Tea does not really expire – it just fades, quietly, in ways good storage postpones for a very long time. Leaves have four enemies: light, air, moisture and strong-smelling neighbours. Beat those four and the last cup from a caddy tastes like the first. Here is how.
Dark beats decorative
The glass jar of leaves on a sunny shelf is beautiful for exactly the six weeks it takes light to flatten the tea inside. Opaque wins: ceramic canisters and metal caddies keep the shelf handsome while keeping the leaves in the dark, where they belong.
Air is a one-way door
Every opening of the lid trades a little aroma for a little oxygen, and the trade never reverses. Keep leaves in the smallest caddy they fill – a half-empty large jar is mostly air – and decant a fortnight’s tea into a small tin rather than opening the main store daily.
Keep it dry, keep it separate
Moisture is the fastest ruin: never scoop with a damp spoon, never store above the kettle’s steam path. And because dry leaves absorb smells greedily, the caddy next to the coffee grinder is a blending experiment nobody ordered. Give tea its own shelf corner, one caddy per tea.
What about the fridge?
Leave it alone. Refrigerators are damp, smelly places by tea standards, and condensation on a cold caddy does more harm than the cool does good. The exception is sealed, unopened green tea bought in bulk – and even then, let the caddy come fully to room temperature before opening. For everything else: cool cupboard, opaque caddy, small portions. That is the whole science.
