"Michael Plant" > wrote in message
...
> 9/26/06
>>
> Thank you Thitherflit. It is just as I suspected.
> The Tetsubin was/is a water heating vessel meant
> to heat the tea water, not to brew. God, you,
> and I triumph yet again. All else is trash.
>
> Cordially,
> Michael


Actually I have been to couple of cafés in Russia where they serve "north
african style" sweet teas with milk and spices from not too large (may be a
1 liter) but quite massive tetsubins with enamel lining and although it has
nothing to do with any particular tea serving style its quite nice. The
tetsubin keep hot for quite a while because of large metal mass, its well
made and milk tea looks quite good in tetsubin styled glasses. Testubin also
serve as a nice hand warmer (it was numbingly cold).
Has nothing to do with the styles of drinking tea that we on this forum
mostly do, but I have to admit that it was quite nice. I would absolutely
love to have had one of these during my field geology days because that
would allow me to brew black tea on campfire real easy and keep it hot for
awhile. But the enamel might not be sturdy enough for campfire.
I tried several times to brew black (shu, cooked) puerh in testubin for my
friends who like shu puerh (I kinda don't anymore) and it also worked
beautifully.

I prefer the lentil-shaped ones with "porcupine" spikes or hobnails (hira
arare) for smaller ones (and this one has that wobderful oxidized bronse
color)
http://cgi.ebay.com/Japanese-Tetsubi...QQcmdZViewItem

and for larger ones this is my absolute favourite:
http://www.cutleryandmore.com/detail...ucts&kw=70 91


Sasha.