How to Actually Prepare Hemp Flower Tea
I have two methods and which one I use depends entirely on whether I feel like having a tea party.
The first is a traditional Chinese clay teapot with a built-in infuser. Compact, beautiful, feels ceremonial in the best possible way. The second is a cafetiere - practical, straightforward, perfect when I'm brewing for two. Both work brilliantly. The cafetiere just has slightly less theatre to it.
This is the post I wish existed when I started brewing hemp flower as a herbal tea. Because there's a surprising amount of nuance to getting it right - and most of it comes down to a few simple decisions that make a real difference to what ends up in your cup.
Why Preparation Actually Matters
If you've read the CBDA vs CBD post I wrote recently, you'll know that when you brew hemp flower as a loose-leaf herbal tea, what you're primarily extracting is CBDA - the raw acid form of CBD that exists in the plant before heat converts it. That's a different compound to the CBD in oils and gummies, and how you brew directly affects how much of it - and how much of the terpene profile - you get into your cup.
Get the preparation right and you've got something genuinely remarkable. A complex, aromatic brew that tastes of the strain it came from - fruity, earthy, spicy, floral depending on the genetics - and delivers the full character of the plant in a form that's been used for thousands of years. Get it wrong and you've got something grassy, flat and a bit disappointing.
The difference is mostly in three things: temperature, time and what you add to the cup.
Temperature - the Most Important Variable
This is where most people go wrong, and it's easy to fix.
Boiling water - 100 degrees Celsius - is too hot for hemp flower tea. At full boiling temperature you degrade terpenes faster than you extract them, and you drive off the volatile aromatic compounds that give each strain its character before they've had a chance to make it into your cup. You also accelerate the decarboxylation process, converting more CBDA to CBD through heat - which as I covered in the CBDA piece, may not actually be what you want.
My method: boil the kettle, then let it sit for three to five minutes before pouring. This brings the temperature down to somewhere around 85 to 90 degrees Celsius - hot enough to extract properly, cool enough to preserve what you're actually trying to get out of the plant. An added bonus: you're less likely to burn your mouth. I also find the flavour is noticeably better at this temperature - cleaner, more defined, more of the strain actually coming through rather than a generic herby note.
If you have a temperature-controlled kettle, 85 to 90 degrees is your target. If you don't, the three to five minute wait after boiling gets you close enough.
Time - Less Than You Think
Five minutes. That's roughly the sweet spot for most strains and that's the maximum I'd recommend.
Beyond five minutes and the hemp taste starts to overpower the more delicate terpene notes. The earthier, more vegetal character of the plant material dominates and you lose the nuance - the citrus top notes, the floral character, the fruity sweetness - that makes a well-bred strain worth brewing in the first place.
I start checking at around three minutes. With a lighter, more floral strain like Lavender Cupcakes I'll often pull it at three to four. With something denser and earthier like Bubba Kush or Royal OG I'll let it go the full five. It varies by strain and by personal taste - the best way to find your preference is to taste as you go the first time you try a new flower.
When I'm trying a strain for the first time I always brew it plain - nothing added, nothing to interfere with the first impression. You want to know what the plant tastes like before you start layering anything on top of it.
The Fat Solubility Thing - and Why It Actually Matters
Here's where I'm going to get slightly science-nerdy for a second, because this is genuinely one of the most interesting and underreported aspects of brewing hemp flower as tea.
Cannabinoids - including CBDA and CBD - are fat soluble, not water soluble. This means they bind to fats much more readily than they dissolve in water. Plain hot water extracts some cannabinoids from the plant material, but the addition of any fat to the cup changes the chemistry of what you're drinking quite significantly. Fat soluble compounds that wouldn't fully bind to plain water bind to the fat molecules instead, meaning more of what's in the plant ends up in the cup and more of what's in the cup ends up absorbed by your body.
In practical terms: adding a splash of milk - oat milk, whole milk, whatever you prefer - to your hemp flower tea isn't just a taste preference. It may actually improve the bioavailability of what you're drinking. The fat content in the milk gives the cannabinoids and fat-soluble terpenes something to bind to.
I use oat milk when I want that familiar milky brew feel. It replicates the experience of a regular cup of tea in a way that feels natural - and for someone who's a two sugars and milk kind of tea drinker normally, that matters. Whether you add it or not is personal preference, but knowing why it might make a difference is useful.
What to Add - and When
After that first plain brew, I start experimenting. And what I add depends almost entirely on how I'm feeling and which strain I'm working with.
Bad stomach or an IBS flare - I add fresh ginger. Ginger has been used for digestive complaints for thousands of years and it pairs naturally with most hemp strains without fighting the terpene profile. It also adds a warmth to the cup that I find genuinely comforting.
After a meal - mint. Clean, refreshing, settles the stomach and lifts the overall flavour of the brew. Works particularly well with lighter, more citrusy strains (like Sour Lifter) where you want something bright rather than heavy.
Evening, wind down, something indica-leaning - this is where the milk really comes into its own. Strains like Bubba Kush, Royal OG or Lavender Cupcakes have spice-forward terpene profiles - caryophyllene, linalool, myrcene - and brewed with oat milk the result is genuinely reminiscent of a chai. Warming, slightly spiced, deeply settling. It's become one of my favourite evening rituals.
With the sweeter, more fruit-forward strains - Rainbow Sherbet, anything citrus-heavy - I tend to leave the milk out. The sweetness and the fruit notes come through more clearly without it, and adding milk can muddy what's already a complex and enjoyable flavour profile.
None of this is prescriptive. Hemp flower tea is inherently personal - part of the pleasure is finding what works for your palate, your routine and how you're feeling on a given day. These are just the combinations I keep coming back to.
How Much Flower
A rough guide: around half a gram to one gram of dried hemp flower per cup is a reasonable starting point. Less and you'll find the brew quite light. More and it can become quite intense and earthy.
I tend toward the lighter end for more delicate strains and the fuller end for something robust like a kush or an OG. As with steep time, the best approach is to experiment and adjust to your own taste.
The Kit
You don't need anything special. A teapot with an infuser, a cafetiere, a simple mesh strainer over a mug, or a dedicated loose-leaf tea infuser all work well. The cafetiere is probably the most accessible option if you already have one - press it slowly after steeping and you've got a clean, well-extracted brew with minimal fuss.
If you want something that feels a bit more considered, a traditional teapot with a built-in infuser is hard to beat. There's something about the ritual of it - warming the pot, measuring the flower, timing the steep - that makes the whole experience feel more intentional. Which, given what you're actually drinking and why, feels appropriate.
A Final Note
Hemp flower tea rewards attention. It's not quite like any other herbal tea - the flavour profiles are more complex, the preparation has more variables, and the results vary noticeably between strains in a way that keeps it genuinely interesting.
Take the time to try each new strain plain first. Pay attention to the temperature and the steep time. Experiment with additions once you know what the plant tastes like on its own. And if you find a combination that works brilliantly - let us know. This is a community thing and the best discoveries tend to come from people sharing what they've found.
This article reflects the personal views and experiences of the author and is provided for general information only. Hemp flower is sold by Originals CBD for use as a herbal tea product.