Hello and welcome! We are Sprudge, the world’s most popular coffee publication, and for the last decade, we have published stories all about the world of coffee every single week, sometimes two or three or more a day. But this week, if you will so kindly permit us, we’d like to try something a little different.

This week we’re going to run around a dozen or stories about tea. This is Tea Week on Sprudge presented by Breville USA.

Yes, tea! We really, really love the stuff. But moreover, tea is enjoying a particularly interesting cultural moment right now, as access to better and better quality small lots grows worldwide, and the ancient culture around tea enjoys new interpretations and points of influence. As a beverage and medicinal practice, it is thousands of years old, with roots in mainland China and a cultural footprint across nearly every nation in Asia; and at the same time, it is blowing up right now amongst young people in the all around the world, across social media and Instagram, and at high-end tea shops and coffee bars from Taipei to London to New York.

It has never been easier to have access to great tea, and yet this access is threatened by political forces. Mankind’s fundamental urge to trade openly with other peoples and cultures around the world is under attack by an ugly, virulent resurgence of isolationism and racism. Tea stands against all that—it is both old and new, local and global, a personal practice and yet inherently political—and that’s why we love it so much.

Across these pages, you’ll find stories about tea shops and tea influencers, traders and purveyors, ceramicists and design artists around the world. We’ll explore how tea interacts with graphic design (“Tea Cakes are the New Sneaker Drop“), and travel to Taiwan with one of America’s foremost young tea buyers (“For Song Tea, Sourcing Matters—But It Isn’t Everything“). We offer a series of guides on where to buy delicious tea and how to get started with the stuff you need to make it, from ceramics to home brewers like those offered by our sponsors at Breville USA. We talk to tea shop owners like Elena Liao of New York City’s Té Company and Lina Medvedeva of Floating Mountain, both of whom escaped the corporate world to follow their passions into tea entrepreneurship.

We’re also looking forward to serving you tea in person this week! On Thursday, March 7th and Friday, March 8th we’re throwing the doors open to our HQ in Portland for an open tea service, featuring complimentary teas from around the world (featured in our guides) served in artisan ceramics, along with a hands-on chance to explore Breville USA’s range of tea brewers, kettles and steepers featured in these articles, including the Tea Maker, Tea Maker Compact, Smart Tea Infuser, and IQ Kettle Pure. There will also be yummy tea snacks. Check our Instagram for full details! 

This is our first real crack at writing about tea on Sprudge, and we won’t nearly come close to telling every meaningful story from this deep and fascinating world. We hope to continue writing and reporting on tea in the months and years to come, bringing in more viewpoints and perspectives on the topic along the way. And don’t worry, we still love coffee! Coffee and the global industry around it will always be our main focus here at Sprudge, and we assure you, a great many gallons of coffee were brewed and consumed over the course of writing and researching these stories.

But for this week let’s cast our eyes together on the world of progressive tea in 2019. There’s fascinating stuff happening here, both from a culinary and cultural perspective. Today tea offers a fascinating global culture mash-up for modern drinkers, and there’s never been a better time to fall in love with it.

Happy steeping!

—The Sprudge Team

Sprudge Tea Week is presented by Breville USA.

The post Welcome To Tea Week—Presented By Breville USA appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

The tea cake is nothing new. Compressed tea bricks date back to before the Ming Dynasty, where they were traded along the ancient Tea Horse Road across Tibet, Sichuan, and Yunnan. In modern times tea cakes (called bǐngchá) are most commonly used for Pu’erh teas hailing from Yunnan, though other kinds of tea cakes and tea bricks are produced throughout mainland China.

For more on the history and culture around tea farming and tea cakes in Yunnan, we strongly recommend reading Lisa See’s seminal historic fiction novel “The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane.”

For our purposes today, we want to cast our design eye towards how the tea cake form is being reinterpreted here in 2019. Sprudge has a long tradition of covering innovative packaging and branding, and we’ve been really blown away across the last few months of research by all the cool design work happening across the world of tea. This, too, is of course nothing new—tea cakes have long been a platform for beautiful art and calligraphy. But in 2019 the artistic milieu, as interpreted by a new generation of tea lovers, draws from a global field of influence and inspiration, interpolating the form in wild and vivid colorways. The end result looks every bit as much like something you might find in a hypebeast sneaker shop as you would in a tea bar.

This is just a snippet, a soupçon really, of some of our favorite contemporary tea packaging design work. Gaze upon it and feel covetous urges, yes, but too assured that within such neat design wrappings there be flavors and textures to match the trappings.

Kilogram Tea

Nothing else looks quite like Kilogram Tea of Chicago, whose technicolor art mural boxes stand out at home or on a shelf at a coffee bar. For tea design with the coffee drinker in mind, this is some of our very favorite work.

Kuura

Melbourne tea purveyors Kuura brand themselves as “tea from the future” and from a design and packaging perspective, that about nails it. These are the tea cakes that have most drawn oohs and ahs from office visitors over the last few months, but it’s also worth noting that there’s some quality sourcing work being done here, especially with offerings like their “Ghost” white tea (pictured below). For pure aesthetic joy it’s tough to beat Kuura’s “Prescription Only” raw pu’erh, but be forewarned—this tea is not for the faint of heart or meek of stomach.

Kuura “Prescription Only.”

White2Tea

Inarguably some of the coolest design work in the biz and a staff favorite here at Sprudge, White2Tea sources, prints, and ships out of Yunnan. With vivid colors, punk text, and a design scheme drawing from equal parts pop-art and streetwear, if BAPE and Supreme had a tea-stoned cousin, this would be it.

Crimson Lotus

Crimson Lotus of Seattle walk a fine line, pushing both quality and design aesthetics with feet planted in both the West Coast of the United States and the hills and mountains of Yunnan. Owner duo Glen Bowers and Dawa Lamu source exquisite raw and ripe teas from across the region, focusing only the many teas of Yunnan known colloquially as “pu’erh” (named for a village in the region, kind of like how Chardonnay is named for a village in Burgundy).

Crimson Lotus are big on artist collaborations, which is how you get works like Honeymoon, a Spring 2018 cake designed in collaboration with The Oolong Drunk and artist Stephanie Osborne, or the sci-fi influenced Forgotten Nebula, designed by Jones Pitsker.

Liquid Proust

Vintage and rare tea import savant Andrew Richardson manages Liquid Proust out of his home in Columbus, Ohio—we visit him there elsewhere in our Tea Week coverage. This stunningly minimalist design for his 2018 “Almost” white tea cake release is something we’ve returned to again and again—a subtle white gauze offset by simple block text. Sadly this cake is sold out, but watch Liquid Proust on Instagram for upcoming new releases and limited edition drops.

Bitterleaf Teas

Another collaborative piece, this tea cake wrap from artist Jason Wasserman gives us serious back of the notebook bored in class vibes. We love its evocation of the tea itself—Bitterleaf’s Spring 2018 Limited Yiwu—a raw, powerful tea with many years ahead of it and big-time Year of the Dog cosmic vibes.

Jordan Michelman (@suitcasewine) is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network. Read more Jordan Michelman on Sprudge.

Photos by Zachary Carlsen and Anthony Jordan III for Sprudge Media Network.

Sprudge Tea Week is presented by Breville USA.

The post Tea Cakes Are The New Sneaker Drops appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

New York City is often seen as a vanguard of trends, of things to come. It is said, “If you can make it in New York City, you can make it anywhere.” For a town that is remarkably one dominated by (sometimes excellent) coffee, by an unwavering need for speed, and for a mentality that “time is money,” tea seems to be a beverage that would not survive. But despite all that, within the last 10 years a new generation of teahouses has emerged, bucking these trends and indicating that, amidst all the urban clamor and rat race, there is not only a place but a need for spaces where people can slow down and focus on the meditative act of making tea.

To be clear: I am not talking about the onslaught of now-ubiquitous, trendy, and Instagrammable to-go matcha lattes. These new teahouses purvey directly-sourced, single-farm, hard-to-come-by teas from the far off tea-producing mountains of East Asia. Brewed mindfully and traditionally (whether whisked or steeped), these new teahouses are in themselves a reflection of a growing appreciation in America for a standard of tea that is more commonly found in Kyōto, Hong Kong, Taipei, Seoul, or the mountains of Yunnan or Northern India.

Best of all, while some teas can range in price up to hundreds (if not thousands) of dollars per cup, these shops in New York instead curate focused menus of excellent teas that encourage price-savvy exploration before breaking one’s budget. And with their founders dedicated to educating their clientele, these listed teahouses are the perfect places to navigate the vast world of tea in NYC.

Kettl

Kettl is a tiny jewel box of Japanese tea and teaware in Brooklyn’s Williamsburg neighborhood. Located above the locally-renowned Japanese breakfast and ramen joint Okonomi/Yuji Ramen, a journey up a flight of stairs reveals a sparsely-furnished space filled with a wide variety of high-quality loose leaf teas from all corners of Japan. Inspired by travels throughout the Japanese archipelago, owner Zach Mangan imports teas that aren’t often available outside of the regions in which they are produced. This approach to showcasing “local varieties” means that in addition to stocking some of the best sencha, gyokuro, and matcha available in the United States, Kettl also contains exquisite examples of teas even highly versed tea drinkers might never have enjoyed, including single-varietal tamaryokucha (pan-fried, coiled tea produced in Kyūshū), kyo iribancha (late-harvest, deeply-roasted full-leaf tea with notes of pine resin and tobacco), and rare Japanese black teas from Ureshino and Yame (which often exhibit flavors of apricot, grape skin, and osmanthus).

