Trying VIRAL TEA TREND - How to Brew Tea in a Tangerine!

Hey teaheads! This is Don, and Celine from Mei Leaf. Today we're going to be trying out one of those recipes that we saw on social media, to brew tea, to check it out, see if it's any good, and see if it needs approving. The recipe, you've seen it, right? Celine, Yes, I have seen it. You cut it, you take out the juice and stuff in it, then you heat it, or you don't heat it, you put tea in it... Don You put tea in it, you bake it... Celine Are you baking it? Don You heat it, you punch some holes in it, you brew it, and it makes delicious tea. Usually, on these social media feeds it's all filmed so beautifully. Celine It's beautiful. Don It's got a lovely, soft focus in the background. It's all lovely. But does it taste good? Celine That's what I wonder. Don That's what it's all about. So let's get stuck in. So we're going to cut this orange. Celine Yeah. Shall I do it? Don No, I can do it. Do we do half? Celine I'll take the stuff out. Don Maybe a bit less than half to give it a bit more. Celine A bit less than half, yeah. Don All right, so we're going to go here. Now, the depulping is going to be a bit of an annoyance, I think. You can try that. Celine I think I can handle it. I think I've done enough oranging for Iana. Don Mm-hmm. For our little girl. Celine To do it. Don Okay. Yeah, it looks good. It's doing a pretty good job. Okay, orange depulped, as you can see. Looking good. Although it's still got a bit of residue, but you can't do anything about that. Now we're going to punch, what do you reckon? One hole? Two holes? Celine Oh, wow! A big hole. Okay. Don Well, it's going to be stuffed with tea, right? Celine That's true. Don One hole like that? Celine One hole. Don One hole. Celine One hole. Don Then we're going to put some tea in, and we're going to put in some Superior Keemun, just because it was a black tea in the video. Celine It was a black tea. Don It looked Keemun-like, so I'm going to put that in here. Nice. Celine Wow! That's a proper Gong Fu brew serve. Don Yeah, and you could like make that little Gai Wan lid. I've seen other stuff like that where they sort of use it as a Gai Wan lid. There's lots of fun things out there, but I'm always suspicious that they're just little fatty things that aren't actually going to do anything. Right. So now we're going to go over here. We're going to turn this bubba on. Celine Yeah. Heat that orange up. Don Heat that up, and we're going to bake it. So we're just sort of heating it, warming it. I guess the idea is that all of the essential oils in the orange skin are going to make their way through to... You didn't like that. Celine No. I could have eaten that. Don We can still use it. Celine It's all right. It's all right. I'll be a bit tea-flavored. Don Yeah, exactly. Like I said, the heat will infuse the tea leaves with an orangey flavor. So that's now hot. We're going to put that on there, and we're just going to sort of bake it a little bit. Celine I just wonder if the whites of the orange is going to make it bitter. Don That is exactly my concern as well. Is it going to be pithy? Celine Yeah, pithy. Don Also, how much of the essential oils, which are on the outside of the skin, are going to go into the tea? Celine Exactly. Maybe it's by going through. It might hit underneath the skin. Don There will be some transfer, but I don't know how much. Okay, so that looks pretty scorched to me. I mean, I could go more, but it's starting to get quite soggy, so I'm going to turn this off. Right. Now we've got some hot water here. Don Yeah, that's hot. Right. Let's pull out... Celine Dan. Don ... a Gong Dao Bei. Celine Cups. Don I mean, it looks kind of cool. You put that on there. That's kind of funky. I kind of like it. What do you think? Celine Yeah. Don It looks good, right? Celine It looks good. Don So we're not going to be rinsing our tea, obviously. Celine Obviously. Don We've got 90 degree water, 93 degrees. That should be okay for Qi Men. All right, here we go. Our first try at this orange-brewed tea. Celine Does it work? Don Well, it doesn't. Nothing's coming out, so let's just see what's going on here. Celine It's too much leaves? Don I don't know. All right. First issue, drainage. Celine Ah! Don There we go. Celine Lovely. Don Maybe because I baked it, it like closed the hole. Celine That's true. Don All right, let's see. Celine I think you need more water. Don Yeah, we're going to now let the water infuse down. Clearly, the drainage is one of the issues. When we saw it on Instagram it was like, perfect drainage. Now I'm making a mess, aren't I? Celine Did they put the same amount of leaves? I can't remember. Don Well, you know me. Always a lot of leaves. All right. Come on. Yeah, it's not very happy, is it? But it's draining. Celine It is draining. We will have some tea. Don I guess you want sort of about 30 seconds or so, in terms of a drain. So this is probably more. I probably put a bit too much leaf in. Celine Do you want to take some out? Don No, no, no. It's fine. It's fine. So, you know, as I said, all of these shots that you see on Instagram are carefully choreographed. I