Can Tea Expire? | Tea with Olivia

Hello everyone. Have you ever wondered the tea sitting in your cupboard, is it still good to drink? Let's find out. One thing to figure out whether the tea is still drinkable is figure out the tea type that you have in your cupboard. Commonly green tea, white tea, jasmine, wulongs and then there's pu-erh and hei cha, yellow tea. Some tea are meant to drink when it's fresh. Some tea can be aged and also be stored so it changes property later. So it depends on what tea type you have. Now your answer may be, I know green tea is supposed to be consumed when it's fresh. You get 50% right in this answer because some green teas are more grassy. It has very little workmanship in it to retain its nutrient. Yes, those need to be consumed fairly fresh. But some green tea are dry a little differently and so they draw a lot more moisture from the tea leaf. As a result those ones keep a lot longer, has a lot much longer shelf life. So again depends what you have in your cupboard. So now fresh tea, some green tea, jasmine tea and the more lightly fermented wulong, those ones are meant to be consumed a little bit sooner. And if you store it correctly, meaning you keep it cold for example, those would also prolong its shelf life. Now how can you tell if my tea is still good? One thing very visually you want to be able to tell by its color. So one of the thing is here, these two teas, they both are green tea and very easy to tell that this one is a lot darker and this one is a lot greener. Because when you store it in your cupboard, what happens is this fluctuation of temperature. So fluctuation of temperature makes the tea expand and they shrink and then that way it squeezes out its oil. And that's why you see the color comes off a little bit. So you know this is a very good example of telling to see if your tea leaf is still fresh to drink. But you say hey somebody say I don't mind if it's a little bit darker, can I still drink it? Another way to try it out is when you drink it, if it's still smooth, it still has that aroma, then yeah it's not as fresh but it's still consumable. It's not dangerous to drink. But if you're drinking green tea for antioxidant, for all the goodies, the ones that's been oxidized through storage, through putting in your tea cupboard, you'll lose a little bit of those properties. So that's the major difference. Other tea that are like jasmine or lightly fermented oolong like this one here. Again I have the fannings here, this is full-size leaf. But the idea I want to share with you is that when the tea is not stored properly or it's been sitting there for too long in your cupboard, it oxidizes itself. Meaning because of the oxygen, again the fluctuation of temperature, it's warmer in the summer, cooler in the winter, and perhaps if you put it in something that's also see-through like a glassware, those would damage the tea leaf quite a bit. So see this one's a lot more amber, yellow, and this one a lot more greener. So tea, particularly what I mentioned, lightly fermented oolong and jasmine, you purchase this tea or you have this tea because you enjoy the aroma. And if tea were not properly stored and or is kept for too long, then it loses its aroma because the leaf has went through different temperature in the room. So those are the other things you want to look for. So generally you'll see the leaf is a lot more shinier here, a lot more shiny, and this one a lot more dull. So that's one way to tell. And again, if you're drinking it and you find the aroma has decreased quite a bit or it's gone, then the tea is no good. Sorry, gotta get new ones. And I also have some black teas here. Black tea is another one that's not to be kept for too long either, shelf-life. Depends how it's drying shelf-life. Typically one year, two years. If it's vacuum sealed, up to about three years. But again, general rule of thumb, you want to look for if the oil is there, has the color changed quite a bit. And last, if you say, hey, I'm gonna give it a try. So you want to see if it tastes smooth still. Because some of tea gone through different humidity in the room and it loses smoothness and it loses body. So once those elements exist in your cup of tea, that mean is no good. Unfortunately, you can use the liquid to water your plant or whatever you like with it, but it's not as great to consume. One of another very common question is, hey, my tea is vacuum sealed in the bag and is it still good? Because it's vacuum sealed, so no air is going through it. Because depends if it's been there for years, like two years, three years. Some of the tea, unfortunately, they will deteriorate as well. So that brings us to another question. How do we store our tea so we can keep our tea in best condition and to prolong its shelf life? So in the next video, we're going to talk about different ways of how we can store our tea and different canisters that we can use. Until then, I will see you next time. Take care. Thank you for watching. If you have any questions, please feel free to drop me a comment below. For more tea content, like, subscribe and share. Cheers.