tea memories (and stocks exploration)
Greetings, Hivers! I am a coffee aficionado, but I tend to protect this heaven-sent pleasure from over-usage. We drink tea massively during the day -- unlike coffee, which goes max once a day, usually in the morning... not every day.
Tea topic is immense as China's millenial history; it is much more versatile subject (unlike coffee, which I simply grind & brew in a jezzwa same way every time, following verified route...)
I have never shared my tea experience on the blockchain: I rather afraid to approach this immense field, don’t know where to start and scared of the distance to go, lol. Should I describe evolution of my tea likes & habits? show my collection of teapots? tell unusual natural recipes? Discuss the real tea / tea-bags opposition, and on and on.
I really cant decide. I opened one of our tea stock boxes to explore and find find the inspiration. Hmmm..... let me make a cup of tea, grab the camera and will see where it goes 😇
...A few hours and sixty shutter clicks later...
It turned out into a time journey. Cool! My sort of things. My first teapot, bought around 2000. Appealing design! time has left its marks.. cap have cracked, so it went into honorable retirement - but how can I throw it away?
But first things come first. Until I grew up and started living a separate household, I did not pay much attention to tea. As a kid I'd rather prefer hot cocoa and milkshakes :P See, I was born and raised in late USSR, a lot of ordinary things were in short supply (production could never catch up with demand...), including the tea. Especially tea. USSR had tea plantations it Georgia - but that sort of tea was of poor quality; most valued sorts of black tea were the ones imported from India and Ceylon; older people remember this design. #img #src
Memories! I DO remember the taste of strong black tea (and 'Bird's Milk' soufflé cake that adorned our family NewYear's dinner, in rare cases when mom was lucky to buy it...). Few things I remember from my childhood, this precious gem is one of them.
Later, in 2000-es I developed a habit for green tea - namely, Ahmad Jasmine Green tea. I used to get 250g carton packs, several at once, and shared the pleasure with my wife. In few years our user experience deteriorated - you may assume I got tired of its taste; more probably manufacturer have changed the technology on the sly, replacing natural jasmine buds with chemical flavour, good long-leaf base tea with a cheaper sort, etc. #src: ozon.ru
So. Our taste / consuming level developed, we were ready for something better, and by the late 2000s, my wife started 'DYOR' and ventured into direct purchases in China and India through intermediaries. Due to her efforts, we tried a lot of elite and pricey stuff.
Soon she was granted this glossy wholesale buyers catalog, which greatly educated us about Chinese tea.
We've got plenty different sorts in those handy aluminium cans from RealChinaTea; in the photo above: DahunPao, Bilochun, DyanHun, Shen-Puer, Golden Eyebrows, Black Gold... and there were much more others. These cans turned empty a long ago, but they're so adorable we didn't throw them away, but use to store stuff, spices, etc.
Another brand we dealt with, 'Tea Express' - provided us with Indian tea; mostly Darjeeling.
I keep photo of their weighty parcel, all sealed with dozen wax seals, imagine that! totally unexpected, surprising and joyful. Our toddler babygirl's explorational hand is in the frame :P
Tea moment with a friend. Actually, it was 1st time I tried 'blooming tea' - I was impressed, and fell in love momentarily!
My further tea evolution no way fits into 1000 words. Schematically: Jasmine Green tea > Milk Oolong > various Oolong sorts, Tie Guan Yin > Puer > Green (Shen) Puer > Darjeeling (sorts). Now, lets dig into said box...
Lapsang Souchong is very, very unusual and special black tea, no sense to explain its taste or smell. Sausages? Turpentine? Ski wax? try it and decide for yourself.
Ginseng Oolong; not among my faves.
'Blooming tea' is an intresting specie; it has a flower(s) inside the tea leaves that perform a cool action in front of your eyes while the tea is brewing... I don't have a suitable photo to show you.
In the dry state, it certainly does not look too spectacular :)
Next time I will dont forget to take pic xD
But the package does look nice. The carton box uses a magnetic lock and closes-opens by itself, smoothly. Chinese Magic!
