May days

Today happens to be the fifth day of the fifth month
I'll wear the straw sandals with blue-eyed cords I was given as they allude to ayame-gusa.
— Basho

Hey, you, get offa my cloud

Heaven, n'est-ce pas?

(via design-dautore)

Goin' underground

A man sets up a blog to write about one of his personal passions, he hopes nights like these come along every so often. They do. The photo above is that of a cluster of fellow Chicago tea junkies, in the basement stock room of a fine Chicago tea shop, cupping teas some had been wanting to share or show off. If the first rule of Underground Tea Club is not to blog about Underground Tea Club, I'm in trouble.

I myself am a bit underground these days. Teasquared is not dead, but it is cooling for a while. I'm deep into data collection for my master's thesis — I've really taken to a lemony rooibos to keep me going at night without the caffeine — and as soon as all this work blows over in the next few weeks, I'll have something of a life again and will heat this blog back to boiling. Till then, please bear with me. Posts will be sporadic. But this fall I'll have news and a whole new outlook, literally.

Share some weak tea with Morrissey

I've written about Morrissey recently — I interviewed him last fall, at the end of which he answered a nagging tea question — and here's another bit, a fun one.

The second half of "Victoria Wood's Nice Cup of Tea," a recent two-part special on the BBC, the British comic shares a cup with Morrissey in Manhattan, talking tea (he travels with an Italian pot, drinks weak Ceylon daily) and, in this clip, suffering through easily the most awkward gift exchange ever ...

A cuppa veggies?

Check this out: Numi Organic Tea introduces a new line today — Savory Teas. It's quite a large line of blends using black tea, spices and (here ya go) veggies. A press release hawks them for a variety of occasions: "They can be a satisfying, low-calorie snack alternative, a great complement to a light lunch, a delicious brew for cooking rice or noodles, a comforting cup when a cold or flu strikes, a pick-me-up on a hike or camping trip, an easy-to-prepare mood booster at work or on the road, or a perfect pairing to cheese and crackers." Well, I certainly boil rice in leftover tea all the time ...

I'm intrigued!

Here's the lineup:

Tomato Mint
This bright Mediterranean infusion is reminiscent of the sweet savory scent of stuffed grape leaves (dolmas). The combination of ripe tomatoes, mint leaves, decaf black tea, a touch of cinnamon and lemon peel makes for a zesty, mouthwatering cup.

Spinach Chive
Layers of steamed spinach greens give way to the mouthwatering fullness of this savory brew. The citrus notes of Numi’s Dry Desert Lime tickle the roof of your mouth as coriander teases your taste buds. Dill, chive and decaf green tea are the perfect finish to this well-rounded, yet complex, blend.

Fennel Spice
Coaxed by the soothing scents of freshly cut fennel, this crisp concoction will transport you to the enchanting European countryside. The soaring flavors of sweet licorice envelop the earthy fullness of celery root while slivers of orange peel and decaf green tea delight the palate.

Carrot Curry
Be transported to the heart of India with the rich exotic flavors of curry, turmeric and ginger. Kissed by sweet carrots and bright cilantro, the earthy, vegetal and piquant notes are marvelously woven together into this full-bodied blend.

Broccoli Cilantro
As pungent aromas lure you into this abundant garden, the hearty flavors of broccoli, celery leaves and cilantro capture your palate. Turmeric and decaf green tea deliver a peppery roundness. Come home and relax to a cup of Broccoli Cilantro’s sweet lingering taste.

Beet Cabbage
A bright crimson hue welcomes you into delightful scents of clove. This smooth buttery blend is rooted with beets and cabbage and delicately spiced with mustard seed and coriander. The finish is accented by sweet notes of apple and decaf black tea.

Garden Sampler
A cornucopia of vegetables herbs and spices await you, ready to nourish and warm you from the inside. This Garden Sampler holds a variety of our delicious and satisfying Savory Teas. The box contains two bags of each of the new flavors: Tomato Mint, Carrot Curry, Fennel Spice, Spinach Chive, Beet Cabbage and Broccoli Cilantro.

Whaddya think?

Tuesday tea TV: Creep-tastic ad

Warning: The video posted here is uber-creepy. I've watched it the one time. I won't be watching it again. I'm not a spooky movie kinda guy, and I hate clowns. But ... but ... it's so weird, and so cool, and a really different and interesting way to advertise tea. Don'tcha think?

Yes, let's

Just sharing this photo, which was Facebooked by a couple of friends who've just relocated to Leeds, UK. I couldn't help giggle more than I probably should have at the box of Yorkshire Tea in the background.

I came for the "160 bags for the price of 80"; I stayed for the fabulous slogan: "Let's have a proper brew." Henceforth, I shall begin each teatime with that gentle but insistent prelude.

White tea riot

Look at the birds up in the trees!

Saw this over at fair-trade-minded shop Ten Thousand Villages: a beautiful tea tray hand-painted by Peruvian artists. Birds in the tree, sunny warm colors, all on reverse-painted glass. Stylish, handy.

Tuesday Tea TV: Tea on the lawn

Occasional flashbacks to my ’80s youth — a recent one took me back to "The Young Ones" and their dreadful tea parties on the lawn ...



Alas, I can't locate video of the clip I was really thinking of, when Neil kills the kettle and Vyvyan says, "Oh, no! That means we'll have to have raw tea again!" — as he proceeds to chew on a dry tea bag.

Tea ceremony can be of yore or yours

We use the word "ceremony" a lot in tea doings.

