US firms claims to have developed `revolutionary’ tea making machine
05 May 2014
A US firm claims to have developed a new machine that could revolutionise making a cup of tea.
Though many people claim they could make a perfect cup of tea, according to the American company, its new machine is better at brewing tea than any human being.
However, the machine that brews the world-beating cuppa comes with a steep price tag of $13,000 (nearly £8,000).
According to Bkon, their technology, currently at the testing stage, could one day spell the end of the teabag.
The BKon machine comes with a 'brewing chamber' into which loose tea leaves and water are added.
The leaves and water are then subjected to a vacuum pump and negative pressure, which makes the tea leaves rise to the surface.
According to Bkon, this releases gases which bring out the many complex flavours in a far superior manner than by simply adding boiling water to a teabag.
Repeating the process over 90 seconds produces the brew that the company has labelled 'Tea 2.0'.
The machines' prototypes that are in the final test stages could even go for sale later this year.
Brewing a perfect cup of tea is rather tricky as the leaves if steeped for too long, leaves a bitter taste, but if they are taken out soon, the brew would be too weak. There is also the fact that the optimal steep time varied from leaf to leaf, so getting a consistently perfect cup is easier said than done.
The company's brewer uses ''Reverse Atmospheric INfusion,'' or RAIN to allow the maximum amount of ''soluble flavour elements'' to be extracted.
What apparently draws out the flavour in full measure is the application and subsequent removal of negative pressure. The vacuum allows the opening of the leaves' cell structure, letting trapped gases escape, and allows free entry to water.
This process is continued over 60 to 90 seconds, during which the machine continually adjusts variables like vacuum depth, internal pressure, and water temperature to achieve the ''optimum flavour profile'' of the tea inside.
To help users get the best extraction for different kinds of teas, the machine can store over 200 different recipes, which could be accessed by users via a large touchscreen panel on the side.
