Funny Tea Infusers – The Silliest Ones on the Planet

ILOVEDECAFI Love Decaf, Funny products20 December 20212 June 2022Leave a Comment

Do You Want to See Some Funny Tea Infusers?

If you’re in the market for a new tea infuser, why not choose one that’s fun and funny? You can find infusers in all shapes and sizes, and many of them are quite silly. From animals to characters to food items, there’s something for everyone. We’ve put together a list of the funniest and silliest tea infusers on the planet.

1. What makes a good tea infuser?

When looking for a good tea infuser, you want one that will allow the flavours of the leaves to disperse through the filter, while preventing any bits from doing the same. You also want one that is easy to clean and will improve your mood during the day. Some infusers are more funny than others or more disgusting.

2. How to choose the right infuser for your tea and coffee needs?

When it comes to choosing the right tea infuser for your needs, there are a few things to consider. First, you need to decide what type of tea you want to brew. Loose-leaf teas require a large infuser with plenty of room for the leaves to expand, while bagged teas can be brewed in a smaller infuser. Second, you need to decide what type of material you want your infuser made of. Stainless steel and silicone are both durable materials that are safe for use with hot water, while plastic infusers can be less durable and may not be safe for use with all types of tea. Finally, you need to decide what type of Infuser you want. The most popular types are the teapot infuser, the travel mug infuser and the hanging infuser.

3. What are the benefits of using a tea infuser?

Tea infusers have a number of benefits. Not only do they make it easy to brew a perfect cup of tea, but they also keep the leaves out of your drink. This means that you can enjoy the full flavour of the tea without any bits getting in the way. Plus, they’re just plain fun! With so many different designs and characters to choose from, you’re sure to find one that you love. Whether you’re looking for a silly tea infuser that will put a smile on your face every morning or a practical one that will make your tea brewing experience easier, we’ve got you covered. So whatever your preference, we’ve got the perfect tea infuser for you!

4. Types of tea infusers?

There are all sorts of tea infusers on the market these days, but which one is right for you? If you’re looking for something fun and silly, we’ve got just the thing. From Heavy Metal Satantic Skull Loose Leaf Tea Infusers to Potentially Funny Poo in a Cup Tea Infusers, we’ve got a variety of tea infusers that will make you laugh. If you’re looking for something a little more cute, check out our Cute Whale Loose Leaf Tea Infuser or our Umbrella, Shark, Ball, Owl or Leaf Loose Leaf Tea Infuser. And for those who want to feel like they’re from another planet, we’ve got the Rocket Loose Leaf Tea Infuser Made by Martians. No matter what your style, we’ve got the perfect tea infuser for you!

5. Funny tea infuser designs

If you’re looking for a tea infuser that doubles as a fun and quirky kitchen accessory, then you’ll love our collection of funny tea infusers. From aliens to skulls, we’ve got a wide variety of designs to choose from. Tea time will never be the same again! Our Heavy Metal Satanic Skull Loose Leaf Tea Infuser is perfect for those who love a good scare, while our Poo in a Cup Tea Infuser is sure to get a laugh from your family and friends. If you’re looking for something a little more cute and cuddly, our Whale Loose Leaf Tea Infuser is perfect. No matter what your taste, we’ve got the perfect funny tea infuser for you!

Does Decaffeinating Your Life Make It Better?

I Love DecafDecaf coffee hacks, Science of Coffee, Decaf coffee, Advice2 March 20228 March 2022Leave a Comment

Decaffeinating your life is one of many approaches and strategies you can try on a journey to better health. Broadly, it’s an element of ‘detox’ – while caffeine is a mild stimulant in moderation, your body and brain still get used to it being in your blood stream. Your brain, in particular, does not tolerate chemical change well and this is where withdrawal comes in. Fortunately, the most common symptom of caffeine withdrawal is a minor tension headache, and the cravings are quick to subside.

With decaffeinated tea and coffee you can even mask some of the cravings and continue to enjoy the same tastes and aromas you have become accustomed to.

So: so far, a small amount of sacrifice to decaf your body, but can it make your life better in a meaningful way?

