color.