Mint Tea

What is better than a nice cup of herbal tea on a cold evening?  It warms you us as it soothes the mind and eases the tension from the day.  Tea is also good in the morning for the kiddos when they have a sore throat or stuffy nose.

This summer we enjoyed herbal tea from our lovely garden mint patch.  Now that fall is here, I am preserving the mint to use as dry tea.  Since my kids like tea but don't like to scoop out loose tea with the metal tea ball, I bought fill-able paper tea bags.  I filled and sealed the bags with dried mint and now we have ready to use tea in our pantry.

First I dried the mint leaves in our food dehydrator.  I used a fruit leather liner under the mint to keep any small pieces from falling through the bottom.  To prevent the mint from blowing around inside the dehydrator I put a regular mesh tray liner on top.  This combination seemed to work well.  If you don't want to use a dehydrator you could air dry the herb by tying a string around a bundle and hanging it upside down until completely dry.   

fresh mint on a dryer tray

mint between two liners

When the mint was completely dry, it was easy to move from the dehydrator tray to a deep mixing bowl by rolling the two liners up like a jelly roll.  I had to pick some of the stems out of the mesh, but it slid right off the fruit leather liner's smooth surface.  Next, I removed the leaves from the stems by gently crumbling them with my hands.  This deep bowl kept all the little pieces from scattering about. 

leaves and stems together

stems were removed and composted

Now came the really tedious part.  I filled the bags with crushed mint leaves using a spoon.  The bags I bought are T-Sac size 1, and are available from Amazon.  They are advertised to hold two teaspoons.  Since the bags are biodegradable they are going in the compost after tea is enjoyed.   

filling a bag with mint leaves

Each bag was sealed using our vacuum sealer.  This was a bit of a tricky process.  I had to use a vacuum sealer bag because the tea bag did not trip the sensor to start the machine.  The tea bag wasn't going to be air-tight so I stopped the vacuum with the stop/seal button and just used the heat feature of the machine.  I have heard that a flat iron or clothing iron works well for sealing the bags.   

sealing the tea bag

Now when we want a warming, soothing mug of tea all we have to do is put the kettle on and open the pantry door. 

tea in the pantry