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Comment by platevoltage | Hacker News Reader

A nice tea kettle where the temperature is adjustable.

What's it for? It's always better to boil water for tea for hygienical purposes, no?

Guessing the hygenics depend on your local water supply, but some varieties of tea (and coffee actually) want to be brewed at below-boiling

You can still boil it and just wait a couple of minutes and use a food thermometer, no?

Yes, it's just really nice to be able to push a button and have it hold at the right temperature; sort of like how boiling water on the stove or in the microwave and using an electric kettle are functionally equivalent but the kettle is way more convenient.

Some teas steep at less than boiling temperature. And I imagine the tea itself may have more risk of microbes depending on how it is stored, and that the temperature drops way below boiling almost immediately upon pouring out.

I wonder if any studies have been done on this....

Some teas(white and green particularly) are better brewed well under boiling, but even those lower temps kill 99.9...% of pathogens in a few seconds(vs a fraction of a second at full boiling)

I'm sure it depends where one lives, but if your drinking water is safe there's no real reason to boil the water except for proper steeping.

I definitely use boiling water with my bagged breakfast tea, but boiling is too hot for white and green tea (especially fancier teas), and boiling water "scorches" the "delicate flavors" (using quotes since I'm sure there are better / nicer words than those), so you want to steep at 80C or lower depending on the tea, the quantity the vessel, and the process.

I found that 200 degrees F makes my tea taste better than full on boiling.

I always use bottled water anyway, our tap water is full of bleach. And just run it up to 100 every few days to sterilise it.

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