Photos Knives and tea, pix thread

cbach8tw said:
I have to ask as I am naive about block tea. You just shave tea off the block and place it in a diffuser? Or in the tea pot and use a filter when pouring to catch the loose tea? My block tea looks like it has a plastic edge, I thought, don’t scrape that, bur use it to scrape the block. We had tea bags in the household growing up as a kid, specialty tea was not something we did. TEA-se be gentle.
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There are others here who are MUCH more qualified than I am to give you an answer, but until they chime in, I use something similar to this glass tea infuser cup for my loose tea. I also use it in regular ceramic mugs, not only in the glass mug it came in. You can buy them as a cup or pot, glass or clay, etc. Folks will tell you it’s good to give the tea more room like this to open and expand than stuffing it in a small dunkable metal mesh ball infuser. They’re probably right but the reason I went this glass mug infuser route is that the mesh ball infuser made my tea taste like metal. Yuck.

I bought a block of tea recently but haven’t opened it yet since I’m working on a couple of bags of loose tea that are already open. But from my reading, many recommend breaking the block apart with something like an ice pick. They tell you the goal is to minimize the number of individual tea leaves that you break - try to separate whole leaves as best you can, and just break off what you will be using for that cup, pot, etc. I won’t pretend to be able to tell a difference between brewing whole or broken leaves. All the tea bags I’ve used my whole life are ground up to basically powder, but I’ve read enough recommendations to do it this way that I suppose there’s got to be something to it.

The amount of tea used is another rabbit hole. For loose tea I use 0.5 grams per cup and steep about 5 minutes and I like it that way. Most of the reading I’ve done recommends much more tea than that, and steeping it for a much shorter time, and reusing it for multiple brews - and that seems to be for a pot, not a cup. Most of my tea is at my desk in the morning waiting on my computer to boot and going through email and the day’s schedule - I’m usually not making tea for two, or coming back to reuse the tea several times in the day, so this works for me. Folks will say the flavor is different from steeping a larger quantity for seconds than a smaller quantity for minutes, but I’m not that discerning I suppose.

And then you can go down the Google rabbit hole of washing/waking the tea, and sharing the tea and all the traditional tea ceremony things. Again, not my cup of tea. :) Maybe I’ll learn more as I go along.

We’ll see what I settle on when I get to opening my first tea block that’s waiting for me.

Let us know how it goes and what you end up preferring.

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Culprit99 said:
There are others here who are MUCH more qualified than I am to give you an answer, but until they chime in, I use something similar to this glass tea infuser cup for my loose tea. I also use it in regular ceramic mugs, not only in the glass mug it came in. You can buy them as a cup or pot, glass or clay, etc. Folks will tell you it’s good to give the tea more room like this to open and expand than stuffing it in a small dunkable metal mesh ball infuser. They’re probably right but the reason I went this glass mug infuser route is that the mesh ball infuser made my tea taste like metal. Yuck.

I bought a block of tea recently but haven’t opened it yet since I’m working on a couple of bags of loose tea that are already open. But from my reading, many recommend breaking the block apart with something like an ice pick. They tell you the goal is to minimize the number of individual tea leaves that you break - try to separate whole leaves as best you can, and just break off what you will be using for that cup, pot, etc. I won’t pretend to be able to tell a difference between brewing whole or broken leaves. All the tea bags I’ve used my whole life are ground up to basically powder, but I’ve read enough recommendations to do it this way that I suppose there’s got to be something to it.

The amount of tea used is another rabbit hole. For loose tea I use 0.5 grams per cup and steep about 5 minutes and I like it that way. Most of the reading I’ve done recommends much more tea than that, and steeping it for a much shorter time, and reusing it for multiple brews - and that seems to be for a pot, not a cup. Most of my tea is at my desk in the morning waiting on my computer to boot and going through email and the day’s schedule - I’m usually not making tea for two, or coming back to reuse the tea several times in the day, so this works for me. Folks will say the flavor is different from steeping a larger quantity for seconds than a smaller quantity for minutes, but I’m not that discerning I suppose.

And then you can go down the Google rabbit hole of washing/waking the tea, and sharing the tea and all the traditional tea ceremony things. Again, not my cup of tea. :) Maybe I’ll learn more as I go along.

