Leveraging Tea to Improve Our Cooking
As tea becomes more and more popular cooks are beginning to use it more too, as a way to add a new flavor to dishes. A similar thing happened with coffee when Starbucks helped the already well-liked beverage become even more popular.
Tea goes great with food so it is a organic step to begin using it as a seasoning, the same way we use herbs and spices. But there are other great reasons for the increased interest involving cooking with tea.
With the many known health advantages of tea any new way to slip it into your daily routine is advantageous. Another advantage of cooking with tea is that it’s an effective way to add or enhance the flavor of a dish without adding unwanted elements like fat, calories or sodium, that sometimes accompany other flavor amplifiers.
While cooking with tea might seem like a new movement, it has in reality been done almost as long as the beverage itself. The Chinese have been using black tea to smoke and simmer dishes for centuries. The Japanese have been relishing a dish that is prepared by dripping green tea over rice before serving. And the British have used tea to flavor tea cakes and to stew dried fruit for years
Popular cooks have been expanding these uses of tea and finding that even small additions are able to lend a richness to dishes without overwhelming the true flavor of the dish. For example try adding a tablespoon of English Breakfast to a dressing, or a Jasmine teabag or two to rice while it is cooking.
Cooking with tea doesn’t have to be limited to the appetizer or main course. Tea can also lend a complex taste to dessert. Rich black teas like Darjeeling have deep tones that help strengthen the flavor of chocolate desserts. Green teas are able to add a zing to creamy desserts while they also tend to calm the tart flavor of a citrus sorbet. While fragrant teas like chai are able to impart a pleasant flavor to rich items like frosting or cheesecake.
You can let the creative juices flow when preparing food with tea. It may be applied as a spice by adding tea leaves to a pepper grinder; you might even want to add white pepper, or some other spice of choice with the tea in the spice grinder. Tea can also be used as a marinade. If you’re not sure where to begin, or if you need a little guidance, check out a cookbook that specializes in cooking with tea.
If you’re just beginning to use tea in your cooking it may help if you think of the tea as another ingredient or a spice, instead of a beverage, and go with your instincts. Also remember all the forms of tea — you can utilize tea leaves, brewed tea, tea bags or if you enjoy green tea you can use green tea powder to sprinkle on things like fruit. There are also all the varieties to select from — Earl Grey, Darjeeling, Matcha, Bancha — to name a few.
So get creative and enjoy the benefit of this whole new world of flavorings. Happy Cooking