Kettl, while mostly operating as a farm-direct online purveyor of fine Japanese teas, keeps its retail space in Williamsburg open for in-store sales, education, and sampling of any of their more than 30 distinct teas that regularly shift with the seasons. All teas here are refrigerated to ensure their freshness, and Kettl’s selection of teawares, from tea bowls for Japanese tea ceremonies to teacups and teapots for daily use, are all of excellent quality, produced both in Japan and by local New York ceramicists.

What to drink: Ayame Kabuse 10-day shaded sencha from Fukuoka, Japan

Floating Mountain Tea House

Opened in 2017, Floating Mountain Tea House is one of New York City’s most recent additions to a growing constellation of excellent tea spaces. Taking cues from classic East Asian teahouse design (with a dose of Manhattan gallery minimalism), the space is clean, meditative, and intimate. Featuring over 90 different whole leaf, single-origin teas from China’s famous tea producing regions, Floating Mountain is not only a great place to taste the depth and breadth of tea styles, but is also one of the best locations in the United States to learn about the subtle differences between different regional varieties. Here you can explore rare varietals of hong cha (“red tea”) produced in the eastern province of Fujian to new, aged pu’erh tea grown in China’s southwestern region of Yunnan, green teas from Sichuan, and single grove “Phoenix” oolong teas grown in the mountainous region of Chaozhou in China’s southern Guangdong province. Paired with Chinese porcelain and clay ceramics, guests are guided on how to brew tea by owner and founder Elina Medvedeva in the traditional gong fu cha style, where each tea is skillfully brewed to express optimal flavors.

In addition to directly sourcing all of her teas from small, single-plot farms in China, Medvedeva organizes tea educational events, private tea tastings, meditations set to tea, and even chi gong courses. Floating Mountain is typically most busy on weeknights and on the weekends, with early afternoons being the best time to grab one of the four low tables or a place at the tea bar. Floating Mountain is located just minutes away from Central Park and Lincoln Center in Manhattan’s Upper West Side, making it ideal for those seeking to fully enjoy the city—and then escape from it.

What to drink: A pot of Lao You Hua Xiang (“Old Tree Pomelo Flower Fragrance) Phoenix oolong from Chaozhou, China

29b Teahouse

29b Teahouse is equal parts upscale Japanese-inspired restaurant, East Village bohemian drinking den, and full service gong fu cha tea bar, mixing an elegant straightforward presentation of whole leaf traditional teas from Japan, Korea, China, Taiwan, and India with innovative pairings of wine, beer, soju, and sake. What first began as a private tea sourcing venture and pop-up shop begun by founder Stefen Ramirez in Brooklyn’s Williamsburg neighborhood has taken full flight in lower Manhattan, as 29b is now one of the largest tea spaces in the United States. The layout incorporates a central bar where tea and tea-infused drinks are masterfully prepared, alongside ample table seating for both tea drinking and relaxed dining. While featuring stellar teas from all across East Asia, 29b features some of the nation’s best (and hardest to find) Korean green teas and tisanes, as well as thoughtful tea-infused alcoholic drinks, including a must-have matcha and rice beer, as well as a rotating menu of soju and sake-infused cocktails.

29b currently features one of New York City’s most diverse menus of teas, tisanes, and tea-infused beverages. They feature a regular calendar of tea tasting events and classes, and offer a wide selection of privately-commissioned teawares from master ceramicists. This place is heaven for late-night tea lovers, folks looking for a great date spot with plenty of non-alcoholic options, and fans of considered bar design.

What to drink: 29b’s signature matcha beer or a pot of organic Woojeon (“pre-rain”) Korean green tea from the Jiri Mountains, South Korea

Puerh Brooklyn

Named for a distinctive style of fermented tea that comes from the mountains of Yunnan province in southwest China, Puerh Brooklyn carries well over 20 different types of puerh, as well as a diverse array of other teas, from red, black, oolong, white, yellow, and green from China, Taiwan, India, Sri Lanka, Japan, and Nepal. Located in an airy two-floored teashop in the heart of Williamsburg, co-owner and founder Gabriel Grippo has built a shop where the community comes to enjoy tea in a relaxed and casual style. Originally begun by Grippo in 2001, the current space was purpose-built to include tea alongside with his two other passions: clothing design and art. (The space includes an active clothing design atelier and gallery.)

Entering through the street-level upstairs, guests are met with rows of shining canisters full of loose leaf tea, large ceramic jars filled with stacks of aging puerh cakes, and teapots made by renowned local and international potters. Descending to the open, gallery-like lower level, stark cement walls are juxtaposed by the organic lines of wooden tea tables, carpets, and teaware set for both casual tea brewing and the occasional meditation meet-up. Set below the clamor of Williamsburg, Puerh Brooklyn’s tea space is a hidden gem and welcome respite in busy Brooklyn, a great place to find peace and explore the vast world of tea at a natural pace.

What to drink: 2015 Lao Ban Zhang Old Trees sheng puerh (“raw puerh”)

T Shop

Tucked down a long corridor off of SoHo’s quiet Elizabeth Street, T Shop is one of those perfect New York “hidden gem” spots. In a relaxing, no-frills environment of small tea tables and a long tea bar, T Shop delivers what is easily some of the best Chinese, Taiwanese, and Korean tea New York City has to offer. The space encourages brewing at your own pace, with simple gong fu cha set up and the option to brew one’s own teapot or gaiwan (a traditional Chinese tea brewing cup). With a strong, die-hard community of regulars but a welcoming and accessible vibe, T Shop is a great place to first enter New York City’s tea world.

Teas here are sourced by Theresa Wong and Hyun Lee, who regularly travel to Asia visiting tea farms and tea collectors to bring back teas that are of exceptional quality. While the regular menu features a highly-curated selection of teas, private tea tastings often include many rarer “off menu” teas that Wong and Hyun have procured in limited quantity. As such, a single visit will never fully reveal the depth of what T Shop has to offer. Better to go once, then again, and before you know it you may find yourself fitting in alongside the regulars.

What to drink: Old Bush Dan Cong Mi Lan Xiang Phoenix oolong from Chaozhou, China

Té Company

Taiwan has what many tea aficionados consider to be some of the world’s best teas. Best known for their intensely floral and complex-tasting high mountain oolong (which are grown at altitudes higher than 1,000 meters) and “bug-bitten” teas that bear poetic names such as “Oriental Beauty,” it is easy to get lost amidst the many levels and layers of tea this island nation presents. Luckily for New Yorkers, Té Company in Manhattan’s West Village is entirely devoted to the teas of Taiwan, from inside an elegantly appointed salon-style space in a converted historic brownstone.

At the helm of Té Company are the husband and wife team, Elena Liao and Frederico Ribeiro, with Liao sourcing the teas she grew up with while living in Taiwan and Ribeiro using his culinary acumen acquired working in such famed kitchens as Per Se to create an inspired menu of tea snacks both savory and sweet. The two bring a balance to a space that at times can feel frenetic when weekend brunch-goers pack the tiny teahouse. In addition to their regular menu of tea and food, Té Company offers table-side tea tasting flights, as well as the option to book tea tastings to learn all about Taiwanese tea. Rightly revered for its tea service, Te Company also has a dedicated following for Ribeiro’s pastry program, particularly his take on pineapple Linzer cookies, which have become something of a matter of obsession for in-the-know New Yorkers from near and far.

What to drink: A pot of “Frozen Summit” ’11 Vintage aged oolong, from Nantou County, Taiwan

Setsugekka

Nestled amidst the brownstone facades of the East Village, Setsugekka, with its tiny storefront and shoji-latticed windows, hides one of New York City’s best kept secrets: the best bowl of matcha. Stepping inside, the space is a mixture of traditional Japanese teahouse architecture, complete with a four-mat tatami platform, and old-school New York charm. Hosts and owners Souheki and Junya Mori opened the doors to Setsugekka in 2017 (profiled shortly thereafter on Sprudge). Souheki, a master in the Dai Nihon Chadō Gakkai school of Japanese tea ceremony (chanoyu), expertly prepares every bowl of matcha by hand, infusing with it the warmth and intention that can only be achieved by years of practice and dedication.

With an incredibly-focused menu of matcha grown in the famed tea-producing regions of Japan on farms tended by the same families for hundreds of years, the quality of Setsugekka’s tea is second to none. To take things a step further, the Moris have installed their own traditional tea-grinding mill, with which they grind their own matcha weekly. Matcha is served either traditionally hot in a ceramic tea bowl (of which is often handcrafted by a notable Japanese ceramicist), or chilled over ice or ice cream as a twist on the affogato. In addition to tea served, Souheki regularly teaches a growing number of students the art of tea ceremony, making Setsugekka not only a place to enjoy tea but to learn the “way” of tea.

What to drink: A bowl of freshly-ground koicha (“thick tea”) prepared by Souheki Mori, with tea sourced from Uji, Japan

Scott Norton is a freelance journalist based in New York City. Read more Scott Norton for Sprudge.

Sprudge Tea Week is Presented By Breville USA.

