Hot Water Soluble Tea

Hot Water Soluble Tea
In country consuming the traditional hot beverage the instant product has not, so far, enjoyed the same fairly wide acceptance as has instant coffee. Only on the last few years has there been any serious attempt to market instant tea in the United Kingdom outside the catering and vending sector. The market is still in an early stage of development with several freeze dried products of reasonable quality consisting of 100% tea solids retailing alongside mixes containing whiteners or sugar and other flavoring.

The manufacturing process is essentially similar to that for instant coffee, namely the preparation of an aqueous extract, followed by concentration and drying of the extract to yield a completely soluble powder or granules. In the case of tea, however, control of the processing condition is much more critical of product degradation is to be avoided. The extract may be prepared from conventional black tea or from undried green leaf which may be partly processed before the extraction. In either event the extraction conditions must be precisely controlled in order to provide both satisfactory quality and a commercially viable yield. After extraction the liquors require very careful handling to minimize undesirable changes before the final drying step. This may be by spray drying or freeze drying.

For a retail product, marketing considerations dictate that the product density should be such that one tea spoonful of powder or granules corresponds to a cup of average drinking strength.
Hot Water Soluble Tea