07.02.09
T. Tea Bar: Fits its name to a “tea”
Part 3 of this short series on unique specialty tea start-ups across the United States highlights a three-step process that resulted in a very modern concept called T. Tea Bar, owned by a woman, and the winner of her city’s (Chico, CA) 2004 Chamber of Commerce Women In Business/Entrepreneur of the Year Award. Shelly Blanshei and ...
07.01.09
More research on tea’s possible role in weight management
A new study, conducted by researchers at Beiersdorf, AG, has identified new mechanisms of action that white tea has on reducing the development of human adipose tissue (fat cells).
Many of you have probably been aware, for years, of the ubiquitous (and sometimes questionable) ads for weight-loss teas. These inevitably prove to be ads for just ... 06.30.09
Teas of the Americas, Australia, and elsewhere
From South Carolina to Australia, English-speaking people have planted tea wherever they went, and not only in Asia and Africa. These efforts have produced teas less interesting than the stories about them - how South Carolina tea won the Gold Medal at the 1904 St. Louis World Fair where Darjeeling was used for the first ... 06.29.09
Is there a tea meet-up group in your community?
Meet-up groups are popping up all over the place! If you are thinking such groups are made up of a bunch of desperate single people longing to make a connection and hiding their hope that Mr. or Ms. Right will show up at the event, think again.
If you love tea and you love people, single ... 06.26.09
The tea shop at the end of the universe
If the names Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect, and Zaphod Beeblebrox bring a smile of recognition to your face, you’re obviously acquainted with The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams’ 1970s BBC radio show that spawned a multi-media cult phenomenon.
When the iconic Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles reopened after a four-year renovation, it included a ... 06.25.09
Tea’s Cinderella story in the U.S. marketplace
For decades, tea has been the stale, boring step-child of coffee. Coffee was rich, fresh, dark, aromatic, locally roasted, artisanal, and brimming with cultural cache. Tea was old, crotchety, and British – or maybe niche Asian. Regardless, it was almost always stale and static.
Don’t believe me? In 1990, most Americans were drinking Folgers®, Maxwell House® ... 06.24.09
Tea and chocolate: Some marriages are made in heaven
It’s not surprising that tea and chocolate make good tasting partners. Although the cacao plant’s terroir and the tea plant’s terroir only overlap north and south of the equator, the saying “what grows together goes together” is at least partly true. (Cacao grows within 20 degrees of the equator while tea is cultivated up to ... 06.23.09
Teas of Russia, Turkey, and Iran
This is not the sort of flowing report one would wish to offer, especially inasmuch as the former Soviet Union was once a major tea producer with a fascinating history and interesting neighbors. Russian tea may well be extinct, and with it dies a tradition. What follows may be read purely as requiem, for the ... 06.22.09
How to break the coffee habit
Every day, new patrons come to our teahouse looking for an alternative to coffee. Perhaps their doctor told them to cut down on their caffeine intake, or perhaps coffee wasn’t “working” like it used to, causing jitters and anxiety, accompanied by lower highs and even lower lows. Often, the search for an alternative is borne ... 06.19.09
Demystifying loose-leaf tea
We’ve all heard it. We’ve all tried to explain it. Sometimes the patron buys into your pitch about the merits of loose over bagged, but other times it can be like talking to a wall.
You know what I am talking about here. You might be able to sell them on the quality and taste difference, ... 