The post 6 Remarkable Destinations For Tea In New York City appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

It’s true! Everything you know about tea is wrong—or at least, if you’re me. I grew up on tea bags; I can still see them right now, a yellow box of Lipton tea bags, hanging out in the back of the middle shelf of the bank of cupboards in my mother’s kitchen. Maybe this article should have been titled “Everything Jordan Knows About Tea Is Wrong”—I apologize for making assumptions by using the royal you.

Until a very short time ago, tea was this very ancillary, secondary, overlooked thing in my life. I usually drank it (if I drank it at all) served as iced tea, sweetened of course if I was in the American South, or served dry as a bone over great hulking chunks of ice with a lemon wedge on that rare hot day in the Pacific Northwest, where I grew up. I didn’t take tea seriously—I ignored it on coffee shop menus, I didn’t make it for myself at home, I couldn’t really tell you anything about the various styles and varieties. I didn’t own a gaiwan or any tea-making gear, even at the entry level. I was oblivious to its many cultures and subcultures and rich history.

I was fucking up and I didn’t even know it.

And then very suddenly, everything changed. It started, like literally every major event over the last decade in my life, because of coffee. More specifically, because of a story I was assigned to write for Sprudge. We had noticed an uptick in tea quality at high-end cafes, specifically here in Portland, where the San-Francisco-based tea company Song Tea was showing up on the menu at a couple of the good local coffee bars. We started following Song and realized they were being placed in several well-respected cafes around the country. A hypothesis emerged.

In the early days of Sprudge you could tell if a coffee shop was any good just by the gear. If you walked into a coffee bar in 2009 and they had a La Marzocco and a Mahlkönig, you knew they likely gave a shit. Nowadays it’s harder to tell quite so easily, as the third wave coffee movement has exploded and things like gear and interior design have become more copycat. But maybe this tea brand was on to something; maybe Song was sort of like a third-party quality control vetting system, and that by only going into good coffee shops, we could look at them as a kind of hack. “If a cafe serves Song, they must be good.”

Photos from our 2016 interview with Peter Luong by Zachary Carlsen.

And so I went to San Francisco and interviewed Peter Luong, Song Tea’s founder, who grew up in his family’s tea shop and has been traveling for tea sourcing since he was a kid. You can read the interview here—it’s an okay interview, I think, and it helped turn more people on to the good work Peter is doing. But the subtext of that interview is what leads us here today. Because throughout it, while I asked Peter rudimentary questions about Song’s approach to tea in a coffee context, he was making tea the entire time. Teas like I had never, ever tried before—wonderful buttercream oolongs and chocolatey roasted tieguanyins, Cypress smoked black tea like a campfire jujube and endlessly complex Sichuan greens, all of it served in a procession of simple, stunning, utterly pleasurable teawares. Peter was serving me his own personal take on gong fu cha as I interviewed him, and honestly, it changed my life.

I left high. Floating. Tea drunk, tea stoned, whatever you want to call it. (Although if we really want to get into what psychotropic most mimicked by a sizable consumption of tea, I think it’s closest to a gentle microdose of psilocybin.) Blowing like a feather in the wind around Pacific Heights, with a laptop full of notes and no particular place to head next, clutching my backpack now full of teas for steeping back home.

And steep back home I did—pot after pot, with a strict 10:00pm cutoff so as not to mess with my sleep schedule, chasing the sensory memory of that incredible experience in San Francisco. I love a rabbit hole, a new world to explore, and tea—like coffee, and like natural wine—offered a vast and never-ending beverage culture to soak up like a sponge.

Tea quickly became a daily part of my creative and personal life. I found myself writing better, or at least writing more voluminously (which I know should not be mistaken for “better” but often feels like it) while consuming an ever-growing raft of teas. I started exploring different brands, seeking out interesting tea accounts on Instagram, pouring through websites big and small, from tea purveyors based in China to tea purveyors based a few blocks from my house. I started collecting teawares, began following talented ceramicists from around the world, and started—slowly at first—to begin making tea for others, as a form of expression for this new passion.

I also began traveling with tea in mind, seeking out tea experiences in different parts of the country and digging out time for tea alongside Sprudge’s busy travel schedule. An hour here, an hour there, ducking out of a festival on my lunch break or landing with an extra day to explore tea shops across a city. Along this path I started talking with the people who run these tea shops and bars, asking them about their own journeys with tea, their own perspectives on the drink and the multitudes it contains.

And through it all, I learned a couple of surprising things.

First, tea people are by and large kind to each other. I learned this first by haunting the Instagrams and Reddit forums for tea drinkers, and by taking on some local tea writing for the alt-weekly here in Portland, which got me into more and more local tea bars, begetting more and more happy, sunshiney, tea-stoned conversations. On the internet, and IRL, tea conversations appear at least to this outsider to be mostly full of positivity and kindness. It’s one of the nicest Reddits, which is really saying something, and on Instagram you have to look hard to find tea people being shitty to each other. I can assure you this is not always the case in coffee, and it is really not the case in wine.

Tea scoop and rest inside Floating Mountain. Photo by the author.

The notion of tea’s inherent kindness landed while I was sitting in a tea bar on New York’s Upper West Side called Floating Mountain, whose owner, Lina Medvedeva, escaped the world of Manhattan finance to open a serene, meditative, beautiful little second floor tea bar and gallery above W 72nd Street. Over a single pot of Phoenix Dan Cong (I can still taste its warm red comforting flavors now, months later writing this) we talked about her past life, her upbringing in Russia’s far east, near Vladivostok (“We grew up drinking tea like water”), and how Floating Mountain came to be. It was once a tailor shop, and today is imbued with the most glorious Manhattan light, streaming in through floor to ceiling windows, like an oasis of energy and calm in the middle of the city, just blocks from The Dakota and Central Park.

Lina’s gong fu cha is minimalist, with everything just so—nothing extravagant, nothing loud. A tea scoop from the Czech Republic, made from vitrified bogwood. A simple porcelain gaiwan. A glass water kettle. An hour became two, and I was then hopelessly late for my next appointment, but I remember asking: “Is it just me, or do tea people seem rather content? Like as a culture, it seems to be a pretty positive place…do you agree?”

“You can never know the inside of another mind,” she replied, “but the tea speaks. There isn’t much left to say.”

The house of Liquid Proust. Photo by the author.

A few weeks and a thousand miles later I sat for another tea experience, where I learned a lesson on tea’s power to transform our very souls. This time it was inside an unassuming house, on a nondescript street amongst a row of clapboard little boxes in suburban Columbus, Ohio. This is the home of Andrew Richardson, who goes by Liquid Proust on Instagram and runs a fast-growing digital tea company of the same name. His focus is on rare and aged teas, typically from Yunnan but also some truly remarkable oolongs from Taiwan and eastern China. His entire business and network of tea community happens online, and walking up to the house, you would never in a million years guess that inside it dwells one of the foremost young American collectors and distributors of vintage single-origin tea.

Nearly every surface inside of Andrew’s house is covered in tea: tuongs, satchels, bags, parcels, caddies, ceramic resting jars, wooden commemorative chests, boxes and boxes and boxes with China Post shipping labels affixed (oh, what the mailman must think!) and enough shipping material to ensure safe passage between here and Mars and back, Express Class. There is more tea in this house than one person could drink in a thousand lifetimes, though I suspect Liquid Proust would die happy trying. In his cluttered office (tea, tea everywhere) across an industrial minimalist metal tea table, Andrew brewed me a procession of increasingly rare and fine teas, and talked to me at length about his growing business.

Liquid Proust began as a side hustle from Andrew’s full-time job, which is as a business advisor and student in a corporate MBA program. He fell down a particular sub-section of the tea rabbit hole, chatting with tea purveyors in China and Taiwan and Malaysia using auto translate programs, assuming financial risk by purchasing lots–large and small–of vintage tea, and documenting all of it on Instagram. Today his website is an ever-changing array of tea offerings, collaborative buys and special lots, handpacked from his home in Ohio.

Tea has been a transformative force in Andrew’s life. “Tea has taught me to be accepting,” he told me. “I grew up in a very conservative religious family, and without tea, I think I be like… somebody totally different. A Christian conservative Trump supporter, most likely.” He grew up drinking Bewley’s tea bags with his family, he tells me sheepishly, and I can relate. As tea gained more and more prominence in his life, the old vestiges and relationships of his past life fell away. He fell into a new world of tea drinkers and tea lovers—diverse, international, accepting, kind. His doors are always open to fellow tea heads on the same journey.

“People come to this house from around the world,” he tells me, as we look over jar after jar, bag after bag, an entire living room given over to boxes to ship, every square inch of kitchen counter overflowing with tea from his remarkable collection. “We just start laughing together, and talking. It’s almost like drinking beer—if you drink enough tea you get silly after a while, and then you get to really hear about people’s lives, their views on religion and love, and who they truly are. I would have never had this conversation before—I would have never known you.”

Too soon I was back outside in the Ohio chill, waiting for a Lyft to take me back into the city, my bag and mind and heart crammed full to bursting with tea. I started crying in the back of the car.

As a Western tea drinker, tea doesn’t need me. Not economically, not culturally, and certainly not spiritually. Indeed, there is something almost comically absurd about obsessing over tea here in America, thousands of miles from where it’s cultivated and revered, separated by a vast ocean both literal and cultural, although I’d like to think it’s kind of modern and cool too—bridging language and culture gaps digitally over a shared love for something truly good. But the economy and language of tea is quite happily percolating along in the countries where tea is produced, a brisk market of sales and consumption and obsession. Tea is not, like coffee, primarily an export crop. It’s more like wine—the cultures that grow it most revere it, and typically keep all the good shit close to home.  Indeed, as I understand it is only relatively recently that truly great teas from China and Taiwan have even been available for mass consumption in the United States. General access to premiere quality tea in America is a fairly new thing informed by the opening up of China’s flexible take on communism vis-a-vis small business growth, the linking of our world through the towering modern marvels of online shopping, international shipping (thanks China Post!) and global free trade.

