Prince Vladimir
As long as we're in a Russian mood, let's quickly review Prince Vladimir, a beautiful aromatic blend by the old Franco-Russian company Kusmi Tea. Russian blends are typically Chinese teas mixed with a various citric scents. This tea is a bit more complex. It is a blend of China teas but with natural scents of bergamot, lemon, grapefruit, vanilla, cinnamon and cloves. The combination of citric fruits and spices makes for a fresh but warm flavour very evocative of ... winter ! A great tea for these short, cold, wet days of November ;-)
This very nice picture, entitled Tea Time and painted in 1883 by Vladimir Egorovitch Makovski, will be up for auction tomorrow at 
All tea comes from a single plant, the "Camellia sinensis", an evergreen shrub that may grow up to 18 meters in the wild. When cultivated for harvest the tea bushes are kept to a height of about 1 meter (by constant picking). There are over 3000 varieties of tea each with its own specific characteristics. The naming and growing of teas has many similarities to wine. Just as Bordeaux wine is named after the Bordeaux region in France, Assam is named after the Assam region in India, and Keemun is named after the Keemun region of China. Like wine, tea comes from one bush, and where the tea is grown, the climate, soil conditions, and how the tea is processed, determines the flavor characteristics of the tea.
Long Jing, which translates as dragonwell, is one of China's most celebrated green teas. It is grown in the mountainous regions of Lion's Peak of Hangzhou, Zheijiang province. Like other famous teas (notably Darjeeling), the notion of "flush"(time of picking i.e. spring, summer or autumn) applies to this wonderful tea. First flush Long Jing, which is picked once a year by hand when the leaves and buds are at their smallest and most fragrant stage, is immediately roasted and has a characteristic shape of leaves folded flat along their length. This is a premium tea and highly prized as such in China. It is difficult to find in export as it's mostly consumed by the local market and it isn't cheap. Long Jing is very delicate and fresh tasting, has a nutty, slightly sweet flavor and a lasting buttery finish. It's a very healthy tea with a high vitamin C content and many of the anti-oxydants that are usually present in green tea. It is good for any moment of the day except maybe evening where it might a little too stimulating and so prevent sleep. This tea doesn't store very well (green teas are best drunk fresh). Green teas can be stored for 1 year in a dry, air- and light-tight container.
Legendary emperor Shen Nung is said to have discovered many medicinal properties of plants. Worshipped as a god for the many gifts he gave to China, the discovery of tea is attributed to him and even dated to 2737 B.C. The story goes that one day, while resting under a tree, Shen Nung, who always boiled his water, saw a few leaves fall into the pot. When he drank the resulting brew, which he found delicious and refreshing, he "discovered" the stimulating beneficial properties of the tea leaf.
All tea comes originally from China so the word "tea" comes from there as well. Tea, in mandarin, is called cha but the dutch traders who first brought back tea in the early 1600s, bought it from traders on junk ships from the port of Amoy in Fujian province. In the Amoy dialect tea is te (pronounced "tay"). Hence the Dutch called it thee and, as they were the first importers of tea, they spread the word as well as the product. From there on, the French called it thé, the Germans thee, it became te for the Spanish, Italian, Danish, Norwegian, Hungarian people, tea in English, thea in Latin, tee in Finnish, teja in Latvian, tey in Tamil and thay in Sinhalese.
Jane Pettigrew is a very knowledgeable author when it comes to tea (and anything remotely connected to tea). We will be reviewing several of her works on this site. In this book, she explores essentially British tea wares, why they developed and how we have come to us them as we do. In some ways, it's the history of tea through the objects associated with it. The use of anecdotes, panels on social and economic aspects of tea, etymological explorations, tons of illustrations and plenty of wit make this quite serious book a lot of fun to read while remaining hugely instructive. The approach is very methodical and every category of tea ware is covered : teapots, spoons, cups and saucers, caddies, tables and trays etc... Form and function are influenced by history, economics and social realities, and while Design for Tea manages to cover it all, it remains at all times interesting and very readable.
The first Festival du Thé is taking place this weekend and until the end of tomorrow in Paris. The goal of the event is to introduce the general public to the enormous diversity that is to be found in the world of tea and to explain that tea is much more than just Lipton Yellow Label tea bags. To that end they have organized several tracks to present what they call a world of scents and colors (the various types of tea), a world of origins (countries of origin and specifically Sri Lanka, Japan, China, India and Kenya), a world for today (when, where and what to drink as tea in today's world) and last a world of spirituality and happiness (beauty and health benefits, relaxation, stimulation).
This site is dedicated to tea. Everything and anything about tea. This will include customs, history, economics, social impact, varieties, grades, objects, cultivation, destinations, news, events, recipes, how-to's, stories, art, literature, legends, book reviews, glossaries etc... etc...