Our loose leaf teas and herbs are precious - they hold a delicious abundance of flavour. They have so much to offer that will not only flood your life with pleasure, but save you money. The same leaves can often be infused multiple times to reveal myriad delights.
How do you reinfuse loose leaf tea?
All you need to do is make sure you pour off all the water when making your first cup so that your leaves are not still steeping between infusions. When you are ready for a second cup, simply add fresh hot water.
If you leave your tea leaves stewing in a teapot, all the flavour will infuse into the water, along with tannins and bitter compounds that overpower all the other more subtle flavours. It's a bit like a rambunctious brass section drowning out the woodwinds in an orchestra. Long infusions will give you one very strong and rather bitter pot of tea. For many people that is exactly what they are after, and all power to them.
However, if you stop the infusion (by pouring off all the water from the leaves) BEFORE all the flavour has been extracted and BEFORE the tannins have had a chance to overpower everything, you can get several varied infusions from your leaves. They will be softer and less full-bodied than one long steep, but incredibly nuanced and elegant.
With shorter, more controlled extractions from the best loose leaf teas, the second infusion is often even better than the first. It's the beauty of high quality tea that has been so beautifully crafted to retain and enhance deep layers of flavour. The same is not true of an industrial teabag. If you try to reinfuse one of those you’ll probably get nasty, insipid water.
What is the maximum number of infusions you can make with loose leaf tea?
How many infusions you can make depends on the tea and how you infuse it.
If you use a gaiwan and a high proportion of leaf to water (typically 2-4g of tea per 60-80ml of water) you can make around 6 short infusions- just a few seconds each. If you use a teapot and 2/3g per 150ml (a teacup) typically you might get 2 to 3 infusions of around 90 seconds each.
Rolled oolongs and whole leaf teas generally give the most infusions- they have the highest surface area to volume and it takes more time to extract the flavour. More broken tea or herbs like Speedy Breakfast or Wild Rooibos have the highest surface area and the water can extract the flavours easily. They only make one infusion if you like them strong.
Our Malawi Antlers is a real marvel. It can easily be infused at least six times, although we've managed to make as many as eleven! At six infusions that's around 34p/46¢ a cup.
Just 60 kilos were able to be crafted in 2024- one of the rarest teas on the planet and such an affordable luxury.
We note how many infusions we recommend making for each tea in the infusion instructions on their product page, just underneath the tasting notes:
BUT, the number of infusions you can get will vary depending on how much tea you use, the water temperature, and the length of infusion. It's worth experimenting until the leaf has been exhausted!
How long can I leave between infusions?
Most importantly, the leaves should not be sitting in water between infusions. How long the leaves will last depends on your environment, they will stay better for longer in a cool, dry place. I have left a teapot for 24 hours with no problem, but I would want to use my leaves within a few hours on a particularly hot and humid day.
If you don't want a second or third infusion, you can also put your leaves into a bottle or jar with cold water and leave to cold infuse overnight in the fridge. The next day you will have a delicious iced tea. As a general rule of thumb, we would use no more than 250ml of cold water for every 2.5g of leaf. In cold water, loose leaf tea needs longer to infuse. Depending on how many times you have already extracted the leaf, it will need 4-8 hours. Overnight is fine - it won’t overextract like hot tea because the really bitter compounds are not soluble in cold water.
If you have any other questions or information to add, do please get in touch.
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Henrietta Lovell | |
| Rare Tea Lady | ||
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| Since 2000 Henrietta has been travelling the world, working directly with independent tea gardens, from the Shire Highlands of Malawi to the foothills of the Himalayas. Lovell is at the forefront of the tea revolution. She founded Rare Tea Company in 2004 to champion responsible and ethical relationships direct with farmers. In 2016 she founded Rare Charity pledging a direct percentage of Rare Tea revenue to their partner farms, supporting tertiary education scholarships. In 2019 Faber & Faber published her first book – "Infused - Adventures in Tea", named the New York Times book of the year and was awarded the prestigious Fortnum & Mason award. She is currently working on a documentary series. | ||