Tea prices, trade wars, globalism: all of this is made possible by international commerce and the free movement of goods and services and ideas through international markets. Like coffee, tea is an unexpectedly and explicitly political product to consume in the best of times. And today? When these trade freedoms are imperiled by tariffs and racism and shudderingly incompetent political leadership? Drinking good tea in America right now is a profoundly political act, more so than at any time since the American revolution.

Tea doesn’t need the West but I think we need it. I think we could all stand to sit with this stuff as a regular part of our lives; not to replace coffee in the mornings, or instead of wine at night, but as a bridge and a complementary force alongside the other drinks we already love. Tea is a vast, bottomless, endlessly complex world of styles, producers, history, modern expression, accoutrement and idiosyncrasy. It is a lifetime—indeed, many happy lifetimes—of culinary inquiry. Drinking good tea can make your life better. Drinking good tea has definitely made my life better, made me a happier person and a more creative thinker, a better friend and colleague and partner. It has comforted me in times of sadness and tragedy, and I have celebrated good news with it, and it has been there for me as alacrity fuel of the highest order on plain old boring work nights.

I strongly recommend drinking a lot of good tea to anyone who wants to better know their own mind. Bathe your brain in theanine any possible chance you get. Think of it almost as like a performance-enhancing drug for your life.

I will end this essay by telling you a secret. I’m “the guy from Sprudge” which means that every so often at an event (be it family or promotional) someone expects me to make coffee. And I can do it serviceably well enough. I’m okay at it, but I don’t think I’m particularly great at it, or that I approach it with the easy confidence and muscle memory of a champion barista or anything. My coffee brewing prowess is nothing special, and I always kind of dread being asked, because it comes with a lot of expectations that frankly I’ve done nothing to deserve beyond stringing lots of flowery words together.

But I love making tea. Adore it, really. I love making it for myself, for my friends and family, for guests at our Sprudge offices in Portland, at parties or brunches or pretty much wherever. I love (and I mean love) the ceramics; I love the tactile change from dry to porous; I love the flavor variation across a long session; I love the steeping rhythm; I love the intimacy it creates, the way you really get to know someone somewhere between the fourth and seventh cup. Some of the very best conversations of my life have taken place over the last two years, with friends new and old, across a gaiwan.

My dream is that someday I will be able to give my own personal expression of gong fu cha to someone else and change their life, too, by opening their eyes and mind up to what tea can be, just as Peter Luong and Lina Medvedeva and Liquid Proust have done for me.

It’s the least I can do.

Jordan Michelman (@suitcasewine) is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network. Read more Jordan Michelman on Sprudge. 

Editor: Liz Clayton. 

All photos by Anthony Jordan III (@ace_lace) unless otherwise noted. The top image for this feature depicts a ceramic teascoop “chahe” from Russian ceramicist Anton Filonov, distributed in the United States by Liquid Proust. 

Sprudge Tea Week is presented by Breville USA.

The post Everything You Know About Tea Is Wrong appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

I hesitated in writing this guide. The world of teaware is vast and intimidating, and can be a money pit of fakes and forgeries. It is also where so much of the joy in loving tea can be derived. Ultimately our team felt Tea Week would be incomplete without some sort of feature on teaware. My very best attempt at this here in 2019 is what follows.

For coffee lovers, you might think of teaware as like the espresso machine of the tea world. To casual drinkers or the untrained eye, it just looks like a nice object that makes the thing you drink—and nothing more. But for those who obsess it can become an endless quest of sourcing and seeking, of pride and cost. A life’s pursuit, even. There is no small amount of money to be spent at the top end of teaware buying—may I call your attention to the infamous Chengua-era “chicken cup,” which sold for $35 million at Sotheby’s in 2014. For our purposes this guide caps objects at the $500 range, with prices average considerably less for most of the offerings.

Photo by Anthony Jordan III.

Note that this guide only barely touches on the world of Yixing, the traditional tea pottery of Jiangsu, made using porous clay in a style dating back to the 10th century. This is its own whole world, a vast guide I don’t feel prepared to lead at this time—perhaps in a few more years.

For now, these wholesalers and makers are more than enough to get you started and find new favorites. The guide below is hopelessly biased towards my own personal taste but hey—teaware is supposed to be personal. That’s part of the fun, and it’s something I hope you are inspired to explore further with support from this guide

A Solid Foundation

Photo courtesy of Rishi Tea.

Rishi Tea

Rishi is a truly solid place to get started with home teawares, offering for example this workhorse starter gaiwan for $12, and this cute little basic tea tray for $25. They’ve also got a lovely collection of flex items, like this stunning blue studio-made celadon “fairness pitcher” from Taiwan, or this rustic clay and mineral cup. Rishi ships free domestic at $25, which is plenty to get started making gong fu cha—pair that $12 gaiwan with, say, a couple of oolong samples (we like Rishi’s Iron Goddess of Mercy and Phoenix Dancong) and you are off to the races.

Photo by Anthony Jordan III.

Breville

Breville is the presenting sponsor of Tea Week on Sprudge—for which we thank them!—but they also produce a range of tea-focused hot water boilers and teamakers we have no lie legit been happily using in Sprudge Studios for the last few years, long before this content package was a twinkle in the editorial eye. The Breville Tea Maker Compact‘s tech allows you to set up brew parameters for whatever kind of tea you’re into; the machine’s automated basket then plunges your brew into water heated to your temp of choice. When the cycle is done, the basket lifts out of the water, ensuring you won’t oversteep. I’d liken this machine to something like a nice home batch brewer, a simplifier that’s perfect for tea making on a busy morning or for large groups (for which the classic Tea Maker is a bigger, better fit).

Another option is the Breville Smart Tea Infuser, which we especially dig these Tea Makers for their handiness with single-steep tisanes, like those from Smith Tea, Song Tea, and Tea Dealers featured in our tisane spotlight. We also really like their IQ Kettle Pure (pictured above) for heating water consistently and at scale—you can transfer from there into a ceramic kettle for service, or pour directly from the Breville IQ.

If you are looking for a fusion of tea, taste and tech, this is the gear for you.

Photo courtesy of Manual.

Manual Tea Maker No1

Chicago tinkerer Creighton Barman puts out new stuff each year, typically pre-funded on Kickstarter, but we’re still in love with this 2016 release, the Tea Maker No1, a modernist reinterpretation of the gaiwan built for ease of brewing. Double-walled glass is the hook here, which keeps the Tea Maker cool to the touch throughout the brewing process, and also gives you peek-a-boo viewing at all that beautiful steeping action. I think these gaiwans offer a rare degree of utility no matter where you are in terms of tea knowledge and experience—they are rad and very forgiving for beginners who are still mastering the whole gaiwan thing, but also fun for experts who want to incorporate western and modern influences into their teaware collection.

Let’s Geek Out

Photo by Anthony Jordan III.

Bitterleaf 

With full respect to Bitterleaf’s collection of teas for drinking (featured in our buying guide), the site’s assortment of teawares, tea tools, tea pets, and assorted Chinese tea ephemera is truly deep and excellent.

From beautiful little studio tea cups (starting around $8) to Chaozhou teapots in a range of classic styles (more like $80) to really cute hand-painted animal vessels ($35) to all manner of entry-level trays and supports (prices vary) and much more, there are hundreds of pieces of tea kit to shop from and swoon over at Bitterleaf. I especially like their selection of “tea pets,” little clay figurines typically depicting children or animals, incorporated into tea service as a symbol of good luck. You “feed” the tea pet with excess water or tea throughout the teamaking process, with the clay left to develop a lovely luster over repeat feedings. (It’s fun. Don’t @ me.)

Photo by Anthony Jordan III.

Song Tea

Song Tea are also featured in our tea buying guide for their literally life-changing (as in it changed my life) compendium of meticulously curated tea offerings. But the ceramics offered by Song are on another level. Founder Peter Luong has an eye for relatively young and emerging artists, making commissions across his travels to Taiwan. Works by artists like Zhang Yun Chen (Nantou), Qiu Qing Yun (Meinong), and Hu Tie Ha (Jiefen) evoke what’s possible at the blurred edge of collectible art and practical working pottery. I cannot realistically see myself being someone who collects art to hang on the wall, but the idea of owning this Husk #2 tea bowl by Zhang Yun Chen gives me heart palpitations. If you are, say, truly enjoying tea week and would like to, you know, say thank you as a grateful reader or whatever, please buy this for me. DMs are open.

