Steeping
浸泡
Tea BrewingDefinition
The contact between tea leaves and hot water during which soluble compounds — caffeine, amino acids, polyphenols, pectins and aromatics — diffuse out of the leaf into the liquid. Every round of that contact is one steep, and its duration, water temperature and leaf load together determine what ends up in the cup. Longer steeps do not simply make tea stronger; they extract in a different order, pulling bitter and astringent compounds forward once the sweeter ones are spent.
Etymology
From Old English stēpan, to soak, a word first applied to grain and herbs left standing in liquid.
In use
Used both for a single immersion, as in a ninety-second steep, and for any hot-water extraction method as a whole.