Tea Discovery

Think of your favorite piece of music in the whole world; one that drives you close to tears, inspires you to jump for joy. Now imagine that piece of music stripped down to a 1998 cell phone MIDI tone ringer. … Continue reading →

Ultimately, I have Qingdao University to thank for opening the doors to tea culture for me.  If not for my freshman year of college Chinese language intensive trip to China, and summer of study at Qingdao University, I would never … Continue reading →

In the world of high-end teas there is a definite bias towards “pure” unflavored tea, and for many good reasons. The complexity of fine tea evokes a whole spectrum of tastes on its own. Tasting them is a more quiet … Continue reading →

Practically every village in China has its own school of tea ceremony. Even within a village, everybody adds a bit of personal flair, reinventing the process to fit their style and their priorities in sharing tea. Yet, across China, there … Continue reading →

A tea leaf is an amazing thing- it is the realization of so many different factors. First, there is the environment: how clean is a growing region? How much rainfall did the tea receive? What season was it picked in? … Continue reading →

With spring in full force, and the excitement building for the new year’s harvest, you can really see the seasonal nature of tea.  Some are willing to pay thousands of dollars for the chance to taste that coveted first picking from famous … Continue reading →

My first exposure to tea in a serious way was under the training of Wang Huiming, a master Tieguanyin taster and gongfu ceremony practitioner from Xiamen. She taught me almost all I know about tea as hospitality, the act of … Continue reading →

Too often, I walk into a tea shop only to be confronted by hundreds of tins lining the walls.  I will ask for something I know and love like Tieguanyin and be presented with six different grades to try.  Of … Continue reading →

Verdant Tea Founder David Duckler has done more than tea research in China.  He got a research fellowship from the Freeman Foundation to go to Tibet and interview writers, attending literary salons, and even tracing the journey of Tibetan novelist … Continue reading →

Works Best With: Tieguanyin, Jasmine, Dancong, Big Red Robe, Black Tea Start with a gaiwan, a glass pitcher, strainer and small cups.  Bring your filtered water to a boil (Wang Huiming had water delivered every day fresh from the springs … Continue reading →

Tea names transliterated from the Chinese can be confusing, and lead to many different ideas on pronunciation. David Duckler, founder of Verdant Tea, is also a translator of Chinese fiction and poetry, and names teas according to the principles of … Continue reading →

Dragonwell village, praised by emperor Qianlong and even Mao Zedong, is considered by many to be the epicenter of Chinese tea culture.  You wouldn’t know it in the distant northern province of Shandong working with the tea farmers of Laoshan.  … Continue reading →

There is nothing more romantic than pu’er.  Forget roses, chocolates, and the like.  Nothing proclaims eternal love like a beautiful brick of wild arbor tea, pressed and aged.  Perhaps it seems strange, but when you examine the facts, it makes … Continue reading →

There are as many teas in China as there are mountain villages, but regardless of whether you are drinking the Golden needle of sub-tropical Yunnan, or the Laoshan green from rocky Shandong province in the North, every tea is cultivated … Continue reading →

Drinking Xingyang Pu’er to stave off the Minnesota winter, I am reminded of one of my dearest tea friends in China, Wang Shilin.  I first found Wang Shilin’s tasting room while scouting for fine Yixing clay teapots.  There was a … Continue reading →

Works best with: Big Red Robe, Dancong Start with two 4-8 oz yixing clay teapots.  Heat them with boiling water.  Pour out the water and add  leaves to 2/3 full when dry.  Pour boiling water over the leaves and immediately pour … Continue reading →

Works best with:  Any green tea, especially Jingshan, Songyang White Start with a tempered glass tumbler.  Fill with fresh boiled water, 6-8oz is ideal.  Allow the water to steam and cool for about 45 seconds to one minute.  add two generous pinches of … Continue reading →

Works Best With: Laoshan Green, Huangshan Maofeng, Jingshan Green Start with two glass picthers, and use 2 teaspoons (give and take) of tea per 4oz of water. Measure the tea into one pitcher, and fill the other with freshly boiled water. … Continue reading →

When I got back to America from a year of field study in China, I wondered where all the tea went.  All the small farmers I worked with in China were brewing up cups of tea that were life-changing and … Continue reading →

Big Red Robe has captivated generations not only for its flavor, but for the rich legends that surround it.  Like many of the origin stories of tea, Big Red Robe involves emperor, a dream, and a miraculous recovery.  While many … Continue reading →

We have seen them online, we see them in the malls- those humble clay teapots that look too small to use.  Where did they come from, and what are they for? The Yixing pot is not a toy, nor a … Continue reading →

I notice that the imitation Gucci purse-toting crowd of Qingdao has dissipated and now the bus is filled with mostly older women with big bags of vegetables, or 2 gallon jars of peanut oil. Some older men sit in the … Continue reading →

Yixing Teapots are extremely rewarding. Treat them well and they will give back the best tea possible, as well as grow in luster and depth of color. High quality hand-crafted teapots are investment objects, and increase greatly in value if … Continue reading →

Have you ever tried an incredible tea at a shop, paid out a significant chunk of your wallet, only to take the tea home and have it be completely uninteresting or flat out bad? As a person who stood behind … Continue reading →

In the tea business, Fair Trade and Organic certification get thrown around a lot. I won’t speak to India or Japan, but after working with Chinese tea farmers for over a year, I have some insights on these labels. First, … Continue reading →

I sit with a thimble-sized Yixing clay teacup in hand, looking into the second steeping of my Laoshan green tea, transported away by the smell of wet earth and soy beans swirling up in water-bead vapor trails towards the ceiling … Continue reading →

It seems sometimes that our taste buds trick us into eating and drinking things that are not healthy.  Candy and fried food taste really good, but in excess, are toxic to the body.  Fresh asparagus tastes really good too, but … Continue reading →

One day, a few thousand years ago, the emperor of China was out doing research for his great encyclopedia of medicine, eating every herb he encountered in the forest and recording the results. On this fateful day, he ate something … Continue reading →

The word “coffee table” is about as common as words like Kleenex and Band-aid. We say it, but we don’t think about it. Coffee tables are those short, long tables where you put big books of pictures that so-and-so gave … Continue reading →

In the last few years, I have seen the number of yixing clay teapots for sale in the United States go up quite a bit. Just this year, all the tea shops in Minneapolis/St. Paul have started to carry them. … Continue reading →

Dear Friends, After years of research, and months of tea tastings and long conversations with fellow tea-lovers, I have reached a high point of frustration with the quality of tea available in the West, and with the lack of emphasis … Continue reading →

As spring unfolds here in Minnesota, I think of my friends in Anxi, preparing for the busiest time of the year: the spring picking of Tieguanyin. This exquisite oolong tea, sometimes seen as Tikuanyin, or Iron Goddess of Mercy, is picked … Continue reading →

Pu’er is a culture within a culture. I spent eight months meeting with a pu’er master every week and I have only touched the surface of all there is to know. This is because no two bricks are alike. A … Continue reading →

There are not many teas out there with such a love-hate dichotomy. Very few people can find green tea offensive, even if they don’t prefer it. Pu’er is an exception to the rule. Pu’er is a unique kind of tea … Continue reading →

Works Best With: Pu’er, especially shu pu’er Take a 4-5g chunk of pu’er and place it in a gaiwan. Don’t worry about warming anything up. Pour boiling water over the tea. Take a pu’er pick and hack the chunk apart until … Continue reading →