The narrative of detox is intertwined with lifestyle woo-woo. That’s a term we just made up to describe a big wicker basket of good-intention ideas like veganism, holistic spirituality and Eastern systems of thought. Nothing wrong with any of it, but decaffeinating your life is about restoring a chemical, not spiritual, balance in your body.

You know us – we are hardly the type of people to go all yoga-crystal-dreamcatcher-mindful-woo-woo on you. As far as we are aware, we have no chakras and feng-shui is not so much a way of life but more of a storage solution. Neither do we store our socks to the west of a lucky rabbit’s foot. Think about that for a moment: It wasn’t so lucky for the rabbit, was it?

Trust us when we say, we have no woo-woo.

Your body doesn’t need caffeine

The best reason for drinking less or no caffeine is that your body doesn’t need it. Like nicotine, heroin and strong painkillers, your body has just got used to it being around. Caffeinistas claim that it helps attention and focus, and they are both right and wrong at the same time. Scientific trials have concluded that, at best, caffeine helps attention and focus get back to where it was before you became withdrawn. And that’s what caffeine withdrawal looks like – a craving for a big mug of coffee in the morning to escape the tug of withdrawal and restore the world to where it should have been. It’s not restoring the world; it’s restoring your brain chemistry. Your brain in this instance is acting like a wilful, truculent teenager. It’s refusing to get its act together until you do something nice for them. Your teen asks you for money, chocolate or the latest tech before they clean their room. Your brain won’t move until it gets a chemical leg-up. Like your teen, your brain is lazy and used to the good life of drip-fed feel-good. The good news is that the brain has its own feel-good chemistry, caffeine is a cheat code that robs it of achieving its own balance.

Your brain is the most complicated thing you own. Indeed, it is among the most complex things in the known universe. It is capable of extraordinary calculation and every minute of your waking day, it perceives, renders and constructs your entire world. Throwing additional stimulants into the sentient bucket of porridge that exists between your ears is like lighting a campfire in an art gallery.

Decaffeinating your life is one part of restoring the natural balance of this most sensitive instrument. Once the minor withdrawals are over it will make your life better simply by re-establishing its unaided potential.

Decaf Peppermint Tea – What’s That About?

I Love DecafDecaf tea, Herbal tea20 December 20218 March 2022Leave a Comment

The crisp and sweet, airy tang of peppermint tea is one of the most vibrant and punchy of all herbal infusions and, like all such teas, proper peppermint tea is decaf. You will find a few peppermint brews around that are tributes to the way North Africans always added mint to their food and drink. When Europeans first took tea across the Mediterranean to Morocco, the locals blended it with mint, making it as Moorish as it is moreish. Tea blended in this way will be caffeinated to some extent, depending on the blend.

Pure peppermint tea is as it should be, made only with Mentha piperita leaves from the world’s freshest corners. Proper peppermint tea, which is properly pepperminty contains no tea at all.

Got it. So, peppermint tea is decaf? Right?

No. Not quite. Peppermint tea is un-caffeinated. Peppermint has no caffeine in it at all. You can’t decaffeinate something that has no caffeine in it in the first place. That’s just silly.

All that aside, the purity of peppermint tea is important because it has been shown to have several benefits from digestive problems to relief of migraines, as well as its ability to help with blocked noses. That little wafer-thin mint on your plate after a restaurant blow-out is not there by accident and neither is the menthol oil that relieves nasal congestion like a boss. We can’t make health claims because of ‘the man’, but we all know what’s right.

Peppermint tea is not tea either

Strictly speaking, it is a herbal infusion. Tea is different: Black, green, white and oolong tea all come from the leaves of varieties of a kind of camelia bush or, rather, rows and rows of camelia bushes. Camelia sinensis is an evergreen shrub, native to Southeast Asia. Blend those leaves with mint leaves and switch the kettle on and you’ll have a caffeinated drink, just like those Europeans taking tea across the Mediterranean. It’s a bit like those pan-faced telly chefs who insist on adding ‘a twist’ to traditional recipes by sprinkling balsamic vinegar, yuppie sauce or liquid nitrogen into the pot.

We have shown decaf peppermint tea cannot be decaffeinated because it contains no caffeine at all, and it cannot be said to be tea because there is no tea in it. Which only leaves the crisp and sweet, airy tang of peppermint behind.

