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Moroccan Mint Tea

Green tea whose first infusion is thrown away, boiled with the sugar rather than sweetened after, and poured from a height.

Vegan.

Ingredients

Method

  1. THE FIRST INFUSION IS POURED OFF AND THROWN AWAY. Boiling water over gunpowder tea for thirty seconds draws out the dust and the harshest tannin; that water is discarded and the leaves are used again. Keep it and the tea is bitter in a way no amount of sugar covers -- this single step is most of the difference between good mint tea and the disappointing kind.
  2. THE SUGAR IS BOILED WITH THE TEA, NOT STIRRED IN AFTER. It goes into the pot and the whole thing is brought to the boil, which changes how it tastes: dissolved in at the end it sits on top as sweetness, boiled in it becomes part of the tea. This is also why it is sweetened in the pot and not in the glass.
  3. AND IT IS POURED FROM A HEIGHT, which is not showmanship. A long thin stream from thirty centimetres aerates the tea and puts a head of foam on each glass, and the foam noticeably changes the texture. It also mixes the pot, which is why the first glasses are poured back in.
  4. Tea leaves into a warmed teapot.
  5. A cupful of boiling water poured over them, swirled for 30 SECONDS, and poured off down the sink. The leaves stay in the pot.
  6. Mint washed and pushed into the pot, stalks and all -- the stalks carry a good deal of the flavour. Pack it in; it wilts to nothing.
  7. Sugar in.
  8. The litre of boiling water poured over. The pot set on a LOW heat and brought just to the boil, then held there 2 minutes. It must not boil hard or the mint turns bitter and black.
  9. Off the heat. A glass poured and TIPPED BACK INTO THE POT. Repeated twice. This mixes the sugar and the infusion without stirring, which would bruise the mint.
  10. Tasted, and more sugar added if wanted -- it is meant to be properly sweet.
  11. Poured into small glasses from as high as you can manage without spilling, so each has a head of foam.
  12. The pot can take a second filling of water for a weaker second round. A third is usually tired.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Morocco · All recipes