Fresh smells/tastes fucking hideous. Dried smells/tastes more like bitter hay. Bitterness is to a degree indicative of alkaloid content.
Take pods, to tolerance/taste/need/desire/level of pain, smash 'em up, and, starting with cold water, slowly bring to simmer. Stew for a short time. Do not boil, don't prolong the prep time, opioid alkaloids are present in the plant as meconate salts, so addition of acid isn't necessary, desirable or a good thing.
Leaves? they shouldn't and need not be in there, don't fret about a few scraps of leaf matter that made it over from your crop. What you want, is the capsules, aka 'pods', thats where most of the sought-after alkaloids are hiding, in the form of readily soluble salts with meconic acid, an organic acid unique to the poppy, they will tolerate some heat, but they do not love it, don't overheat, for too long etc.
Handy tools are a potato masher, and a sieve/strainer.
I allow a liter or so of cold water, to be brought to the simmer per serving, for MY tolerance. This is for bog standard pods grown in a british climate with no really special care.
Although the better the climate, the better, likewise, the more you are careful in selecting your strain, and attend to your grow conditions the better. British pods can, and DO produce goods. And they can be farmed away from home, so to speak, guerrilla grows on waste ground, fertilized away from prying eyes, oh yes it can Bee done.
Legal to grow as a garden ornamental, but once you start lancing pods, slicing with razorblades etc. then its obvious you aren't after a few pretty flowers, and under UK law, yeah, well...I leave that to your discretion and common sense.
The species needed is Papaver somniferum, the opium poppy,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papaver_somniferum, others,
such as P.rhoeas, the red poppy, look similar, and/or produce related akaloids, but no, they aren't what you want. P.bracteatum which is high in thebaine, but contains no morphia or codeine, and P.argemone which is toxic stuff.
Once you look at a few pics, and see your first pods, you will know what to look for.
The thebaine content of pod tea, although it is toxic, in high concentrations, it modifies the character of pod tea/opium to something quite different to morphine/codeine/H any mixture of the above, its more stimulating, awakening and cerebral, a property quite unique to pod tea. A batch of pods can often be reused a second time for a top up, or a weaker batch of tea. Do mix it with a fucking TON of sugar though, and hold your nose while you drink it, then chase down with a more palatable drink. The taste and in particular smell of fresh pod brews is something that personally, knocks me fucking sick. Like chlorine gas, or bleach, or the smell of freshly mowed grass, just one of those things I can't stand. Does the trick though, and works a treat for pain.