If you’d like your own crisp, sweet and airy properly pepperminty peppermint ‘tea’, then take a look at I Love Decaf’s ballistic Intercontinental Peppermint Tea – as well as our Moorish blend of peppermint and decaf, Menthol Health Tea. Get yours while it’s cool.

Does Coffee Have More Caffeine Than Tea?

I Love DecafDecaf tea, Science of caffeine, Advice24 February 20222 March 2022Leave a Comment

We’ve all heard the old chestnut that tea contains more caffeine than coffee, but is it true or false? The answer is that it is both true and false at the same time. We should explain.

Before it is brewed, a tea leaf typically contains about 2-3 times as much caffeine as a coffee bean. Once you compare the average caffeine content of a cup of tea and a cup of coffee, however, coffee wins hands down with approximately twice the amount of caffeine than black tea.

What about different kinds of tea and coffee, eh, eh?

Keep your knickers on, tiger. Perhaps you should be cutting down on caffeine. Not all coffee is created equal. Fine ground coffee as you might use in a high-pressure espresso machine will yield five times more caffeine per ml than coarse ground coffee from a French press. But, unless you double-shot your way through the day, your caffeine intake from a 30ml espresso will be less than a full mug of French press brew.

There are differences, also, in tea brews – from the cup of tea that your partner drinks, where, ideally, a tea bag is wafted over the cup in a less-than-vigorous fashion, to Yorkshire builders’ tea that looks as though it has been drained from the engine of a rusty Transit van.

The secret of soap opera tea

Whenever there’s a soap opera crisis brewing, the aftermath will always feature a pot of tea. There’s a lot of truth in the observation that a nice, hot cup of tea will put the world to rights. Tea contains its own stimulant, L-theanine, said to help ease stress and anxiety as well as reduce insomnia. Sipping on a fresh cuppa really can be relaxing. A study even found that people who experienced higher blood pressure discovered L-theanine helped reduce the increase in blood pressure. And because L-theanine stimulates without raising cortisol, the body’s natural stress hormone, the way that coffee does, tea can even help you sleep more soundly. The welcome surprise is that tea’s L-theanine is not removed by decaffeination. Decaf can still be used to dramatic effect after your pub landlord has gone postal with a baseball bat, the hospital has exploded, or there has been a murder or similar feature-length episode of festive trauma and ill-will.

Apart from L-theanine, your decaf cuppa also contains plenty of antioxidants which may well lower the risk of diabetes and strokes, as well as combat free radicals and slow the wear and tear on your DNA. Any tea is a healthy choice because of its antioxidants, but herbal teas that are naturally uncaffeinated are the best choice of all. As far as drinks are concerned, only tea made from the leaves of the tea plant camelia sinensis contain L-theanine, but a cup of chamomile is a great aid for restful sleep, well known, as it is, for its relaxing effects.

To find out more about I Love Decaf’s teas and herbal teas, look around our online shop.

How to Make Coffee Without a Coffee Maker

I Love DecafDecaf coffee hacks24 January 20224 March 2022Leave a Comment

You woke up this morning and your coffee maker has croaked. Despite what it sounds like, this isn’t the start of a modern blues song penned by Blind Grapefruit Jefferson, but it is potentially the start of an awful, dismal day.

Expect the car not to start, a piano to fall out of the sky or to for work to end up as an eight-hour PowerPoint presentation. Before all of that, you must achieve normality and that means you must have the cup of decaf that starts the day. Nothing else will help.

Making decaf coffee without a coffee maker is not an art

Fortunately, whatever Bob the barista at Cost-A-Few-Bucks says, making coffee is nowhere near an artform. It’s hot water over ground coffee, a little brew time and Bob has stopped being your barista and is now your uncle.

Honestly, I can’t believe I have to spoon-feed this to you. When we were out all day on the ranch, we could make coffee using only a primus stove, a length of rubber hose and a homemade moka pot fashioned from a Land Rover carburettor and a ship’s compass. It wasn’t too difficult, but it also wasn’t too nice either, so here’s how to make decent coffee without a coffee maker. You will need a kitchen or a designated area you prepare grub at least.