We’ll see what I settle on when I get to opening my first tea block that’s waiting for me.

Let us know how it goes and what you end up preferring.

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Thsnks for the thoughtful reply, I learned a few things. Another thing I heard here in the forums is not to squeeze the tea bag to get the last of the tea out of the bag, it will make it bitter.
 
cbach8tw said:
Thsnks for the thoughtful reply, I learned a few things. Another thing I heard here in the forums is not to squeeze the tea bag to get the last of the tea out of the bag, it will make it bitter.
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You’re welcome! And I agree with not squeezing the bag. Not only does it make it bitter, but it stained my teeth. When I learned not to squeeze the bag, my teeth stopped getting tea stains. I used to go to the dentist four times a year to get the stains cleaned off.
 
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Warmed up a big mug of puer this morning to ease the flu/cough/ache before heading to work. Would be nice to stay home and recover but I don’t have that possibility.
 
Happy new mug Saturday! This fall is our 25th year reunion so that means buying some new mugs, glasses, shirts and such.

Today I’m carrying my Redmeadow Cowbell and Demko AD20.5. And of course I’ll slip a Buck in my pocket if I leave the house. I just can’t not. :)

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Lazy morning, day off, sleeping in, breakfast and tea on the deck with my wife, idly carving on a popsicle stick… might have to light some fuzes later… Happy Independence Day!

Speaking of which, my father in law retired this past year and has been spending his time catching up on his 20-40 year old to-do list on his cattle farm in East TN. He’s spent months saving/restoring the older of his two barns - the one next to the highway leading into town. The barn was built in the 1860’s and was close to falling down. He’s replaced main beams, all new boxing in the outside and is about to put new metal on the roof. This week, he installed this! It weighs 300 lbs. Happy Birthday and God Bless the U. S. A.!

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cbach8tw said:
Do you ever one across ww1 or other war sites in your hikes or camping? Still have to watch out for possible dangerous things to avoid going boom? Thanks for sharing.
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Not unless I was especially visiting places like Ieper of the Vallee de Somme or the beaches in France, Utah, Omaha.... ... Don't know if there's any no go areas around because of explosives or if everything is cleaned up.
 
Happy New Knife Tuesday!

A cup of loose leaf red tea that a friend brought back from China. I’m down to the bottom of the tin so I’m stretching it out to one cup a month or so.

This Buck Saunter 250 clip point was waiting in the mailbox when I got home yesterday. I’ve been stiff-arming this modern slip joint for a few years since it came out, but finally caved. I’m looking forward to getting to know this little knife.

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Happy Wednesday!

Buck, as a company, is 122 years old. Older than Harley Davidson. Older than Orville and Wilbur Wright’s first successful airplane flight. Older than voice-modulated radio transmissions (Morse Code radio transmissions are older).

Twinings is 318 years old. Older than the piano. Older than the tuning fork. Older than the steam engine. Older than the Mercury thermometer. Older than cast crucible steel.

The Buck 301 model is 58 years old - their first pocket knife model. The 250 Saunter model is 2 years old. Buck is still cranking out 301’s, and they’re better than ever. Some things are just timeless. It’s neat to see the similarities and differences between these two models.

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Culprit99 said:
Happy Wednesday!

Buck, as a company, is 122 years old. Older than Harley Davidson. Older than Orville and Wilbur Wright’s first successful airplane flight. Older than voice-modulated radio transmissions (Morse Code radio transmissions are older).

Twinings is 318 years old. Older than the piano. Older than the tuning fork. Older than the steam engine. Older than the Mercury thermometer. Older than cast crucible steel.

The Buck 301 model is 58 years old - their first pocket knife model. The 250 Saunter model is 2 years old. Buck is still cranking out 301’s, and they’re better than ever. Some things are just timeless. It’s neat to see the similarities and differences between these two models.

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I like that Buck Saunter, never seen them before.
Looks like a nice EU friendly folder. Wrote it down on my wishlist!

We got a new pup in the house so not going anywhere since about 2 weeks ;)
Did get a new stove for my birthday, and old Brunton Optimus Nova.
Tested it out in the backyard to make some fresh gingerroot tea.


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