wonder how many times they've actually shot them, and they all look so beautiful and soft-focused. That ain't us. We're just about trying to get it right. I'm not happy with that. But anyway, we can taste it. Let's put the orange in the Gai Wan. Let's tidy up this mess. All right. Here you go. Put it on, and let's taste this tea. So this is our first sample of the orange black tea... Celine All righty. Don Done in a very messy, styly... Celine As we do. Don Cheers, everybody. Celine Cheers! Don The social media sensation. I can smell the orange. That's nice. Celine Oh, true. Don Pithy. Celine Oh my gosh, so pithy. Don Pith, pith, pithy. Okay, so the first problem is that white pith you can taste. tea. Celine No. Don That is bitterness that comes from pith. Celine That's pith. Don And I suspected, or you suspected, and we both suspected, pith may be an issue. Celine Yeah. Don So the first issue was drainage. The second issue was pithiness. Celine Yeah. Taste, if there wasn't a pithiness, I think it would be quite nice. Don But my issue is it's a little bit orangey. Celine A bit too orangey. I feel like it's covering the tea a little bit. Don It's a little bit too bright orangey, rather than deep orangey. So I think we need to change the citrus fruit. I bought tangerine, so we're going to test that out. So first problem, drainage. Second problem, pithiness. Big problem, pithiness. Third problem is the oranginess of it. Tea type is all right. I think it could match, but we're going to have to look at that a little bit. But yeah, I wouldn't say that that was a success. I wouldn't be going back to it. Don So we're going to have to sort of sit down and think about how we're going to improve this. Okay, so the first thing we want to sort out is, is orange right, or is tangerine right? So I've got an orange and a tangerine here. We've got the same tea in here, Keemun. What we're going to do is we're just going to take... Celine Oh, some zest. Don ... some zest of orange, and stick it in here. We're going to take some zest of tangerine and put it in the other one. There's a bit more of the tangerine, isn't there? We've got to make it even. Something like that. We're going to just brew them up and see which one we prefer, because that's the easiest way to test it, rather than doing all of the palaver with the holes. Yeah, that way we can be... One thing at a time. Let's just take it like one element at a time. Celine I'm intrigued. I feel like the tangerine will be sweeter. Don Tangerine just generally has more aromatics, doesn't it? They're a more deeper set, the aromatics, and I think that they're richer. Celine Yeah, and also just smelling them. Look, that's more sweet compared to that. Don It's not just sweet. I actually don't find it more sweet. I find it more like complex. Celine Okay. Don Whereas that one just feels like, when we drank it, it was just a bit orangey. Straight-up orangey. Celine True. Don Yeah, you pour that one. All right. Celine All right. All right. All right. Don Let's see which one we prefer. Here you go. Taste a bit of orange. Celine Thank you very much. Okay, I get the tea. I get the orange. Don That's nice. First of all, that's nice. Celine It's very nice. Don So currently, as it stands, don't do that. Just put some zest in with your tea. Much easier, much better, but less Instagrammable. Celine Yeah, very much. Don Less TikTok-y. Celine Yeah, but you don't get the pithiness of it. Don No. Celine It's smooth. It's sweet. The orange isn't overpowering, which is nice. Don But it is still a bit simple. Celine But it's still a bit orangey. Don Okay. Have a taste of that one. Celine Okay. Mmm! Oh! I prefer that. Don Yeah, just by the smell. Celine You're right. It's more complex. So you get some of the orange note, but it's not so orangey. It's like a bit more of a deeper kind of resinous note. Don Yeah, it somehow blends with the tea a little bit more. Celine Ah, it's so much nicer. Don Right? At least with smell. Celine Yeah, yeah. Tangerine all the way. Tangerine all the way. Don A hundred percent. Tangerine wins. Tangerine comes from Tangiers. It originally comes from China, then was imported into Europe via Morocco. Tangiers, Tangiers, Tangerine. A little bit of knowledge for you. Celine Very nice. Don That is so much better. Celine That is so nice. Don More resinous, more in-keeping with tea. Celine It's a bit like orange blossom honey, or something. Don Yeah, it's so much better. Okay, so that's an easy decision. Let's move this to the side. This is going to be our little area of mess. All right, can we get another tangerine out? We're going to be eating lots of oranges and tangerines a bit later on. All right, so now the next thing we need to work out is pithy. Celine Okay. Don The pithiness situation. Obviously, the problem is, if you're going to brew in it, the pith is going to be there. Celine Yeah, because it would be nice if you could hit the... Don You could reverse it somehow. Celine Oh, yeah. So you get more of the zest, then less of the pithiness. Don You can't reverse the whole tangerine, but what you could potentially do is... Because this is