Photo courtesy of Pu.Erh.Sk

Pu-Erh.Sk

Based in Slovakia, Pu-Erh.sk is an online webshop shipping worldwide, focused on sheng and shou Pu’er teas from Yunnan. Their tea sourcing is concise and well-considered—the gushu heads love ‘em—but for me the site’s focus on Eastern European ceramicists and teaware artisans has been a revelation. Czech artists like Jiří Duchek and Jura Lang are building truly compelling, one-of-a-kind teawares that fuse traditional regional clays with far-flung design influences from the east and west. Pieces like this gorgeous Jura Lang shiboridashi (a kind of Japanese easy gaiwan) are handmade, wood-fired, visually stunning, and sure to grow in beauty over repeated use. For beginning collectors and enthusiasts to be able to get in the door with an artist-specific work like this at just €65 is really special. Elsewhere on the site, Swedish artist Stefan Andersson makes a range of gorgeous wares, while Norwegian brand Ad.Infinitum offers bespoke and vintage tea ceremony linens. All of these makers are brands with followings in their own right, collected by Pu-Erh.sk for easy ordering and global shipping.

Everybody’s taste is different, and a lot of tea ceramics collections start and end in Asia, with no deviation. But I really grok the vibe of this stuff coming out of Eastern Europe. To get in at the cutting edge of small maker European ceramics artistry, go here.

Ceramicists To Watch—And Collect 

*A note: While I am personally passionate about ceramics and hopelessly biased towards its validity and urgency as an art form, I also think you—whomever you are reading this—might really dig works from the artists below. The idea of placing a commission with an individual artist might seem intimidating or overly expensive, but we’re not talking George Ohr here; works from these artists don’t typically cost more than $100 for a single piece of teaware, and more like $30-$50 for a handmade cup or set of cups. For less cost than a single dinner at a fancy restaurant you can own and put into daily use your own personal work from a talented artist. It will make your tea taste better, your kitchen look cuter, and who knows—in 50 years you might get a segment on the Antiques Roadshow.

Here are a few talented and emerging ceramicists to follow.

Photo via Song Tea.

Lilith Rockett

Portland ceramicist Lilith Rockett works across a range of expressions for home pottery, including plates, lighting, vases, and abstract decorative objects. Her style—lustrous soft milky white porcelain, entirely handmade—translates well into tea, especially the stunning wheel-thrown porcelain gaiwan. A significant amount of tea consumed for the purposes of Tea Week on Sprudge was steeped in just such a piece. Rockett has a webshop, and also accepts limited commissions. You can find her work at some of the best restaurants in the United States, including The French Laundry (Napa), Smyth (Chicago), Saison (San Francisco), and Nodoguro (Portland).

Follow Lilith Rockett on Instagram.

Photo via Carole Neilson.

Carole Neilson

Buzzy San Francisco-based artist Carole Neilson fuses the rural pottery traditions of her native Alsace with an irresistible contemporary immediacy. Her eye-catching signature glazes evoke smoke fumes and clouds of dust, making for pottery with an earth-dappled glow. Neilson’s range of works include original sculpture pieces and stunning bowl and plate sets, but for tea (and coffee!) drinkers her small cups and pitchers make a lively addition to any collection. Neilson’s work is blowing up, with a growing list of stockists, gallery exhibitions at spaces like Hugomento, pop-up dinners around the country (including a recent dinner at Omaha’s Archetype Coffee), and a successful recent series of artist grants. She is truly an artist to watch. Neilson has a webshop and accepts limited commissions.

Follow Carole Neilson Ceramics on Instagram.

Photo by Anthony Jordan III.

Qi Pottery

Kim Whyee Kee of Qi Pottery first learned his art behind bars. After serving time in the Singaporean corrections system for gang-related crimes, Kee graduated from an arts college, helped co-found a variety of initiatives working with at-risk youth, and launched Qi Pottery in 2016. His style echoes ancient tea traditions, but does so through a burst of heart-stopping colors that demand attention. Vivid pinks, deep blues, mesmerizing blacks, coral reds—Easter egg pastels that fuse the practical nature of teaware with the elegance of a home statement piece. But this is no gimmick maker—Qi Pottery’s mastery extends to more simple forms, like these beautiful rusted large format cups.

Photo by Anthony Jordan III.

It’s simply some of the most beautiful ceramics work I’ve ever seen, and for an artist with just a few public showings so far, you can certainly expect these pieces to become more and more sought after and valuable over the years. Qi Pottery has a website, but no webstore. If you’re interested in purchasing an existing piece or making a commission, please contact the artist directly via email or Instagram.

Follow Kim Whye Kee of Qi Pottery on Instagram. 

Photo by Anthony Jordan III.

Arturo Alvarez

A full-time artist dedicated to original teawares, Arturo Alvarez is based in Olympia, Washington, and crafts art in a range of styles and expressions. We commissioned Alvarez for our office tea set at Sprudge Studios (we’ll be serving tea there this week as part of the Tea Week fun), and follow his regular updates on Instagram, where his account @your_pencil is part of a thriving Instagram ceramics community. Perhaps his most distinctive pieces involve incorporating found materials, including driftwood handles made from wood found across Puget Sound beaches, but this is an artist growing and advancing his craft before our very eyes, letting it all play out online. Follow him and watch along—it feels like he’s debuting new pieces almost every day.

Photo by Anthony Jordan III.

Arturo Alvarez sells a limited number of teawares online via Etsy. Contact the artist directly via Instagram for commissions or to purchase pieces featured on his account.

Follow Arturo Alvarez on Instagram.

Photo by Anthony Jordan III.

Andrzej Bero

A teaware potter out of Warsaw, Andrzej Bero specializes in the shiboridashi—a gaiwan variant that’s easy to use and, in the right hands, a piece of working art. Bero’s shibos are made from clay that feels coarse and tactile to the touch, in a range of dark reds, greens, and blues. This style translates especially well to larger pieces, like his 300ml teapots, which are hotly in demand for tea services around the world. Andrzej Bero has a website but no webstore; a limited number of his works are available for purchase via the aforementioned Pu-Erh.sk. Contact the artist directly for commissions and availability.

Follow Andrzej Bero on Instagram.

Jordan Michelman is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network. Read more Jordan Michelman on Sprudge.

Editor: Scott Norton.

Top photo by Anthony Jordan III (@ace_lace). 

Sprudge Tea Week is presented by Breville USA.

The post The 2019 Sprudge Guide To Teamakers and Ceramics appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

Song Tea’s Peter Luong, photographed in Taiwan.

Song Tea & Ceramics sources and imports Taiwanese and Chinese teas of exceptional quality and character. I spend a month each year at origin sourcing for Song. My trip takes me to both China and Taiwan, visiting as many as five tea producing regions in each country. These trips are essential to build Song’s annual collection of teas. But sourcing—in so far as it involves traveling to origin and visiting producers—is not what distinguishes Song. It is not our differentiator. Most tea companies can source, we do so with a very specific perspective and blueprint. That perspective is what differentiates us.

———-

The groundwork for our sourcing trip is laid months in advance of the trip. As a team, we determine what part of the collection we’d like to work on. In 2018, higher white tea prices affected pricing and availability of both white and green teas, so my priority was visiting both Sichuan, Zhejiang, and Fujian. This meant that the trip had to begin earlier in the Spring harvest season because the Sichuan green tea harvest typically begins in late March. I also was interested in oolongs, so I stayed through early May.

The goal of each sourcing trip is to assemble an annual collection of teas where each individual tea is special and has its unique place relative to other teas in the collection. This sometimes means upwards of 30-40% of the teas from the previous year are swapped out and replaced with new teas that I find. This dynamic menu is unusual for a tea company: many simply refresh rather than replace teas year to year.

To do this successfully requires relationship building, a whole lot of impromptu travel to follow constantly shifting harvest times, and a whole lot of hard work. Although I think the underlying mechanics of sourcing is straightforward, getting the execution right takes coordination and timing.

I used to think that this hard work is what differentiates Song. But over time, I’ve come to realize the process of sourcing is by no means a trade secret. In fact, we are quite open about when, and where we travel, and as many do, we too photograph our sourcing experiences and post updates on Instagram (it’s @hellosongtea, check it out!).

View this post on Instagram

Good morning from Sichuan! This is Peter checking in. I’ve been in China for nearly a week now, starting out in Fujian, and making a last minute decision to come to Sichuan yesterday. I’ll explain why in subsequent posts, and will backtrack a little to talk about Fujian white teas, green teas, and how this year’s market trends are affecting our buying decisions. But for now, I thought this is an appropriate photo to kick off Song’s 2018 sourcing trip. “You’ll find our tea garden through the red door” ____________________

A post shared by Song Tea & Ceramics (@hellosongtea) on Apr 11, 2018 at 4:25pm PDT

What I think ultimately distinguishes us is the perspective that we bring to our sourcing efforts. With each successive collection I’ve sourced (this upcoming 2019 collection will be our seventh since we launched in 2013), I’ve evolved that perspective.

To build Song’s inaugural collection in 2013, I spent nearly three months visiting tea producing regions in China and Taiwan. I followed what is, in retrospect, a laughably simple guideline: to source the best teas I could find. They had to be very high quality, interesting, complex, and unusually good. And they had to be better than any teas that I had sourced before.

That first collection had quite a few gems, but we were also heavily skewed towards green teas because… well… greens were harvested first and I was impatient. But once all 22 teas that made up the collection was assembled, I knew that the collection as a whole made a lot of sense: they were interesting and complex teas that were also so delicious!

And with each new collection of teas, I honed that perspective. I began looking for more interesting teas. We began working directly with some producers to craft one-of-a-kind teas: whites from cultivars traditionally intended to be made into oolongs. Finessing oxidation rates and roasting to yield sweetness and florality. With each year, Song was developing and refining its flavor profile, and its perspective on what a good tea ought to be. This whole process was ad hoc and very informal, but it became more and more a part of the discussion between myself and the team before each sourcing year.

