Tea Tip: Clean Teaware Prevents Breakage

I drink a lot of tea and use a lot of teaware. It isn’t uncommon for me to drink three, four, five different teas in a day. Some I brew in my Yixing pots, others I brew in a gaiwan or some other form of teaware: All under the watchful and beady eyes of Claudius, my little tea-pet.

I am not always as careful as I should be about cleaning my teaware after each use, though. Take my gaiwans, for example. I’ll rinse the bowls with boiling water between teas, but I may leave the base/saucer on its own for a bit.

This is a bad habit, though, and one I am trying to break, because spilled tea evaporates and becomes sticky. When spilled tea is left in the gaiwan-saucer, bowl and saucer can become lightly “glued” together. When I pick up the bowl, the saucer comes with it. . .but because tea is not a very good adhesive, the saucer then falls and (possibly) breaks.

Moral of the story? If I am rinsing my gaiwan bowl with water between teas, I need to also rinse the saucer. I’d advise everyone to do the same!