Hah! Well as you probably know the traditional Japanese tea ceremony is a very complex ritual of procedure and manners ... I don't actually know that much about it except that it involves several people and has to be done just so. However maybe I could bring some to a trade fest and brew some up for folks. Or maybe just make green tea cookies.

Here's a good video by Eric Gower on how to do it in a portable sort of way. Not exactly traditional but the end product is still great:

http://masterclass.breakawaymatcha.com/#matcha8

Scroll up and down the page for a lot more information on matcha. Eric's a total nut for the stuff and now markets his own (Japanese grown) brand.

I stopped drinking coffee in the 90s. I found that if I didn't drink coffee I was getting headaches, so I just stopped altogether.
I generally drink at least one cup of tea each day. Today it's Tazo Green Ginger. Generally stick to Tazo, Yogi, and Traditional Medicinals teas (sorry Daimyo - I've been calling this stuff tea for too long to start calling it something else!). I've also got some loose chrysanthemum tea from Portland's Chinese Gardens.

Oh, also: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=38374&hilit=+green+tea+
(Way to use the search function, Rich! )

I also love to brew my own spiced tea, from scratch...

Indian Spiced Cardamom Tea
2 cups water
3 -5 cloves
1 cinnamon stick, crushed
*2 -3 cardamom WHOLE pods (remove husk and crush the black oily seeds)
*1/4 cup sugar or 1/4 cup sucanat (whole ground sugar cane--like unrefined turbino sugar or jaggery)
1 cup milk (or for extra richness, use half and half)
2 tablespoons black tea leaves (use a very strong and spicy black tea, i.e. Assam)

Directions:

1) put the water on the stove and add spices, bring to boil.
2) cover and let simmer for few minutes.
3 add sugar or sucanat and milk, stir.
4) bring back to just barely boiling (watch pot, milk will bubble over).
5) add tea leaves, cover pot, remove from heat.
6) steep for 5 minutes.
7) pour through filter to remove spices and tea leaves.

Adjustments:
- For cardamom lovers, add more pods (I add 8-9 pods). When selecting cardamom, look for a light green husk and the inner seeds should be black, sticky, and oily for optimum flavor. If you have dry brown/beige seeds, throw this out!
-A variation is to add a dash of nutmeg and/or allspice, for extra earthiness and spice

* A variation on the sweetner, you can use Piloncillo. This is an unrefined sugar that has been pressed into cones and is used to sweeten and flavor Mexican desserts and drinks. You can find this in the ethnic section of a grocery store or a good Latino food market

*Also makes a nice summer drink, when you blend it with crushed ice, served in a tall glass with mint, and with a plate of bitter dusted chocolate truffles to nibble on too

Dean, maybe you could wear a yukata while you're making the brew ! We could all bring a Japanese sweet to share. We'll have to rename the event to BASK Trade and Snack fest Thanks too, for that neato video link!

Just printed the recipe out. I'm a little wary of caffeine this late in the day so I'll brew some up early tomorrow ... looking forward to it. I have piloncillo on hand (being a fan of homemade Mexican food) and will use it ... love its earthy taste as opposed to white processed sugar. Big thanks!

It's funny to see my own attitude about tea in comparison to you normal people, who just thinks of it as a drink choice. I'm like the hardcore only classic licensed kaiju guy of tea's. No tea for you! *soup nazi voice*

How dare you.

You're very welcome Dean . Don't forget the cardamom, it's the key ingredient!
I LOVE cooking with piloncillo--it has a deep flavor and is waaaay better than white refined sugar. Mexican chocolate (the good stuff!) is also wonderful to cook with, since it has almonds, cinnamon, and vanilla in it (ok, don't get me started on mole!). Looking forward to seeing you wearing that yukata and demo-ing the tea ceremony

Daimyo, I can see a place in purgatory for you, where you'll have to drink Lipton tea--using the tea bag! ...and BOILING the tea bag in a steel pot (starting off with COLD water) until the whole concoction looks like black ink, and served in a beautiful STYROFOAM cup!

