Coffee

I buy SOE beans only (currently Yunnan Red Wine sun-dried), roasted on the estate and couriered to me so that when it arrives the CO2 has escaped the beans. I then hand grind in a burr grinder, and use filtered water in a french press or a Vietnamese coffee maker only. I don't use paper filters, percolators, or even drip makers. I also don't add sugar or milk or any other such additive. I want to taste my coffee, not have the flavours concealed by sugars and oils that make the flavourful agents slip over my tongue without leaving much flavour in their wake.

I'm very fussy about my coffee, I'm trying to say. When I lived in Canada I didn't even buy roasted beans. I had my own roaster.

Tea

As fussy as I am about my coffee, I am far fussier about tea. I try to buy straight from the producers without middlemen involved. And in tea, given the bewildering variety of it available, I keep a pool of standard teas (Lushan Yunwu, Yunnan Dianhong, Biluochun, and Leishan Hong Mei) for daily use, and I hunt down odd and interesting teas from all over China like the "Gold Flowers" black tea from Anhua, or the myriad of radically different teas under the "pu'er" umbrella, or things like Liubao black (probably the most out there tea available under the heading of camelia sinensis). I don't use tea bags. I don't use blends. I don't do brand names. For coffees I reach SOE. For teas it's SOE or even SOF.