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Happy 2019! We are back from break and working on new ceramics and tea launches! Come by and say hello!

A post shared by Song Tea & Ceramics (@hellosongtea) on Jan 10, 2019 at 12:10pm PST

Then, two years ago, we embarked on an internal project we called “Tea by Character.” The idea was to develop a better way for our customers to navigate the tea collection on songtea.com. To do this, we sat down as a team to develop a taxonomy to categorize the flavor and aromatic profiles of our teas. What we discovered was so much more.

To create the taxonomy, we parsed the individual flavor profiles of each tea, and grouped them into broader categories. After many iterations, we developed seven distinct “characters”: grass, sugar, fruit, floral, wood, earth, and texture. We then ranked the teas in each group by how “grassy” or “sugary” or “fruity” the tea was relative to others in the group. For example, Fragrant Leaf ranks higher under “grass” than Dragonwell. When we summarized our rankings, we discovered that the Song collection of teas skews heavily towards three primary characteristics: sugar, fruit, and floral.

This was the “aha!” moment. We had discovered in a roundabout way the blueprint of our palate, and the character profile of the teas that end up in the Song collection. In other words, we source teas that are sweet, with distinct fruitiness and florality. They also had to be complex, texturally interesting, and delicious.

I realized that everything that I’ve sourced for Song since we launched has been driven by this character profile. It’s the blueprint that I use to make almost all of our tea acquisitions, and some key decisions we’ve made over time.

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Making tea on Dragon Phoenix Gorge. After harvest, fresh leaves are withered under filtered sunlight. The underlying tarps are gathered to pile the leaves, which are then redistributed. ____________________ This is actually close to the end of harvest. Because of low rainfall and a cool early spring, tea leaves developed much slower than usual, pushing back the harvest date by nearly two weeks. When warm temperatures finally hit, the leaves sprouted too quickly. Producers are seeing a 30% decline in yield this spring. ____________________

A post shared by Song Tea & Ceramics (@hellosongtea) on May 18, 2017 at 10:12am PDT

The Song collection consists of traditional teas, unique teas, and experimental teas. Traditional teas, such as our Dragonwells, are recognizable. Unique teas have unusual flavor profiles, and are less common. Experimental teas are one-of-a-kind teas we are actively involved in commissioning from producers. Regardless of type, all teas we source are done intentionally with a mind towards Song’s character profile.

I will go out of my way, and pay more, for teas that fit the character profile. In Spring of 2018, I acquired 72 catties of an oolong we call “Four Seasons Gold” from a tea maker on Lishan, a lush and beautiful high elevation tea producing region in central Taiwan. About a half day drive from Taipei, Lishan is a range some of the highest elevation tea gardens in the world. Most teas from these high mountain oolongs are light oxidized, capitalizing on a preference for light floral teas. The Four Seasons Gold is entirely different: it’s mid-oxidized, using a cultivar that is unusual at that elevation. The tea is complex, rich, and delicious.

View this post on Instagram

Happy Tea Day! Here’s some tea in my pocket! ____________________ Next stop, Zhejiang!

A post shared by Song Tea & Ceramics (@hellosongtea) on Apr 21, 2018 at 8:26am PDT

While on Lishan, I also visited a few other producers we do not source from. One told me that the Four Seasons Gold is the type of tea that he drinks, but does not craft. Instead he makes the type of light oxidized oolongs that have wider market appeal.

One last interaction with that producer cemented my own resolve: he said that someone from Michigan had stopped in the week before and mentioned Song. My only thought when I drove away was that if a tea company from Michigan could be there talking to this guy (no disrespect to Michigan, hey Madcap Coffee!), that I best find producers that are a little more out of the way, who could produce teas that better mesh with our character profile.

Every tea company ought to develop its own character profile.

Peter Luong is the founder of Song Tea, a purveyor of fine teas from China and Taiwan. He lives in San Francisco. This is Peter Luong’s first feature for Sprudge. 

Sprudge Tea Week is Presented By Breville USA.

The post For Song Tea, Sourcing Matters—But It Is Not Everything appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

Té Company—Elena Liao’s serene, focused townhouse of Taiwanese teas in the heart of the West Village—isn’t just one of the best tea bars in New York, though it certainly is that. For someone like me, who grew up drinking bags of Lipton, this place feels like a portal to another world. In lost afternoon sessions spent steeping the leaves in quiet contemplation, or tea-stoned giggle fests over pots with friends, I look forward to visiting here whenever I’m lucky enough to find an extra few hours in lower Manhattan.

For Tea Week on Sprudge, Té Company is featured in Scott Norton’s authoritative overview of New York’s best progressive tea houses. But I wanted to dig deeper into this space, in particular, and learn more about the person behind it. There are many lovely places to drink tea in New York but nowhere quite like Elena Liao’s Té Company. I hope you enjoy this interview, which was conducted by phone between New York City and Portland, Oregon.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. 

Hi Elena, and thanks so much for speaking with us! Talk a little bit about what you do at Té Company for folks who are unfamiliar with the space.

We are a Taiwanese tea house in the West Village of New York. We specialize in Taiwanese tea. If you come in to visit our tea room you could do a few things with us. We offer something as simple as brewing a cup of tea to go, even though most people choose to stay because it’s a nice, relaxing space that feels almost hidden, and that’s hard to find in the New York landscape. Most people choose to sit and wait for a table. Once there, you can enjoy up to three steeps of any tea you choose, from around 25 to 30 different kinds of tea on our menu, plus a few blends we do ourselves (including a few that are caffeine free).

We also have a small food menu, and offer a light lunch between noon and 5:00pm. While you’re in the space, really anything that relates to a tea experience is available to you: you can purchase loose leaf teas to take home, try a flight of teas from our menu, or sit with us to book in advance a private tasting session. In that case, me or one of my staff members will sit with you for an hour or so and try teas together. We’ll drink five different things and talk about them.

What is your professional background? How did the shop get its start?

I don’t have a tea background and neither does my family. I don’t have a hospitality background, either. I worked for an American big box retailer for like a decade, mostly in the merchandise planning world, managing budgets and margin targets for merchants at a huge retailer. That’s my background, and it’s very different from what I do today, although I must say there is something universal about running a store. However, I used to manage a book of business for a fleet of 500 stores, and now I only manage one! It’s different, and the scope is a lot wider, but there’s similarities and there’s a learning curve. Hospitality environments in New York City are different from anywhere else in the world, and when you throw in tea knowledge and sourcing and all of that, it becomes a very different thing.

Honestly, this was a side project I was very curious and interested about, and it just kind of blossomed into what it is today. Actually—I think your readers will appreciate this—I only started to really learn about tea because I was trying to figure out how to make a decent coffee pour-over! This was in like, 2008 maybe, or 2009, and it’s when Blue Bottle was still a young company here in New York, and Intelligentsia was just coming out here too. Coffee felt very new at that time, the idea of a “third wave of coffee” felt so interesting and delicious, and that’s actually how I started learning. I liked the idea of there being so many stories, and so much nuance behind the scenes of it all for this beverage.

But I grew up drinking tea, and that’s part of my family. I’m from Taiwan—everyone drinks tea like it’s water. And after getting into coffee, it made me start to say, “You know, I drink a lot of tea… maybe I should learn about it like how I’m researching coffee, too.” And then I fell into the rabbit hole…

Talk to us more about your connection with Taiwanese tea. Why keep such a tight focus at Té Company? 

You know, when I was learning about tea it was literally just by Googling “what is tea” and oh my goodness—all these different styles come from the same plant? I had no idea! So when I decided to learn about it more, I quickly felt the need to narrow it down with a focus; I felt like for me to deliver something significant in a tea context, I would need to have a lot of focus and intention. In the very beginning, I started by selling teas to restaurants on the side while still working full-time at the time. The more I learned about tea, the more I realized how big it is and how long it would take me to learn even a little bit of everything there was to know. There is no crash course for tea; it is a lifelong learning. But the truth is, if I needed to do something to make me stand out and find a focus, well, I am from Taiwan originally. I still have family there, and they have connections—my grandfather, especially, has a lot of connections to agriculture from in and around the little town he is from, outside Taipei. And so I started there. I said, “You know—I’ll just do Taiwan.”

Most tea companies offer something from every country, and I just felt like there was no way I could do that and say something original, or learn enough to accomplish anything before I was 70! But Taiwan, it just makes sense. I should take advantage of my heritage, you know?

And from there it was just connection after connection. Tea is very much a relationship-based buying process. There are thousands and thousands of small family farmers growing tea in Taiwan alone. That’s more than enough to focus on.

Since opening in 2015, have you noticed a progression in knowledge from your guests? Do you feel like (in New York at least) people are becoming more educated and interested in tea over these last few years?

I definitely think there’s an increased interest, knowledge, and focus being paid to tea right now. In New York, the change has been dramatic. Back in 2009, when I was on Google trying to learn, there wasn’t even really a place to go and find out more, unless you were going to basements in Chinatown or little furniture stores that also happen to broker tea off in the corner. That was what it was like when I was starting. Now people are caring more, there’s more access, and there’s so much more interest being driven through things like third wave coffee bars and the whole matcha trend. We don’t serve matcha at Té Company but I do think it serves as a kind of bridge, connecting coffee drinkers with tea in a very natural way. I think most every coffee shop in New York has matcha now; it’s such an obvious substitute for espresso, and it’s a very easy way for anyone to opt out of coffee while still enjoying a cafe environment.