Every tea culture has one. Japanese chado, on any occasion, is peaceful and reverent, a conduit for meanings both profoundly universal and deeply personal. Chinese gongfu is fluid, skillful, utilitarian. Korean tarye is natural and relaxed. Outside of Asia, English afternoon tea is a certain celebration of civility.

These are each ritual in aspect, bearing out in some form the etymology of the word "ceremony," from the Latin meaning "holiness, sacredness; awe; reverent rite." But even the street culture of Burma, the mint tea cafes of north Africa, the mandated cups for visitors and buyers throughout southern Asia and the Middle East — tea throughout the world manages to express itself through ceremonial gestures and symbols. What is the Russian samovar if not an altar, a baptismal font?

At your table, together or alone, tea traditions can be maintained — or born. Learn the old ways, carry them on, forge the links. But also experiment, incorporate, transcend.

En garde! The art of tea dueling

I forget what lead to my brief flirtation with steampunk — I think I backed into the subculture while reading Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle trilogy — but a friend recently asked me if I was aware of tea dueling. It's a steampunk thing, and it beats pistols at fifty paces.

In a tea duel, the duelists sit across a table from each other. Each is armed with a cup of hot tea and a tea biscuit (butter cookie, what have you). Refereed by the Tiffin Master (or Mistress), the duelists dunk their biscuit into the tea for a count of five seconds, at which point the biscuit is removed. The duelist who waits the longest before eating the biscuit — without having lost any soggy crumbs or saturated pieces to the tea — wins. Victory is described as a "nom," and it's harder than it might seem.

Nerdy, but civilized. Complete rules can be found here in the "Articles of the Honourable Association of Tea Duellists" (sic).

Make tea, sit: a manual

This blog post, "How to sit in a chair and drink tea," is every kind of awesome. It's a long read, but it ably captures the mindfulness required — well, you know — in every step within the simple act of doing just what the title says.

"Run water into the kettle, feeling its growing weight, and take a moment to smile at your fortune if you did not have to leave the house to do so." So true.

"You will now confront one of modern society’s ever-present dangers, which is the risk of distraction we face whenever nothing interesting happens for a few minutes." Preach it.

"The tea will take a few more minutes. Good! Those minutes are a little present, just for you, only because you welcome them." Amen, brother.

Tuesday tea tunes: Outside the box

If you've ever described a cup of tea as pure poetry, here some young musicians pushing that notion to the extreme — with an improvised song based on the words from a box of organic black tea ...

The ups and downs of tea science

As a curious person by nature, one of the fun parts about being enrolled in a university is having access to research libraries. Nearly any paper published in an academic journal is usually a couple of clicks away. You'd be amazed — at least I was recently — at the amount of research still going on into the continuing mystery of tea. Just in the last year, papers have included "Chemistry and Pharmacology of Caffeine in Different Types of Tea Leaves," "The Chemistry and Biotransformation of Tea Constituents" and "Flavour Chemistry of Mate and Some Common Herbal Teas."

But chemist Matthew Harbowy, who's focused a lot of his own work on tea and caffeine, has taken to Quora (a question-and-answer service with massively greater credibility than most "answers" sites) in recent months to bring a lot of this kind of research out from behind academy walls.

For instance, Harbowy tackles a question I've heard debated almost as often as the great milk-first debate: "Does bouncing your tea bag actually do anything substantial?" After discussing the Noyes-Whitney equation, the hydrophobic barrier and several experiments, he concludes: "Within statistical error, under almost all testing conditions, I cannot find a difference between dunking and not dunking under controlled circumstances, so do it how you want."

Also see his answers to "Does green tea have more caffeine than black tea?" and "How much caffeine is there in jasmine tea?" He's also a contributor to the scholarly collection Caffeine.

Natural look, natural feel

New favorite home-decor source: Leif, a supplier of artistic living accessories and tabletop pieces hewn from natural materials and designed to look that way.

Dig these cups — this one (pictured) is called Brushed Snow and is made in Japan. Other cups in this same shape are wrapped with wood grain, or real cedar for the sake cups. They also have some beautiful, ghostly glazed tea bowls. Best part: great prices.

New Year hibernation

When New Year week is over, people are likely to be sitting around the fireside to enjoy a kind of hibernation, making and drinking tea all alone. They do not mind having no guest. Their own favorite scroll in the alcove, a single flower, a kettle put on for themselves, a Korean salt-dish teabowl of their liking or the warmth of an oo-zutsu (large tube) teabowl — all are enjoyable. If perchance, a tea friend of their unexpectedly visits them, it must be doubly joyful. — Sasaki Sanmi

Tatezome new year's tea ceremony returns

Hey, locals: Each January, Urasenke Chicago presents a New Year's tea ceremony (Tatezome) and hosts a nice luncheon afterward at the Japan Information Center. I attended and wrote about it a few years ago, enjoyed a rewarding afternoon and met some lovely folks.

The next one is scheduled for Jan. 26, and here's a video of last year's ceremony ...

Tuesday tea tunes: Little anchors

Here's hoping all your holiday travels were safe — and not as wobbly as the planes in this video — and that you, in this new year, "Stay Grounded" like British indie-folk singer Tom Williams does with tea and toast ...

Tea people and the new year

The new year comes with the vanguard of the first streak of daylight accompanied by the burnished dawn wind, in a stately and majestic way. The new year is decked out awe-inspiringly, faultless and graceful. Tea people are pious, serious and peaceful as they welcome it. A new year brings out the gift of myth, classicality and delight. Tea people receive them with admiration, nostalgia and ecstasy. As everything is full of celebration, gratitude and joy, tea people are busy but happy.
— Sasaki Sanmi