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Comment by goldenkey | Hacker News Reader

Their demographic is tea drinkers who are ignored by the coffee industry. We have all these coffee makers that have k-cups, but nothing for tea. And tea bags are 2nd rate, they float above the water depending on the tea, and never brew right. It is for sure directed at a more premium market, people who care about quality. But I wouldn't say that market is vanishing - they got their price a bit wrong. The prices they are selling at now will result in a conplete sell out. The classic teaforia infuser works on any tea..not just the sips containers. Id like to see them come back in style - I dont think this is the end for a great glass on glass tea machine. They did not sacrifice on purity or taste, much respect to Teforia.

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It's just called "getting a decent tea bag" and works pretty well.

The flip side is of course brewing with real quality leaves, but it's more expensive and is more effort. They both have their places, unlike this machine.

To make good tea you have to control temperature, pressure, steeping time, and water volume. The teforia microbrewer does what a teabag won't, let alone an inefficient kettle. I purchased 2 Teforia's at the discounted rate. The machine has its place.

You know, if I weren’t a tea enthusiast myself, all that smoke you’re blowing might obfuscate something.

Here’s how I manage to control all those variables without a thousand dollar tea keurig: 1) one time, just once, I measure the volume of my tea cup. This is good for, you know, the life of the cup. 2) I throw an infuser on a scale, and throw teaspoons of tea in until I’ve hit the the right grams/100 ml. I now know how many tap of loose leaf are right for that cup.

3) I enjoy black tea, so boiling is fine. If it’s a day I’m feeling like a green or an oolong, I’ll dump a food thermometer probe into my kettle - it’ll beep at my desired temp.

4) I pour the water in the cup, stick in the infuser, and throw 5 minutes on the timer that comes with every iPhone.

Just so we are clear, the everyday cup of tea looks like this: throw 2 tsp leaves into infuser, boil water, rinse leaves, stick infuser in cup, let sit five minutes.

Oddly, with all the magic of “a timer on my phone,” my daily cup is controlled for temp, pressure (I’m not changing altitudes here), steep time, and water volume. And All it cost was an 8$ infuser.

But, sure, buy up all the 1000$ kettles you can grab.

I have a machine that does all this it was $200 Canadian, which I assume means it’s $160 US. It was still kinda over priced.

I have a Special-T machine I paid 69€ and order tea at 0.30cts each that are very good. Only available in some European countries alas. (Not affiliated, just happy customer !)

www.special-t.com

What scale are you using for weighing your tea leaves?

Jennings CJ4000 4000g x 0.5g Digital Scale https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004C3CAB8/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_gAi9...

I hate to break this to you, but tea is brewed at standard atmospheric pressure: ~ 101.3 kPa. Plus whatever is contributed by the depth of the water column above the tea bag or loose leaves.

... tea bags are the k-cups for tea. Shitty and fast and convenient.

You didn’t actually say anything new - you just sound like you work for Teforia.

Good teabags aren't even that bad. After all they're still basically tea seeped in hot water. You can also buy plenty of inexpensive infusers which aren't necessarily a lot better than teabags but the cost is a bit lower. And you can have basically open inserts you can put in cups. So plenty of ways to make tea quickly and easily with quality that is, for the most part, indistinguishable from tea pots.

This is simple: there is no form of tea which requires espresso tech, or at least no mainstream, popular form.

Yes, tea doesn't require tech, but espresso-machines are not only tech, but a convenience to press a button and get a cup. I drink coffee because of that, not because I enjoy it more than tea.

Unfortunately, tea market seems to be too small to pay for such a convenience. There are some capsule-machines like Nespresso that can brew tea, but they make too small portions.

More popular in households in Asia than western europe/US is a machine that holds your water at tea temp (it looks almost like a water tank.) You can look up Zojirushi on amazon to get some examples.

So you hit a button, water drops into your cup at the correct temperature, and all you have to do is drop in your tea bag / infuser of choice. Considering tea needs to steep, it's about as close as tea is going to come to espresso.

Yes, I know, they call it for some reason "cooler" :)

The first problem is you should stay near them while they are pouring the water, and it takes time, especially if I'm making a tea for two. The second is that making hot water is not the most time-expensive for me, it's mixing teas and additives and putting them into a tea bag. Unfortunately, pre-bagged teas are usually low quality.

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