Matcha makes a bridge, and from there the question comes: “What else is there in tea besides matcha?” That increases awareness and curiosity, and I think it has really contributed to increased interest over the last few years.

At a tea garden in Taiwan, from one of Elena Liao’s recent sourcing trips.

There is an interesting section on your website about the health benefits of tea. Talk to me about that a little bit more—is this something you have experienced in your own life as a tea drinker?

I think for most people, when you ask about healthy tea they’re going to say green tea, first and foremost. The Japanese government has actually commissioned quite a few studies around the health benefits of green tea, and they see it as an angle to sell the product.  For us, on the website, there was so much info we could have included, but we had to narrow it down, and so what you’re reading now is very broad-stroke—and of course we want to be compliant with regulations, and make it clear that any benefits are suggested. We’re not claiming efficacy in any way.

But if you look at Chinese medicine and, well, tea throughout China’s history, tea has its origins as a medicinal plant. Chinese medicine is all about plants and animal parts, and tea consumption comes from a medicinal place. There’s different properties of tea that, when it gets processed differently into white teas, green teas, oolongs etc, impact your body differently. And body type is a part of that. Not everyone benefits the same way, and some have sensitivities.

For me personally, you know, I think I have been conditioned to just accept tea as part of my life in a really intrinsic way. I drink more tea than I do water, and it’s been this way since I was a kid. My mom, when I was an infant, would use tea leaves to rub around my gums before I had a tooth come through, because this was thought to be antibacterial. I have been drinking this stuff since I was an infant, and as an adult I’m constantly dosing myself, so I don’t really know any different. But I do see it with our guests who come in—people really do feel better from drinking tea, for different reasons. It gives them focus, it calms them, it brings a sense of awareness and focus internally. Some dream when they drink tea, whereas they never used to dream. People can almost get a little addicted to it, but I think some of the benefits are certainly obvious.

How much tea do you drink a day on average?

A private tea tasting at Té Company.

You touched briefly on the private tea tasting experience available to guests, but I’m wondering if you can tell our readers more about what they can expect if they book this?

Tea tasting—and really, just the act of sitting with someone to drink tea—is not a very common thing in the United States. I’d say in terms of experience, maybe a wine tasting is the closest thing to it, but generally people don’t know what to expect from this when we offer it.

Basically you sit with us for an hour and a half, or maybe two hours if I’m hosting—I am chatty and I talk a lot about tea—and we try five different teas in sequence. Generally that means maybe two different styles of tea, and some variation within those styles. The foundation of these tastings are educational based, so it’s not so much like, “Do you taste apricot in this brew vs. do you taste grass?” because the truth is, people taste different things. What we had for breakfast, our life experiences, all these things influence how we experience flavor. And so it’s really more about using the opportunity as an education, where we show you photos of where this specific tea was grown, what it looks like, and where it’s made. You get a virtual leaf to cup experience without traveling. We share photos and videos from when I go sourcing, and answer any questions people might have. Oftentimes I’m asked the same question you asked about health benefits; tea is a large and wild world, and I do not know every answer, but we try and make it a very fun and open experience, so if I don’t know something I’ll be there on my phone alongside you looking it up!

And of course, sometimes people just want to drink tea and talk about their cats, and that’s fine too. We have no rigid design to our private tastings. It doesn’t have to be a certain way.

How much time a year do you spend sourcing tea?

I’m gone about a month a year, give or take.

What did this charming building in the West Village used to be?

Most recently it was a vintage cookbook store, and then prior to that it was a lampshade store, and then at some point a record shop where you could smoke weed. When we got in here, it was empty. The building is from 1911.

People are obsessed with your Pineapple Linzer cookies! How did this all come about? What’s the most you’ve ever seen someone buy in one day?

So, the story of the cookie…

In the very early days of Té Company, when I first started thinking about selling brewed tea to public customers, my husband and I would sign up for these outdoor markets. And for the first few that we did, I knew that I wanted something that could help… well, tea can be a little obscure. It’s not as friendly on a pedestal to some people, especially when you’re charging a premium in line with it being a premium product. If you grew up on Lipton tea, it’s not as easy to connect with at first. And so I really just wanted something that would be fun to have as a hook—have a cookie, try some tea.

Pineapple cake is a very common tea snack in Taiwan, and it’s used as a celebratory snack. You can find it in most bakeries, and there’s certain places who are very well known for their version of pineapple cake, which in Taiwan is typically like a cube of butter pastry, soft and crunchy, with pineapple jam inside. My husband has been a chef for many years, so I asked him if he could make something like that. If you visit Taiwan and bring a gift home, it will be some kind of pineapple cake, probably picked up next to all the teas gift boxes they sell at the duty-free. It’s a very common thing.

The famed Pineapple Linzer cookie.

And so my husband, he did a few trials and sizes, but ultimately the linzer cookie form was the winning combo, with zest and cook salt. It started for the markets and then just kind of stuck around through us opening the store. It’s become a very important part of our journey.

In the beginning we didn’t make that many a day, maybe just 20? When we first opened nobody even knew where we were, we were very hidden, but then somebody wrote an article and mentioned the cookies and all of a sudden… people started wanting dozens and dozens… and we had people like, throwing temper tantrums or shedding tears because there aren’t enough cookies. I had to give people tissues. I felt bad, it’s like, “I’m sorry—there’s no kitchen attached so we can’t just make more.”

It’s become this kind of modern New York thing, I think—a taste of New York to travel home with or bring your friends.

Yes, absolutely, and as it has gotten more popular now we are a lot more organized. Over the holidays we sold big boxes, and we have a cookie assembly line in the back of the store. People are flying with these back home now from New York all the time.

Graceful Hill from Yilan, Taiwan.

Do you have a personal favorite tea? An all-time best, or something you return to year after year?

Yes. It’s called Graceful Hill, and it comes from a tiny town—Yilan—a beautiful town an hour outside Taipei. My parents are from there, and the family that makes the tea is friends with my grandfather. This is the very first tea garden I ever visited, although it’s not a town that’s famous for tea. You do not see these teas at the airport. People kind of don’t really know about it.

It is not an expensive tea, and it is machine harvested—in many ways, on the scale of how you evaluate tea, it is not top of the line. But I grew up drinking it, and until my late 20s it was nearly all I ever drank, and so the flavor of this tea has been imprinted on my brain since I was an infant. I have an emotional connection to this particular tea, and I’m a little afraid that it will go away, honestly. The wife of the family who grows it, she is 80 years old now, and she runs the show. I’m nervous every year that she will stay in good health.  This is the most gulpable and satisfying tea for me to drink anytime, in the shop or just around the house.

As for the rest, all the other teas—it depends! Picking a favorite tea is like picking your favorite child. It depends on the day, and the rest—depends! Greener style oolongs, or roasty oolongs… it’s like picking your children, who do you like most. It depends on the day.

Thank you so much. 

Jordan Michelman (@suitcasewine) is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network. Read more Jordan Michelman on Sprudge.

All photos courtesy of Té Company.

Sprudge Tea Week is presented by Breville USA.

The post Elena Liao of Manhattan’s Té Company: The Sprudge Tea Interview appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

Late in 2017, I couldn’t sleep. I was up all night, in fact. After several weeks of sleepless nights, lost in a fog of midnight madness, I decided to try the unthinkable: I give up caffeine. It was early 2018 and still the season of New Year resolutions and self-care regimes so it seemed like a good time to introduce the idea that I, the founder of coffee blog Sprudge, would go caffeine free in 2018.

I experienced about three days of headaches brought on by the withdrawal, but it didn’t take long (and it doesn’t take long for most) to acclimate to life without the stimulant. The only thing missing was the ritual of enjoying a hot beverage in the morning. Fortunately, I live in a city with a lot of cafes with excellent tea programs and those programs tend to have a few caffeine-free alternatives on offer. Indeed, almost every cafe has at least one herbal infusion, a botanical blend, or fruit-forward tisane, and as I continued what would be a seven-month journey of caffeine abstinence, I discovered delicious offerings beyond your run-of-the-mill rosehips or chamomile.

Just don’t call it tea.

While many call the following drinks herbal teas, these are *actually* herbal tisanes. Tea is a plant, Camellia sinensis, and if it’s not from that plant it’s not really tea. This is a pretty simple thing but it is wildly and widely misunderstood, and for tea professionals who do this stuff full time it is deeply frustrating, to which I sympathize.

Tisanes aren’t teas, but they are highly delicious, or at least they can be in the right hands. For the purpose of this guide, we’ll explore a range of beautiful steeping flowers, roots, plants, and fruits served warm and delightfully free of caffeine. I invite you all to correct your friends, tut-tut your family members, and go forth calling the drinks in this guide tisanes—botanical tisanes if you’re feeling especially fancy.

These drinks can be made at home with very little equipment or expertise and are available to purchase on the internet (or in some cases your produce aisle!) but they also get along quite swimmingly with gear from Breville, our sponsors here at Tea Week, whose range of automatic steeping systems seem ready-made for the thirsty tisane lover. For those at home counting, these tisanes are low calorie, vegan, mostly gluten-free*, keto, paleo, South Beach approved, and mostly sugar-free**.