smaller, the tangerine, we're going to have to cut higher up, I think. Celine Yeah. Don So you've got more room, right? So I reckon about a third. Celine Yeah. Don So we're going to do that. Celine Oh, it's juicy. Don Oh, it's so juicy. Look at the difference. Take that orange. Celine My goodness. That is quite a beautiful color. Don There you go. All right, now we're going to Celine I think... Don Yeah, you see? Tangerines have an easier peelability as well. They separate. Celine Wow. But you don't want to break the... Don Oh, a little breakage. Damn it. It's all right. If you were slower you could do it. You can do it. Just push it out. There you go. Good job. Don There you go. Okay, so that was fun. Yeah, not such a mess. All right, now you can clean up all of that. Now you've got a lovely little shell here. Now the question is whether or not this... Because if I can flip it then I could put it in. Celine That's true. Don Oh, this is dangerous. Just slowly, slowly. Catchy monkey. Yeah, that works. Okay, now you can peel these off. Put this in there. You can eat them. Go for it. Celine Thank you. Don Munch away. Okay, so... Celine Ah, so sweet. Don Now we've got like a little lid, stroke, cup. Will that work? Yes, it will. Look at that. Celine Beautiful. Don Oh, yeah. Okay, now we're cooking with gas. Celine But you need holes? Don Yeah, holes are going to go in. So now, holes... Celine Ah, straight in the middle. Okay. Don Let's put a few in now, right? Celine Yeah, okay. Don Because clearly, last time it was insufficient hole-age. Okay, so I'll put five in. Now... Cool. Now we've got to turn this on, and let's get some tea. We'll put some tea in here. That looks better, right? This looks better, I think. Again, hide. Celine Very nice. Don That, I think, looks better. No piss, or very little is going to cause issues. We've got a double layer, so the hole might be an issue. But let's see. All right, go for it. Celine Same as last time? Don A little bit more than that, and you're good. All right, cool. All right, now, the other thing is I didn't really taste the bake on that. Did you taste the bake? Celine I didn't, actually. I didn't. Don You know what we should do? Celine What? Don Let's just stop. Let's get another tangerine, and we're going to do another one, and we're going to do it unbaked, and see if it makes a difference. Celine Good idea. Don All right, so this is what we decided to do. We've got three tangerines here. One of them has got the zest on the inside, and we're going to bake it. The other one does not. The zest is still here. We're going to bake it with it like this, just on the pith, and then we're going to take it out and put this zest in, and see how it goes. Obviously, that's a bit more fiddly, but we just need to check whether or not that makes any difference. Here, we're going to do one which is going to be just unbaked. Celine Okay. Perfect. Don Just to see whether or not baking is actually worthwhile, because if not, what's the point of all the palaver? Celine True. Don So these two go in. This one we're going to leave to the side. Three oranges, or tangerines. They all have the zest folded in, so that you've got no pithiness. So we're not going to brew with pith, okay? Which was really a problem with the original. One of them has been baked with the zest in, one of them is baked without the zest in, and one of them is unbaked. Celine Yes. Don Right? So hopefully this gives us some good idea about what's going on here. Now let's check out the tray. Celine You can do it. Don Oh! Celine Oh! Don Okay. Celine It's so messy! Don This is a messy thing. This whole idea is a bit messy. Anyway, it's draining a bit better. Celine Yeah, it is. I just wonder how well it's infusing the tea, though. Don Well, that's the other problem. How are you going to do it so that you just put the water in, it stays in, and then punch a hole in afterwards? That's just not possible. Celine No. No. Don Already, this is a giant mess. All right, let's see how messy this one is. Okay, that one's all right. That one's doing all right. Celine Okay. So no breakages on here, and you're okay. Don All right, so you've got the three here, and you can see the one that was baked with the zest is darker. The one that was baked without the zest, but then the zest put in afterwards is lighter, and I think this is lighter still. So the unbaked one. Although not that much difference, right? Celine That's true. fragile. I'll put it over here. Right. Let's give them a taste. So here we go. This is going to give us a lot of information about the best way to handle these bakes, and whether or not the bake actually makes a huge difference. But judging by color it does. All right, let's start with unbaked. Celine All right. Don The nicest... I mean, definitely, for sure. First of all, not pithy. Celine Not pithy. Don So using the zest, and putting it inside as a layer definitely works. It reduces that bitterness that comes from pithiness. Celine A hundred percent. Don The flavor's nice. Celine It's nice. It's just a bit light on the tea. I feel like maybe it could be a little bit stronger. Don What? The tea