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How do you make a great cup of tea? It seems pretty straightforward. Put the leaves or herbal flowers into a cup and dump hot water over it.
But there is more to it than that.
Every single tea or infusion, even different types of the same tea, need to be steeped in a very specific way to get that perfect cup.
Sencha Green Tea has very different steeping requirements than Genmaicha Green Tea, for example.
But today we are going to look at how to make a great cup of an interesting flower herbal tea.
How to make Yarrow Tea? Take a couple of teaspoons of yarrow flower and steep it in 205°F/96°C pure spring water for about 10 minutes using a proper steeping bag or infuser.
Read on for a more in-depth look at making this fine herbal flower tea.
Proper Steeping Tools For Yarrow Tea
To get that perfect cup of yarrow tea you’re going to need the right tools to get those yarrow flowers to infuse your water with the wonderful essence of those great flowers.
There are a few ways to deliver the yarrow flowers to your water to steep your tea.
Let’s take a look at a few of them and why you should choose one of the others.
Steeping Yarrow Tea With An Infuser
Infusers are like little strainers that you put your tea or yarrow flower into and then put the whole Contraption into the water and let it steep for the proper amount of time.
The best way I can describe it is a metal strainer that acts like a teabag.
The issue with infusers for a lot of people is that they are too small and don’t give the flowers or the tea leaves enough room to expand and really deliver the full flavor that they should.
If you do choose to use an infuser make sure you don’t pack it so tight that it doesn’t have room to expand when you steep it.
Other than that it’s a good way to make a cup of tea and still be able to clean up pretty quickly afterward.
Using Tea Bags For Yarrow Tea
Teabags are going to be the most familiar means of steeping tea for most people.
Anytime you buy tea in a traditional grocery store it typically comes and a teabag.
Yarrow tea is no different you can find places online that sell prepackaged yarrow tea bags.
Frankly, it’s quite good and one of my recommendations is a bagged Yarrow tea from Buddha tea, you can find it here.
Teabags are pretty straightforward although you want to make sure that you’re tea bags are biodegradable and bleach-free to get the best flavor out of your yarrow tea.
Loose Flowers For Steeping Yarrow Tea
This might be the most foreign way of steeping tea for most people, especially in the western world.
In the west, most people are used to having some mechanism to deliver the tea into the water, whether it’s a bag or an infuser or a Keurig pod.
We seem to think that there has to be some way to keep the flowers of tea together when it’s sleeping in water.
But, that’s not the case. The best way to make yarrow tea is to Simply put the flowers into the hot water and let them float Loosely until the tea is steeped.
After that, you simply scoop out the flowers with a small strainer. Then go about drinking your cup of yarrow tea as you normally would.
If at all possible this is the way you want to steep your tea. It gives your flowers or leaves plenty of room to expand to the fullest and release as much flavor as they possibly can during the Steep time.
Of course, that means you would have to buy either dried yarrow flower or have fresh yarrow flowers that you picked yourself and use them to steep your tea.
I wouldn’t recommend getting a pre-packaged bag of yarrow tea and cutting it open and dumping them in the water since they’re typically crushed a little bit more than a loose leaf tea would be.
Yarrow Tea Steeping Essentials
From my perspective, there are four major ingredients you need to get a great cup of yarrow tea.
You need the right type of water. You need the right time and temperature of the water during the steeping process. And you need the right amount of flowers to get the perfect cup.
Let’s take a look at which one of these essential steeping requirements.
Using The Right Water For Yarrow Tea
You want to use balanced spring water with about 7pH. Mineral water or unfiltered tap water will definitely change the taste of your tea and make it taste a little bit too flat in terms of its flavor.
Filter tap water is also a good choice especially if you’re concerned about the amount of plastic that bottled spring water uses.
Amount Of Yarrow Tea Per Cup
For myself, I typically like around two teaspoons of yarrow flowers to make a cup of yarrow tea with loose yarrow flowers.
This is another subjective aspect of crafting your tea.
If you need more or less that’s perfectly fine and you definitely want to experiment to find your sweet spot.
If you’re using a pre-packaged bag I recommend using one bag for a regular size cup of tea.
Although I have seen friends of mine use two tea bags for one cup of tea is bold and not something that I’ve personally like.
The Right Steep Time For Yarrow Tea
Steep time is one of the most subjective parts of the entire tea making process.
You want to make sure you steep it long enough to draw out as much flavor as you can but not too much that the tea becomes increasingly bitter the longer you over steep it.
However, you always need to steep it to your personal taste. So I recommend starting with 7 to 10 minutes steep for yarrow tea.
After that, you need to just find The Sweet Spot that’s perfect for you and your specific tastes.
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Water Temperature For Steeping Yarrow Tea
The temperature for steeping a good cup of yarrow tea is crucial. You want to make sure your water is hot enough to draw the flavor but not so haunted it burns the flowers and turns the tea really bitter.
This is not really a huge issue with herbal teas including yarrow tea.
That’s because the flowers are typically much harder than tea leaves that you would use for a regular cup of tea. Green, Oolong, and White Are particularly susceptible to high water heat.
You always want to steep most tea with a water temperature under the boiling point. Yarrow tea, however, can be boiled without too much issue. I typically don’t like to use a rolling boil to make any kind of tea so I let the water cool a minute then steep my yarrow tea.
I recommend something around 205°F/96°C. It doesn’t need to be exact and there’s certainly some leeway in terms of water temperature.
What I recommend is just let the water sit in your cup for a minute or so to let it cool down a little bit.
Cover Your Tea For The Entire Steep
The final step to making a great cup of yarrow tea is one that is often overlooked in the steeping process.
And it’s one of the easiest things to do and it makes a huge difference to the flavor for the cup of yarrow tea.
Cover your tea while it is steeping.
After letting your water cool off a little bit after pouring it into your cup you want to make sure that it maintains that temperature as long as possible.
The best way to do this is to cover the cup of tea to trap the heat in.
This means that the water will draw out those flavors much more efficiently than it would if the tea was constantly cooling over the 10 or so minutes that you need to steep your yarrow tea.
I recommend covering your cup for any type of herbal or real tea. After a while, it just becomes second nature and a part of the steeping process.
Yarrow Tea Steeping Instructions Quick Recap
- 7pH Water with relatively few minerals
- 2 Teaspoons Of Yarrow Flowers
- 10 minutes is a good place to start for a steep time
- 96°C/205°F water gives you a good foundation for a great cup of Yarrow tea.
- Cover For the entire Steep Time
That Perfect Cup Of Yarrow Tea
Once you start making your tea this way every single time it becomes second nature and you don’t even have to think about it after a while.
Every cup that you steep just works out and tastes great. Because you’ve built the foundation of great fundamentals win steeping your tea.
Every single tea type that you make is going to have its own little quirks and its own little needs in order to get it to taste exactly like you wanted to taste.
The basic steps are largely the same and it’s just a matter of the exact numbers you need to use for each tea.
This is true of real teas and yarrow tea and all the other wonderful flower herbal infusions, check out our favorites here, that are becoming so popular these days.
I hope you enjoyed the article and hope to see you back here very soon.
Thank you for visiting and have a wonderful day.