Friday Knows Tea

Tea Legend Time! Ti Kwan Yin (also spelled Tieguanyin) is commonly called "Iron Goddess of Mercy," as it's named for Guanyin, a Chinese deity of kindness and compassion. The story goes that a poor farmer named Wei Yin spent all his days in back-breaking labor, but still found moments to tend to a dilapidated statue of Guanyin in a run-down temple he passed every day on his way to and from the work fields. One night, an exhausted Wei Yin fell asleep in the temple while tending to her statue. In a dream, Guanyin led Wei Yin to a cave behind her temple, where she told him he would find a gift. When he awoke, he followed her guidance and found a small tea shoot. Wei Yin was delighted, and vowed to treasure this gift. He took the tea shoot home and replanted it, where it grew strong and healthy, with large glossy leaves! This beautiful tea plant was a sight for sore eyes, as the region was arid and the farmers had little success. Wei Yin, being a kind and loving soul, shared c...

     Have you been harboring a curiosity over the small statues in Chinese tea shops? Do your friends, with their fancy slatted trays and rare oolongs, have a little friend who frequently graces their tea table? Are you super super into tiny cute animal figurines and delicious teas? You, my friend, are ready to get hooked on tea pets.     These little buddies date back to the Yuan Dynasty (1206-1368 AD) when pottery artists began playing with teapot scraps, fashioning whimsical figures out of the spare clay to entertain themselves and their clients. The practice caught on and soon there was demand for intentionally fashioned statues designed to represent household spirits and mythological guardians such as dragons, great turtles and luck-bearing dogs. A bed of coins under the pet (or one in the mouth as pictured below) represents a pet that will bring financial prosperity to a household. Birds are thought to bring wisdom and happiness. Some are fashioned to...

Hello, Thirsty Nerds! I've been receiving quite a number of emails, dms & in-person questions regarding pu-erhs lately. It seems there's an upswing in popularity for this complicated and delicious tea family and y'all are thirsty for knowledge! Pu-erh tea (most closely for American tongues pronounced as "poo-ahr," try to swallow the R) is one family in the category of tea known as "heicha," (pronounced "hay-cha"). Heicha is the sixth type of tea and the outlier when defining true teas (leaf from the Camelia Sinensis plant). All other tea types are defined by their oxidation range at time of processing as such: White tea is unoxidized: 0% Yellow tea is delicately oxidized (also smothered to slow the oxidation process): 1-4% Green tea is lightly oxidized: 5-10% of possible oxidation in the leaf Oolong tea ranges widely from moderate to high oxidation: 11-99% Black tea is fully oxidized: 100% of possible oxygen saturation in the leaf...