Sunday, July 31, 2011

Poll #2: How Many Brewing Vessels?

I would like to thank everyone who participated in the first poll on MySI! This gave me a lot of insight to several things...

First, it let me know more about my readers. Thanks to all who took the time to comment on the poll post. I did not get an answer directly to my "Do you like polls?" questions, but the number of votes and comments alone let me know that people are okay with sharing their opinions. Again, thank you! I loved reading all of your responses and finding out more about fellow tea-lovers.

Second, I think I may have been a little preemptive about the "weekly" portion of the polls. I thought I wanted a weekly feature on this blog, even though it all works in theory, it would just not work for this particular blog. However, I am glad that I tested it out and saw it for myself. The reason I don't think it would work is because I try to post thorough articles less frequently rather than small, asinine posts frequently. Because of that, I am afraid that this blog would house more surveys than informative articles. Thus, I am removing the "weekly" part of the poll and doing it more at random.

Third, all of the comments to the first poll came from the Tea Trade mirrored blog. I both like and dislike that at the same time. I like that because that means Tea Trade is a good source to link blogs with other tea-peeps, but I don't like that because that means more people are going to the crappy-looking mirrored blog than my original blog... the one I have worked so hard to create. This leaves me with issues to ponder...

Anyways, the tallied results of last week's poll was that a good 50% of the voters said that either a handle or no handle was fine because it was more about the design of the tea cup. Very interesting.

On to the second poll question! There is no set time limit to answer this question... it is just whenever I decide to put up a new question.

How many brewing vessels (teapots, gaiwans, yixing, kyusuu, etc.) do you currently have?

I have a total of 20 brewing vessels. Three matcha bowls, four ceramic gaiwans, one glass gaiwan, one cast iron teapot, two ceramic teapots, two glass teapots, two yixing, four kyusuu, and one gourd. Wow, I didn't realize I had so many. As for one ultimate favorite brewing vessel, I am not sure I can pick. However, I have favorites in each category. For example, my red cast iron teapot and glass gaiwan are two vessels that I reach for more than most.

So, how many do you have? What are some of your favorites? Why?

4 comments:

Xavier said...

This time I am leaving a comment here :D
I don't own much brewing vessels as I usually drink tea cup after cup.

Anonymous said...

1 yixing tea pot, 2 purple clay pots, 2 all glass pots, 5 ceramic pots (glazed), 2 unglazed ceramic pots, 2 Chinese Gawain, 1 travel celadon Tawianese gawain, 4 Japanese tetsubins, 3 bodum travel presses, 2 bodum yoyo infusers, 3 fine mesh Japanese tea strainers, 4 double glass travel tea infuser mugs, 2 tea 'oceans', and a strange Ceylon metal basket/tea strainer

Unknown said...

I've blogged a bit about my different brewing vessels, and although I'm not quite as obsessive about teapots as I am about the tea itself, the teapot obsession is developing.

I think I like my oversized yixing teapot the most of all. I only brew Oolong in it and it's gotten quite a workout since I got it last Christmas.

My suspicion is that other tea lovers have much more tea gear than I do.

Reg said...

Oof, an embarrassing amount (though perhaps not in this crowd): 1 yixing, 2 iron, 8 ceramic, 3 stainless mug-infusers, and 1 glass mug-infuser. In addition, I have 2 Moroccan tea cups, 18 British tea cups, 1 Indian tea cup, and 5 Japanese tea cups. I'm still looking for the perfect gaiwan to add to my collection!

My favorite is a small Russian tea pot (because it's the perfect size for me) and a British style tea cup and saucer that I got off Etsy that's been modified—it used to have roses on it, but the roses are now infested with spiders (an animal that I love).