Reader Query: What Kind of Tea?

Noel wrote in and asked the following question about my Dark Earl Grey Cookies:

“Hi Greg, Very cool and unique cookies. I'm very surprised about including the actual tea leaves in the cookie though. How small were the leaves inside the bags? I'm afraid of trying with the loose leaf Earl Grey tea I have because I think it might end up with large leaves in the cookies, giving them an unpleasant texture.”

Hi, Noel. That's a really good question! When I first tried out this recipe months and months ago, I used loose-leaf tea (pictured here), and--as you guessed--the finished cookies had an unpleasant, twiggy texture. For my second test batch, I tried grinding the loose-leaf tea and the other wet ingredients in a food processor. This helped make the cookies less twiggy, but they were still too grainy. (These two batches would have made primo Oops! postings.)

I then decided to use tea from tea bags because tea-bag tea is finely ground and is practically a powder. The cookies came out with just the right texture. (I would have taken a snap of a cut-open tea bag, but I used my last one to make these cookies.) Definitely go tea-bag tea instead of loose-leaf tea.

Comments

[Noel]

That makes sense. Thanks for the clarification. I'm a big tea fan, so I'm going to have to try these cookies. I would have never thought of mixing the tea itself!

[Oatmeal Cookie Guy]

My pleasure, Noel!

[Em]

I work in a tea store (Teavana) and I am now a tea snob, if you will. meaning I don't like tea bags. Do you have ANY suggestion of how I could still use loose leaf rather than bags? We have an excellent Earl Grey Creme that would be stellar, or else we also have an Earl Grey White that would be full of antioxidants too!

[Oatmeal Cookie Guy]

Hey, Em. I've tried using loose/whole tea, but the cookies come out twiggy and not very flavorful. You could dry grinding the loose tea. That way, you could use your favorite specialty tea and get cookies that have a nice texture and flavor throughout.