I've used a Chinese buying service to buy green teas directly from China. It's a little scary though as I don't know how to suss out what is good or not, or if bad pesticides etc. were used.. I just don't know enough about it. I picked shops that had good reviews from customers in China and picked up some green and pu-erh tea.

I had a big bag from a friend of my dads who teaches tea appreciation. Silver Needle etc. etc. wonderful stuff.

I knew I was gonna get some reccomendations, but wasn't expecting underground tea smuggling from china

I was thinking of starting with plain ol, boxed stuff you can get locally. But now I have to research this some more.

But any supermarket boxed bags that are good ?

This board is so cool. I love that there are deep, knowledgeable conversations like this that run in parallel with everything else that's discussed. Anyway, here's my short list of my long-standing top two favorites:

1. Teavana / Thousand Mountain Jasmine. I have also dubbed this "crack tea" because I've gotten so addicted to it.

2. Mariage Freres / Marco Polo. Hard to describe, but dee-lish. It's perfect. Trust me on this.


@Rich: Numi's "Monkey King Jasmine" is a decent (although a little bitter) off-the-shelf tea bag substitute for by beloved Teavana Thousand Mountain Jasmine.

Nooooooooooooo!

I'ma switch to Arizona green tea, maybe sweet tea.

I heard Arizona tea is poison in a can...

in that case i'll stick with sweet tea from Chick'fil'a

This is one of the better ones I got:

My wife asked one of her coworkers to bring some tea in from China but once we got it, we noticed it was full of mold. Thanks to this post I've been doing more research and was wondering if mold was okay? or even expected? Thoughts

No, mold is not okay. Throw away any moldy tea.

^^^What took you so long! I was waiting for at least some irate comment about moldy tea

Ok, just a side note on chawans, that's the other thing that is so much fun about tea! I love finding good handmade ones. Oribeware is so nice!
http://www.etsy.com/listing/89031550/or ... ref=&sref=
...and this one is nice too
http://www.etsy.com/listing/79146961/bo ... ref=&sref=
You can find a lot of neat ones on Etsy
http://www.etsy.com/search_results.php? ... nd_pottery

I'm trying to have Beau Raymond make a cup for me. Not exactly a chawan, but it has 3 very expressive faces on the same cup!


P.S. Daimyo, if Lipton won't do, how about Red Rose tea bags?
...you get a free ceramic animal in the box too!

Mold is bad, but some white tea has white fuzz on it. The difference is probably obvious though as the fuzz is just part of the plant.

grace... where else would i be hunting for chawans?! =p shyrabbit is the shop i've been scoping out, just waiting for him
to post up some chawans with the ash tenmoku and nuka glaze.

It's been years but I used to add a little Dewar's White Label Scotch to my Earl Grey tea.
Probably best in the fall months.

3x3is9, thank you for posting that. I think it confirms my suspicions that the quality of ALL food products coming from China is becoming increasingly suspect. With the scares of contaminated milk products, canned goods, dried goods, etc... this doesn't surprise me that tea production would also be affected. These days, I make it a point when I shop for asian groceries to NOT buy stuff made in China. This is a sad sign indeed . It's a foolish decision in an effort to increase productivity and grow the economy, that China is jeopardizing their reputation and harming a lot of people in the process. Japan has very high standards for quality as well as sustainability of food production, and I have a LOT more confidence in buying food products from Japan (yes, even though there are radiation concerns), as well as goods from Thailand (there's nothing like a fresh hot pot of Thai rice to perfume the kitchen ).

Sbbenhcs, you have good taste ! Thank you for the Etsy shop link (and I thought I was the only one who buys from Etsy around here! )

I used to be a tea snob but now I'm all about the generic-ass Target black tea. That and Bigelow because it's cheap.

I thought I noticed you drinking tea Rich. I'm not a fan of coffee either.

This is in regard to industrial farmed tea. There is no way a tea like Bao Zhong could be sprayed with pesticides, it is far to delicate in flavor and would be instantly ruined. Further more, many quality teas are grown in their traditional fashion by smaller tea farmers. I have no doubt that pesticides get into things like gunpowder and lapsang souchong though. One more good reason to procure tea from a source familiar with it's origin and production method.