Sock coffee maker — “In Costa Rica, this type of coffee is colloquially known as “*agua de medias*” (sock water)”

Using ground decaf coffee

Add ground coffee into a heat-proof measuring jug. 1-2 tablespoons of ground coffee per 250ml cup.
Boil the kettle.
Pour the hot water over the ground decaf coffee as slowly as possible until you reach the amount of coffee you want.
Let it brew for around 3 minutes, then stir and leave for another three minutes. Adjust these timings to your own tastes or how long it is until your train to work leaves.
Pour into a mug through a tea strainer.

Using home-made coffee bags

This sounds a bit Blue Peter, but if it’s a filter coffee make that is broken, you are likely top have some spare coffee filters, an old sock, a used stocking or thick kitchen towel to hand. These can be made quickly into coffee bags with just a single piece of string.

Place 2 tablespoons of ground coffee in the centre of the coffee filter, old sock, used stocking or kitchen towel.
Draw the edges of the filter paper or whatever it is (see above) together to make a bag shape.
Tie a length of string or twine tight around the neck of the bag, leaving one length of the string long enough to hang over the side of the cup.
Boil a kettle.
Place the bag in the cup and pour over the hot water.
Remember to remove anything floating from the mug of coffee if it’s for a guest.

Does Decaf Coffee Contain Caffeine?

I Love DecafAdvice, Science of Coffee, Decaf coffee1 February 20222 March 2022Leave a Comment

While the answer to ‘Is decaf coffee free from caffeine?’ may seem obvious, the reality is more nuanced than that. The short answer is ‘yes’, the correct answer is ‘the absolute minimum’. In legal terms, to be considered decaf, at least 97% of the caffeine must be removed. Some decaf coffees, however, can improve on that and remove up to 99.99% of the original caffeine present like in one of our decaf coffees, Luxe Organic Honduran Decaf Coffee.

In short, you can’t change a leopard’s spots, but you can remove its teeth. The upshot is that you’ll be a lot calmer than either drinking a lot of caffeine or attempting dental work on a leopard.*

So, the answer is yes, decaf coffee does contain caffeine, albeit tiny amounts of the stuff.

Does decaf coffee contain caffeine? — The upshot is that you’ll be a lot calmer than either drinking a lot of caffeine or attempting dental work on a leopard.

Decaf, half-caf

There are also coffee blends that contain reduced caffeine, like our Frankenstein Monster 50/50 blend of regular and decaf. Our monster blend is a bit of a beast, to be fair, so if you’re worried about just how much caffeine remains in decaf, it’s probably not for you. If you fancy a more gradual approach to decaffeinating yourself, it might suit you as a halfway house to 99% decaffeination. Our Frankenstein Monster 50/50 has delicious notes of cocoa, praline and orange that permeate its hybrid blend. Handpicked coffee beans from the Nicaraguan Jinotega estate augment Swiss Water decaffeinated Honduran beans. It’s a great coffee with either less of the caffeine for those of you that don’t want to go all the way or more of the caffeine if you think you’ve gone too far.

This is all a long way from the very first decaffeination in history performed just over 200 years ago by German chemist Friedlieb Ferdinand Runge, after being challenged to do so by German poet Goethe. Runge did not take it to the next level and do anything productive, however, being content to note the caffeine’s potential for gardening.

“After Goethe had expressed to me his greatest satisfaction regarding the account of the man whom I’d rescued … he handed me a carton of coffee beans, which a Greek had sent him as a delicacy. “You can also use these in your investigations,” said Goethe. He was right; for soon thereafter I discovered therein caffeine, which became so famous on account of its high nitrogen content.”
Friedlieb Ferdinand Runge

Germany: the world’s first decaffei-nation

Over 80 years later in 1906, a chance discovery of a decaffeination by another German – coffee merchant Ludwig Roselius – ended in a patent and the foundation of the world’s first decaffeinated coffee brand, Kaffee Hag, subsequently named Café Hag. Roselius was later implicated in a 1943 plot to blow up Hitler on his flight back to Berlin from the East. Once again, decaf is on the side of good, though we are not so sure about Café Hag.

*Please do not attempt at-home dentistry on a leopard or any other animal with a British Standards competency certificate in mauling people.