You have probably already guessed that we keep a lot of old, used up tea packaging: tins, cardboards... and you might ask reasonably: why, what for?! Uh... well, it's used and useless indeed! (Although, now it came in handy for this blog :) but... it's so beautiful! I simply can't part with it. And some were the gifts and memory of old good friends from China (Lily and David! Hello!!!)
Small pot we reserved especially for Pu Er tea.
You can't embrace the unembraceable - and fortunately for me, I didn't try to do that (at least not this time ;). Now its time to wrap up my story. Tell in comments if you are interested in the topic, I will be happy to continue with this.
The post goes for International Tea Day contest by Cinnamon Cup Coffee community. 4% of post rewards I give away for community's power.
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STOPTo support your work, I also upvoted your post!
A pleasure to know. Grazie Mille! 🙏 ☘️☘️
Wow, two badges in a row, awesome work @qwerrie! 🎉🎉
Oh, by the way... there is smth strange in Buzz 1st comment = figures dont match (text vs picture). something might went wrong... 😏
We don't see any mismatch. Maybe you need to reload the page and clear your browser cache (CTRL-F5)
That sounds strange, please @hivebuzz have a look:
below is the screencap (taken at different browser)
Is it worth further enquiring?..
Really weird indeed. Here is a screenshot we took right now:
Ok, then ☘️ might be some local aberration on my side 🤪
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Yuuhh this tea ceremonies are so fascinating and so addictive that sometimes you forget about the time
addictive! correct :P
This is a true passion, love and knowledge of tea, I am a sad novice, who has only had tea bags and infusions, not to mention instant powders, I am ashamed, thank you for this journey, it has been truly enriching.
Чайный извращенец )
Wow, you are a tea master :)
Although I don't drink coffee anymore I haven't dive into the tea world either. Very interesting. I drink a green tea as I write this comment but that's it with my relation with tea. I know a little things about herbal teas, mostly for herbs that grow around here but my big love is hot cacao!
And the first picture of you that I see! I thought you were hiding yourself, or something :)
Thanks for sharing your tea experience. I like it too!.
I love the tiny teapot for Pu Er tea; is quaint. The blooming tea sounds blooming fantastic (hehe😂), I love to see it “bloom” in the pot. However, you’ve given us a remarkable presentation of teas and tea culture and your pictures are wonderful.
My pleasure! Love to share good stuff. One day, when I will get a proper capture, I definitely will show the beauty of 'blooming' tea. Cheerz! 🙏
What can I say but WOW, WOW, WOW @qwerrie
This is AWESOME! I love all of it. There's no way you can get rid of that teapot. AMAZING photos!!!
I am the same. I NEVER threw away beautiful tins and cans.
This is a lovely surprise. I didn't realise that you were so big into tea.
WONDERFUL POST!!!
Grazie Mille 🤸♂️ Glad my visuals entertained you; hope there will be a lot more intresting entries to explore. 😏
Haha! After yours, I'll be needing to do this.
Maybe, better make a cup of black coffee?.. 😎
Haha! I just had one, and I'm heading off to lunch where I'll finish up with a latte 😋
Congratulations, your post has been upvoted by @dsc-r2cornell, which is the curating account for @R2cornell's Discord Community.
I love tea but not as you do with this huge collection you have built over the years. I believe the best way to keep enjoying drinking tea is to go with moderation and not abuse it too much.
Haha, indeed - "collection build over years".... bracketing out all the used packages, we have sufficient amount of unused leftovers... thus, one may say I actually dont like tea 😁
-- Do you like tea?
-- Dont like drinking tea, but love to collect tea packages !LOLZ
Jokes aside... there are so many good ways to enjoy tea that I think one never be able to choose the sole best one ☘️
I prefer coffee personally but love to take tea once in a while.
Both are good, have own power, rituals and in their own right. I love both, in different ways. ☘️
Never tried that realchina tea even though I am here in Hong Kong.. You have a lot of tea there. amazing !LADY
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Oh well, being in Hong Kong, you might have much more opportunities, to choose from?.. It was a problem here, in Russia, to get acquainted with decent sorts / species of tea at a decent price, and this brand/intermediator helped us with it greatly ☘️ Cant say one bad word about the stuff and their attitude to their goods. Thank you for a visit, happy that you liked my visuals. 🙏