A note about health claims: There are a lot of claims out there about the healthful benefits of ingredients like ginger, turmeric, mint, and many others in the tisanes below. While these are all well and great we’re going to base these suggestions purely on the taste experience and enjoyment factor—not their purported healthfulness.

Produce Aisle Winners

The following tisanes are simple to make and use fresh ingredients that most can find in their local specialty shop, farmers market, or grocery store.

Ginger Root

Ginger is a lovely tisane with a tremendous flavor. It’s a spicy meatball if you’re heavy on the ginger so I encourage you to start out using about a tablespoon per cup of hot water to start and moving up from there. At this point, I jam in as much ginger in my tea-pot as I can.

Steeping ginger photographed here in the Breville One-Touch Tea Maker.

Preparation: Carefully peel ginger root and slice into small coins (the smaller, the more infuse-able surface area). Boil water and steep for at least ten minutes. Strain and serve immediately. Wonderful with the addition of lemon and honey.

Hot tip: The Breville One-Touch Tea Maker will infuse ginger root in boiling hot water for 10 minutes at a time.

Fresh Peppermint

Fresh mint tea is a staple in Amsterdam cafes and couldn’t be simpler: stuffing mint leaves in a glass and steeping them in water. No tea bags or filter necessary! Not only is it a pleasure to drink, it’s also a beautiful presentation.

Preparation: Rinse peppermint leaves thoroughly. Place a considerable amount in a tall tempered glass. Pour boiling hot water over leaves and steep for five minutes. Drink from the glass!

Beautiful Blends

These tisanes are a mix of dried ingredients—most available in grab-and-go sachets or in their loose form.

Organic Turmeric Tonic

The Organic Turmeric Tonic from Kilogram Tea is a blend of turmeric root, ginger, lemon verbena, licorice root, lemon peel, and citrus oils. It’s warming, spicy, and slightly bitter. The pyramid-shaped filter bags are a nice touch and keep those pesky pieces of roots out of your drink.

Source: Kilogram Tea
Price: $8.99 for fifteen bags. Also available bagless.

Also worth checking out: Rishi Turmeric Ginger, which all but saved my life during a most unpleasant 2016 Winter season.

Blend No. 67: Meadow

Portland, Oregon’s Steven Smith Teamaker produces this tasty blend of “golden Egyptian chamomile flowers and mildly stimulating, fragrant hyssop joined with smooth Cape rooibos, rose petals and linden flowers.” It has a pleasant mouthfeel and sweetness and a pleasure to steep and re-steep.

Source: Steven Smith Teamaker

Price: $11.99 for 15 sachets. Also available loose.

Carrot

Song Tea in San Francisco creates botanical blends that simulate the profile and visual representation of their traditional teas. Carrot is a “blend of domestic dried carrots and burdock, South African honeybush, Chinese ginger, and Indonesian sweet cinnamon” and has a remarkable fruit quality backed up by the spice of the ginger and cinnamon. Should you come across a coffee bar serving this tisane, it pairs wonderfully with a single-origin espresso shot.

Source: Song Tea
Price: $14 for 120 grams, loose.

Single-Origin Tisanes

These are perhaps the highest-end tisanes on the list in terms of price and scarcity in the US. Available through special importers, the following tisanes aren’t for the faint of heart (but they sure are delicious).

Kettl Nagano Soba Cha 

Sugars in the buckwheat kernels caramelize in the toasting process giving this tisane almost a sugar-cereal-in-the-morning flavor but in a really good way. Sourced from Nagano by Kettl, this beverage is one of our favorites.

Preparation: Kettl recommends steeping 5 grams in 200ml of 205ºF water for but a minute.

Source: Kettl
Price: $20/200grams

Roasted Black Soybean

Tea Dealers sells this roasted soybean tisane that also doubles as a snack (the beans can be eaten once they’ve been steeped!) These soybeans are a smaller cultivar known as Sengoku from Hokkaido. The drink is slightly savory and has a nice sweetness.

Preparation: Steep 5 grams in 200ml of 195ºF water for a minute up to three times.

Source: Tea Dealers
Price: $16/100 grams

Wild Persimmon Leaves 

To wrap up this guide I present another offering from Tea Dealers: wild persimmon leaf tisane sourced from Hadong, Korea. The tisane is orange, like the fruit, but has an herbaceous and nutty quality.

Preparation: Steep 5 grams in 180ml of 176ºF water 3-4 times.

Source: Tea Dealers
Price: $38/50 grams

This guide is just the beginning to the many caffeine-free opportunities that exist out there. There are hundreds of herbs, botanicals, roots, leaves, twigs, fruits, and heck, even bones out there to throw in heated water and infuse for one-to-several minutes. Drink up!

Zachary Carlsen is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network. Read more Zachary Carlsen on Sprudge. 

Sprudge Tea Week is presented by Breville USA.

The post Actually, It’s A Tisane appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

After a successful Kickstarter campaign and the subsequent addition of print into their weekly subscription service, Los Angeles-based Yes Plz is expanding. Now, those looking to enjoy the combination an ever-changing coffee blend and weekly zine from Tony “Tonx” Konecny and Sumi Ali need not wait for it to be delivered to their doorsteps. In a Sprudge exclusive, Yes Plz has announced their brand new stockist program. Starting Monday, March 4th, consumers will be able to find the weekly box set at book and periodical shops and cafes around LA.

Like with the subscription, each Yes Plz box found at a stockist comes with a 250g bag of The Mix, a weekly-changing, “ever-evolving blend” per the website—currently The Mix consists of coffee from San Ignacio Peru, Uganda, and the El Limonar from Guatemala, but Ali tells Sprudge that blend will change next week to include an Ethiopian coffee sourced through Collaborative Coffee Source and two Central American coffees—and Yes Plz Weekly, the brand’s accompanying print mag covering an eclectic mix of topics. Previous topics have ranged from dance to the postal service, bees to dating in the digital age in the soon-to-be-released Issue 015, which includes an interview with writer/filmmaker Nancy Jo Sales, whose HBO documentary Swiped “investigates the dark side of the mobile dating trend,” as well as “[taking] up the cause of the star-crossed would-be lover with some Missed Connections.”

Konecny tells Sprudge that the plan with Yes Plz was always to break out of the subscription-only model, but they needed time “kick the tires.”

The beans and ‘zines combo is a little unusual and I think people are immediately intrigued by it or drawn to it when you hand them a box—whereas with merchandizing stuff on the web, you’re always pushed to center the value proposition around getting coffee sent by mail, framing it around “solving a problem” for the customer. We don’t want to limit ourselves only to people who’ve bought into the utility having a coffee subscription.

It’s hard to grasp what we’re doing with this crazy print magazine thing without holding one in your hands. And then people can’t believe we’re doing it every single week!

For the initial brick-and-mortar release, Yes Plz will be available at Dayglow Coffee, Dinosaur, Kindness & Mischief, Cafe Dulce, and WoodCat as well as Now Serving book shop. More stockists will be announced in the coming weeks, and Konecny states that Yes Plz is looking to expand outside of the LA area, assuming the right partners come along. Any interested stockists can inquire about carrying Yes Plz via email at stockists@yesplz.coffee.

Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

Images via Yes Plz

The post Coffee & Print? Yes Plz, Coming To LA Stockists Next Week appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News

I have written quite a bit about coffee-related shoes, each time not-so-subtly suggesting that the company give me a pair because of what a big-deal tastemaker I am in the coffee industry. The ploy thus far has been unsuccessful. And I’m done—DONE I TELL YOU—groveling at the trendily shod feet of these brands for a pair of coffee-adjacent footwear. But these avocado toast sneakers, hatchi matchi, Saucony should definitely send me a pair of those.

After what I can only assume was a successful Pumpkin Spice Latte colorway for the Grid SDs—successful enough to not send their old friend Zac a pair at least—Saucony has turned to another ubiquitous cafe offering, avocado toast, for their newest limited edition shoe design. According to Footwear News, the Originals Shadow 6000 “Avocado Toast” is a green and brown take on the brand’s “classic running silhouette.” Per Saucony’s website, the shoe is made of a “toast-ed leather” upper (which some may call babyshit brown, if you use that sort of colorful language), with “smashed avocado textured suede,” and a “red pepper flake speckle collar lining.” The insole features an image of an avocado cut in half, with “Saucamole” written across the heel.

Released on Tuesday earlier this week, February 26^th, the Saucony Originals Shadow 6000 “Avocado Toast” is now available via the brand’s website and through select retailers for $130. And at that price, perhaps this is the avocado toast Millennials are buying everyday that is keeping them from buying houses.

I can’t help but wonder, though, if Saucony knows the difference between a smashed avocado and guacamole. Much of the marketing around the new sneaker is very guacamole-forward. Cilantro, lime, fresno peppers, some sort of chipotle or perhaps adobo spice, these are all things that could reasonably go in a nice guac. I’d prefer jalapeños and I have no idea what those scallions are doing there, so maybe they don’t know what guacamole is either. All I’m saying is, you call that “toast-ed” a “cumin leather upper” and you’ve got yourself some nice guacamole shoes.

And don’t get me wrong, Saucony, I want you to send me a pair of these shoes. But if you want my $130, you’re going to have to make a new colorway that’s some combination of coffee, wine, and queso, because that’s what is most likely to get spilled on my sweet kicks.

Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

Top image via Footwear News

The post Avocado Toast Sneakers Are Real And I Want Them appeared first on Sprudge.

Source: Coffee News