flavor? Celine Yeah. Don Okay, but then that's the problem with drainage, because you need to somehow work out how to slow down the drainage. Celine Yeah. Don Which I think is a big challenge. Celine It tastes quite similar to if you just put the tea and the zest in the Gai Wan. Don Well, that's absolutely right. Celine I know. Don It's so much easier. Celine It's so much easier. Don Okay, here we go. This one. Celine Cheers. Don Okay. For sure, the bake makes a difference. Celine Oh my goodness. Don I think it's more than just putting the essential oils into the tea. I think it does two things. It changes the nature of the essential oils, so they become a little bit deeper, and a bit more like caramelized, and I think it also does something to the tea. That is actually really quite delicious. Celine It's way more warmed. Celine You know, when you said caramel, I was thinking that is more caramelized in taste. Don Yeah. That works well. Celine That's the best one so far. Don Currently my favorite. Celine Yeah. Don All right, this one here. Celine So that one was... How did that one go? Don This one is the fully baked. Baked with the zest in, and that is for sure the absolute tops, because of the fact that that heat is going through, and it's causing all of that zest which is in direct contact with the tea. Because this one didn't have any zest in contact with tea. It was only the pith. That one goes all the way through. Celine That's the best one. Don For sure. Celine Yeah. Don You get the warmth. Celine Very warming. Don You get like... Celine The resinousness. Don Yeah, and you get it baked in. Celine And a bit more fruit note coming through. It's a bit more sweet, a bit more honeyed. Don For sure. Celine I like that. Don Okay. So I think that it's clear, from our experiments, that number one, tangerine better than orange. Celine Definitely. Don Number two, the bake is definitely worthwhile doing. Celine Yeah. Add something. Don Number three, you've got to put the zest in to create a barrier between the pith and the tea, so there's not too much pith brewing. Number four, it's better to bake it with it in, which is convenient. Because otherwise, having to take it out, put the zest in, and then put the tea back on top is annoying. Don So we now have a method. The only thing I would say that's still an issue is drainage. What are we going to do about that? Celine I don't know. What about if you use an orange and do it like the Gai Wan, like how you were saying? It looks a bit floppy though. Don No, that's just going to be a mess. I think it literally is about... Maybe it's about lots of holes, and smaller, but lots of them. Don So it's more like a sieve. Celine Let's try it. Don All right. Let's get another tangerine. All right, so this is going to be the one I feel like. First of all, let's take off the little nubbin. Celine Yep. That'll be easier. Don Nubbin gone. Right. Now we're going to cut here, so about a third. You're going to have fun peeling that one, and I'll have fun peeling this one. This one's less of an issue, because if you break it then it's not really a problem. Also, by flipping it like that you're actually breaking all the zest pockets. Celine Yeah. Don So it actually really adds so much extra. Now this goes inside here like this, without breaking anything. Like that. Right. Now the tea goes in. The tea goes in. Heat up our pan. Now I think what you do is bake it now. So you don't like bake it... You don't put the holes in first. Celine Right. Don Because I think that when I put the holes in before, and then I baked it, it sort of sealed up a bit. Celine Ah, I see. Don So I think bake it now. The only thing that we need to figure out is the tea. Celine Mmm. Don But I reckon this would work with lots of teas. Celine That's what I'm thinking as well. Don I mean, I can't imagine a tea that wouldn't work that well, and it's worth trying. I think a green would work. Celine Yeah, I think it would work. Don I think a white would work. Celine White might be a bit light, so the orange might come through too much, but we can try. Don It might be that for some teas it's better to not bake it. Celine True. Don That would be the only thing I would say. Celine True. Don Obviously, the classic is ripe Puerh. Celine Ripe Puerh, I was going to say. That's very classic. Don Which is the one that would probably be just like winner. Celine Yeah. Don Baking-wise, I think you want to bake it until... You can see it's starting to singe around the edges here. You can't really see it. But when you want it, it's going to go sort of white and slightly brown. Slightly, but not too much. Then what we've got is we've got this little skewer here. So instead of the chopstick, which I think is a bit crude, I think we do a bit more elegant, and we have multiple holes. Maybe like 9 or 10 holes across all of the surface, so it drains evenly, rather than trying to go down, and then potentially getting blocked. Celine That's true. Don Okay, I think that's good enough. Right. So we're going to turn that off. Celine Let's show the... Don I'm going to see. Hide behind me. Celine Yeah. Don See? Like a little bit blackened, and the smell coming off it. Wow! Wow! Celine Oh, man! That smells like an orange cake. Like a polenta... orange polenta cake. Don Okay, so now I'm taking this skewer, and I'm poking through. