From my Canadian mother-in-law -
Bring the kettle to a boil and take off the heat.
Use a earthenware British “brown betty”
Pour the boiling water in the Betty to warm it up for a few mins.
Empty the Betty.
Add loose tea or (gasp!) tea bags and refill.
Steep for 5-7 minutes.
The time it takes to warm the tea pot and then refill it allows the water to come down to about 180 degrees. Perfect tea steeping temp.
I’m not a tea drinker, but was in Taiwan doing field work. Out in the jungle, but a half-mile down the road was a tea farm and a man and wife that lived there.
They invited us over one day for tea. We ended up doing it every day for our lunch break.
I don’t recall it all now, but it was very much a ritual. IIRC they would brew up the tea leaves, pour that into the special clay(?) tea pot. Then brew that same bunch of leaves again.
Once those leaves had been brewed the second time, they threw out the first brew that had been sitting in the pot the entire time - then put the second brew in and served it.
In the meantime we would eat our sandwiches and whatever snacks and fruit that they would offer.
It was very much against my idea of a lunch out in the field to take that much time to eat. But my client enjoyed it. I learned to enjoy it too - and enjoyed the conversations with my client and the couple.
Bam a lam