An opened gaiwan full of wet tea leaves with its lid on the side

If you want to taste the full range of flavors locked inside your leaf, resist the bitterness, and get your money's worth… Then the Gaiwan is for you. Western mugs, over-brewed and flooded with too much water, remove the subtleties otherwise present.

Just like a wine glass is made to heighten the experience of your favorite red, the Gaiwan brewing method is the right way to go with tea. This quick article will teach you in 4 easy steps how to brew with a Gaiwan.

What is a Gaiwan?

Real quick before we brew, let's cover what a Gaiwan is. To be very simple, it’s a tiny lidded bowl.

It’s the perfect tea ware to experience tea’s complex flavors, especially mildly oxidized teas (Chinese Green tea, White tea, and some Wu Long teas). If you’re not sure what I mean by ¨mildly oxidized¨, check out our in-depth guide on Oxidation in Tea here.

While there are many sizes, the standard Gaiwan can hold 110ml of liquid. A typical can of coke is 350ml, so a Gaiwan can't even hold 1/3 of that amount!

Even more surprising than the small size of the Gaiwan is the amount of tea you place into it. For a Wu Long (Oolong) tea from the Wu Yi mountain in Fujian, you'd place in about 8g of tea - which visually - will fill the entire Gaiwan well above the brim.

This begs the question: why so much tea, and so little water? That's where the magic of the Gaiwan lies.

Water to Tea Ratio

With tea, each steep will bring out different flavors. By using more tea, and less water, we can distinctly taste the uniqueness of each steeping. With more water, and less tea, these characteristics get blurred together.

After all, most meals taste better eaten without the use of a blender to homogenize everything into a grey-pink paste. This is why we do smaller and more steepings. Still, doing 9 independent steepings can be time-consuming and labor-intensive. That's why the 3x3 system exists.

3x3 Steepings

Most of the brewing I do fall within the 3x3 brewing system. Basically, rather than doing 9 individual steepings, you can opt instead for a happy medium by doing 3 steepings at a time, 3 times.

You'll still get the same number of steepings, but with this method you'll combine 3 of them at a time. You might lose some of the subtlety of each individual brewing this way, but you'll end up with a clear beginning (first 3) steeping, middle (second 3) steeping, and final (last 3) steepings.

Each of the 3 steepings is poured in a container, usually a fairness pitcher (Gong Dao Bei) to be enjoyed from. Now, with the basics covered, let's start with the Gaiwan brewing lesson!

How to Brew with a Gaiwan

Before starting the lesson, I need to warn you about something: it gets hot. If you feel a burn coming, don't suffer through it.

I've seen beginners try to tough through the pain of using a Gaiwan - super heated from multiple steepings of boiling water. But this is a mistake - there should be no pain at all. If you feel pain, it's because you're holding the Gaiwan wrong.

Here's the correct way to use the Gaiwan:

Fill it with tea.
Pour in hot water.
Place the lid on, and wait 3 seconds. (Yes, that short!)
Tilt the lid slightly to allow a gap between the lid and the bowl. Pick up, and strain.

Just a note on how to hold the Gaiwan when you strain it - as this is the most critical part. The idea is that you grab the sides of the Gaiwan with your thumb and middle finger, making sure that you're really only touching the very outer rim.

If you grab too low on the rim, you're at risk of burning yourself. Very little force is required, just a light touch.

Make sure that the gap you leave with the lid is big enough to let the tea effortlessly strain out into your cup, but not enough to let the leaves slip through. This is a learned skill, and a few leaves in your cup won't spoil the taste, so no worries.

Quick tip: Smelling the lid of the Gaiwan can give you a good idea of what a tea’s aroma is, and can even help you understand more about its quality and processing. check out our other delicious tea hacks to learn how to enjoy your tea better.

Watch for yourself

Sometimes it's just better to see for yourself rather than reading descriptions. No problem, we have a video here where you can see all the techniques we've talked about. If you want some more info on the Gaiwan itself, you can take a look at our previous article on What is a Gaiwan here.

Learn To Brew Tea

So you see, using a Gaiwan is not that difficult. By following the simple steps and tips I gave you, you will be a master of Gaiwan brewing in no time! But knowing how to use a Gaiwan is one thing, and knowing how to brew various kinds of tea is another.

Indeed, each tea has its unique characteristics and will be brewed slightly differently. But don’t worry, we wrote a guide on some of the main teas you will want to brew with a Gaiwan, including a section detailing how to brew them the right way: