Lazy Kungfu teapot: It brews with expert timing (In fact, it's a little bit frightening)

The Lazy Kungfu Drip Teapot: masterful brewing with beautiful presentation

 

♫ Everybody, of kung fu I'm writing,
    It's a teapot that steeps fast as lightening,
   In fact, it is a little bit frightening,
   How it brews tea with expert timing.🎝

With our apologies to singer/songwriter Carl Douglas, we at Barb's Tea Service are bringing the exuberance and admiration of mastery from that 1974 classic pop hit and applying it to, not martial arts, but tea brewing.  Specifically, we're talking the "Lazy Kungfu Drip Teapot" which combines beautiful presentation with masterful tea brewing in a convenient tabletop display.

I was gifted this intriguing teapot by my husband, Chris, for Christmas and while I had the teapot front and center in one of my kitchen cabinets with glass doors, I hadn't actually used it until this week. I'm excited to share the positive results.

Kungfu teapot displayed in kitchen cabinet, but now ready for use!

"Lazy" is a bit of a misleading label, as one likes to think of tea making as an exercise with time put in for measuring, boiling, steeping and then repeating (unlike the "dark side" machines that can brew up to twelve cups of coffee with a single button press). But, the Kungfu teapot does offer a clever feature that stops the steep and pours with one slight push. And, if that qualifies as "lazy", okay (although, I'm thinking "leisurely" might be a tad more complimentary).

Kungfu teapot ready to make tea

Measured out loose tea for one cup

The "catch" of the Lazy Kungfu is, quite, literally a catch. Under the tiny teapot is a screen filtered spout which is locked by a steel ball. When the tea is done steeping, one can place the glass cup under the teapot. The cup's handle has a magnet that pulls (or "catches", to be consistent), the ball away and allows the decanted tea to stream through, leaving the tea leaves behind.

Pouring in the hot water to begin the steep.

The Kungfu teapot provides a "dinner and a show" -  one gets a lovely cup of finely brewed tea as well as the joy of watching the whole process. 

The downside is that it doesn't yield much more than a single cup of tea. So, if you want to brew for a guest (or give yourself a second cuppa), you'd need to rinse out the teapot, dispense of the leaves, and start anew - which, again, doesn't sound so lazy to me.

At the base of the teapot, an infuser with a steel ball

The cup handle's magnet catches the ball

However, it is perfect for sharing in an intimate setting, with a few friends, in more of a Chinese tea ceremony fashion, with small cups and several steeps of the same tea leaves. And, that's exactly what we'll be using our Kungfu teapot for next - serving up another gift from the holidays: Puerh tea directly from China.  So, as we are fond of saying at BTS, please stay tuned! 

The Kungfu teapot yield one cup or several small pours

In the meantime, check out our latest BTS video on You Tube where we demonstrate the Lazy Kungfu teapot! https://youtu.be/EiZpY24uWL8