Teaware to go

I love these thermoses!  Pylones has some silly patterns.  It's a French company.

                                                

These are coffee mugs:

    

Extra tea tastings

I've been holding extra tea pourings for the Teacal (the Cal tea class).  This week we had one at Cloyne with a small group.  Madison and Frank started off an then several others joined as well.  We had Root'd Tea's Rock Oolong and a Jasmine Pearl from Samovar.  The oolong, also known as Rou Gui, is a twisted oolong (not rolled) and is dark, roasty, chocolatey, and slightly sweet.

Jasmine Pearl is a classic favorite.  We watched the leaves unroll with each powerful floral infusion, and even ate some at the end.  I like noting how the pearls vary in their buoyancy in the first couple infusions.  Some float, some stay in the middle, and some sink to the bottom of the gaiwan - a sign of high quality leaf.

Madison and Danny

Ryan and his tea cup.

The tea session was accompanied by some Shel Silverstein poems from A Light in the Attic, which I uncovered from the free pile at Cloyne.  

Tasting some Ryokucha

Today, I had a wonderfully delicious afternoon tea called Ryokucha.  It is a Japanese green - a mix of Genmaicha (green tea with roasted brown rice) and Matcha (ground green tea).

Ryokucha is extremely aromatic - grassy, roasted, and grainy from the pieces of rice in it.  The Matcha makes it a beautiful electric green color.  I loved the look of it in the white cups.

Tea Pot

I found this cool Jasmine tea tin from China and turned it into a pot for one of the orchids in my room.  I love this tea tin - it has an English side and Chinese side, and it's in Imperial Yellow.

White Tea Week in the Teacal

Pouring tea in class!  We had teas from Norbu, Samovar, and Numi.

Shout-out to Norbu Tea

One of the White teas we tasted in the Teacal this week was from Norbu Tea.  Norbu generously donated several teas to the class, and on Tuesday we brewed their delicious Ya Bao Wild Camelia White.

Ya Bao dry leaf

The dry leaves are beautifully furry and you can see the whole buds.  One take on its dry smell was "vegetal."  We decided that it is a very herbal white tea, as opposed to sweet.  The brew is light and I liked its calming characteristics.  In the class, people described it as "peppery," "like a hot, dry sauna," and "like a silkworm cocoon" - all very genuine and observant descriptions of the flavor and aroma.

Senchas from Norbu

A beautiful Sheng Pu-erh cake that we will taste later in the semester.

Japanese Green Tea Tasting!

I recently attended one of Teance's tasting classes at their Berkeley location on 4th Street.  It was fun and delicious! Winnie, Teance's owner and chief tea buyer (I believe) lead the class of about 12 people.  Behind the fountain in the store's center area, we sat at the tea bar and chatted about Senchas.

Sencha being drained after brewing in a gaiwan

Cat with her imperial yellow tea cup

Sencha is a specialty Japanese green tea.  It is traditionally consumed by people of stature, as opposed to matcha and kukicha.  Sencha is made from the tea leaves, and without stems.  Processing and production are multi-faceted.  I learned that now, tea production in Japan is highly mechanized, unlike in China.  It is not, however, any less "artisan."

We tasted eight Senchas from three different regions.  For each one, we wrote down notes about aroma, flavor, and aftertaste.  If you've ever done a tea tasting or coffee tasting, you'd know how difficult it is to put words to a feeling on the tongue.  I liked some of the descriptions like "grapefruit," "marine-like," "peppery," "umami,"and "cotton."

Some of the tasting sheets that the group filled out

Teatime at Cloyne!

Sarah, Ellie, Natalie, Liz, and Haley

On Thursday we had a busy tea sesh in the Ren and Stimpy room at Cloyne (my co-op).  About twelve of us hung out and tasted teas for an hour and a half.  We started with Rootd Tea's Wild Honey White Tea.  It is light and flowery, perfect for starting off.  Then we moved on to a Dragonwell Green Tea from Numi.  People really liked its grassy flavor and borderline astringency - it's very refreshing.  The third tea of the night was another of Rootd's selections, donated to me by Nick Bastone.  It was a lightly oxidized Tie Guan Yin, one of my top oolong picks:

Rootd Tea's Tie Guan Yin Oolong - The leaves are unrolled after several infusions.

Maris and Frank

Lastly, we had a darker oolong from Samovar called Wuyi Dark Roast.  The darkest of the teas that evening, people liked its honey color and roasty aroma.  I love this tea - its richness is filling in a really nice way.

Managing the gaiwan!