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine... I reckon 12 should be good. There you go. Twelve holes all around. Smell is great. All right. Now let's see if that did the trick. All right. Come on. Work now, drainage. Work. Ooh! That looks better. Celine Ooh! It's so much better. Don Ooh! Let it rain. Okay. That is definitely the one. Don So we're going to have to work on number of holes. I actually think that's a little bit too fast, possibly. Celine Yeah. Don I did 12, maybe nine. The classic nine-hole star, which is what they use for pots a lot. You know, that nine-hole. Celine That's true. Don But definitely, that drains much more easily. Celine What a nice color too. Look at that. That's like the perfect, not too dark, not too light. Don Yeah. I reckon nine holes would be the one. That looks good. Celine That smells good. Don So we're going to put this to the side. You can obviously then keep that, and then just keep infusing. Of course, we've got a lot of tea and oranges. Celine It really smells like orange polenta cake. Don Oh, it smells so good. That smells really good. All right. Here we go. Our new and improved version, I think. Celine Ta-da! Don Winner! Celine Okay, that is definitely the best. It's sweet, like honey. There's no bitterness. Don It's honeyed as well. Yeah, that's what it means. Celine Very honeyed. Don That bake has put caramel in. The tangerine has added that complexity. Celine Oh, that's delicious. Don Okay, I can get down with that. Celine Tangerine is good for digestion, isn't it? Don Yeah. Celine Like when you age a tangerine. That's what they add in Chinese medicine. Don I can definitely, definitely imagine that working super well with a ripe Puerh. But we're going to have to test out different teas. Don So let's do a little... We'll just do a speed run. We'll empty that out and try different teas with the same tangerine, because we don't want to go through more. We've got like a lot of tangerines to eat later. Then we'll come back and let you know which teas we think work. Okay, so we've tested all the tea types, and they all worked. Celine They all worked. Don They all really worked. Celine Really nice. Don The only one that we've got left is this one, which we've saved till the end, and I think is going to be a favorite. So nine holes here. We've made a new tangerine here. Look how much we've done. This is kind of a craziness, but anyway, don't worry. We'll sort it out. We'll eat the tangerines. We might not brew the tea, but we'll eat the tangerines. So this is nine holes. I think that that's about right. Celine I mean, it's not a bad thing, because ripe Puerh is nice when it's strong anyway. Don Yeah. So I think that this method works. It definitely works for all tea types. You know, what's the difference between this and just using zest? Well, it's the bake. Celine Yeah, the bake. Don But you could bake the zest. Celine You could. Don So you could like peel off some zest, just bake it with the tea a little bit, or just bake it separately, put it in. Probably less hassle. Probably easier. You can then control the brew. So overall, I would say this is much more for the social media, you know, look, rather than for necessarily the best technique. But overall, it works. It does work, and it kind of looks cool, right? Celine It does look cool. Don And you can definitely like then take this and just... Celine Keep infusing it. Don Keep infusing it. All right, here we go. So this is ripe Puerh. The smell of Tangerina ripe Puerh is always a winner. Cheers, everybody. Celine Cheers! Mmm! Don Probably the best. Celine That is the best. Don Although they all really did work, surprisingly. We did white, we did green, we did light Oolongs, dark Oolongs. They all worked. Raw Puerhs, they all worked. But I think that this is just the classic. Celine This is like super-sweet. Celine It almost has a Coca-Cola taste to it. Don Oh, that is gorgeous. That is really gorgeous. So the conclusions are you can use this technique. You need to improve it in the way that we've said. So use tangerines, cut a third top, and take out all the segments, and flip that top round, put it in so that the tea is not touching the pith, bake it, poke your holes in, and percolate through. You could, as we said, just take, peel, and do it a bit easier way. That's probably how I would do it in the future. But it does work, and it works for all teas, so give it a try. That's it teaheads. Check out our other videos, taste our teas wherever you are in the world by browsing Mei Leaf.com, and come visit us if you're ever in London. Other than that, this is Celine, and I'm Don from Mei Leaf. Thank you for being part of the revelation of true tea. Stay away from those tea bags, keep drinking... Celine Keep drinking the good stuff. Don The good stuff, and the weird stuff. Celine The weird stuff. Don Brewed in fruits, and spread the word, because nobody deserves bad tea. Celine Bye. Don Bye.