Olde World Tea Company

On Saturday October, 25 2008 I visited Olde World Tea Company in Smithfield, VA. I had a pot of Lapsang Souchong and lunch--a chicken, artichoke and feta quiche with a cup of soup. The food was good and almost all of the menu items used some local ingredients or local taste--all the items were also made from scratch. I did enjoy the Lapsang. I enjoyed it even more because I had not had that type of tea in months. It was brought out already brewed to a good strength. And I got all of this at a very reasonable price ($9 with taxes for a pot of tea, quiche, and cup of soup).

Olde Worlde also sells tea wares and loose leaf teas (about 50 varieties). Below I do have some photographs of some of the teas offered. I thought that the range of selection was very good and appealed to a variety of tastes. My favorite items in the tea shop are the pu erh cakes and discs because no other shop that I have been to in Virginia carries them (at least none that I have been to). The discs are also a good conversation piece because most people have no idea what they are.

website:

www.oldeworldtea.com

above (L to R and bottom to top): White tea Pu Erh disc, jasmine pearls (my first favorite tea), rolled oolong, pu-erh tuo cha, and two varietes of artisanal flowering teas that open into the shape of a pineapple or a flower. (sorry, I did not write down the details--I will next time)
A close up of the white tea pu-erh disc. This demonstrates Olde World's commitment to the tea-fanatic/connoisseur. (Although if you buy this I would start drinking it right away. I wouldnt recommend buying this specifically to age it and drink it 5 or 20 years from now as your house or basement probably does not have the right microbes to make the taste any good) 
Another photograph of the same teas above. (L to R) Jasmine Pearls, some variety of rolled Oolong, Pu-Erh tuo cha, and two varietes of flowering tea

portable tea drinking

I do a lot of traveling and when I travel I still like to have tea, but usually have a hard time finding good water or a microwave or stove to heat the water. Now while I usually can use the tap water at hand to brew some sort of tea, heating up the water is more problematic.

The solution:

Jetboil. It is a portable camp stove that boils water in two minutes or less.

Morning Tea, Tuesday, October 21, 2008

For my morning tea I had a high-mountain style oolong from taiwan--"Our Good Life Tea". This tea was also acquired from Holsome Teas, www.holsome.com. It was a winter picking. I was told that I had to listen for the flavor and smell of this tea when i procured  it. I like this image. Above are some photographs of the brewed leaves and the first and second steeping. The second steeping is the darker color.

I have decided that this is my favorite tea out of my current stock. You do have to listen to the flavor, which has floral overtones, but perhaps why I like it the most is because it has excellent qi--it doesnt impart too much nor too little energy. 

Now an aside on qi:

Qi is the energy the tea gives you. On a basic level, you could interpret qi as the level of caffeine and other stimulants present in the particular tea, but the qi is affected by other qualities. Other factors that can affect a tea's qi are the water quality (water can ofcourse also affect the taste of the tea), the conditions of the tea growing region, cultivation methods, place where the tea is tasted and numerous other factors.

Thus the soil, water, stimulant content, cultivation methods and location of tea drinking all affect how one feels after a cup of tea.

A tea with good qi leaves you alert and energized

A tea with bad qi can leave you feeling sick or give you a headache

A tea with good qi is probably grown in an area that has very little pollution, using little to no pesticides or other chemicals. It is probably picked by hand (at least in China and Taiwan) by skilled pickers and then dried and processed by skilled tea artisans. A tea with bad qi may be quite the opposite of this, although I am sure there are exceptions.

Morning tea, October 20th, 2008

This post kicks off the Richmond Tea Blog. 

I brewed some Pouchong that I ordered from Holsome, a tea and medicinal shop in Princeton, NJ. The packaging the tea comes in--if you order enough of it--reads as follows:

FRONT:

Bao-Chung Tea 

from Pinglin, Wenshan

BACK:

Tea Making Instruction

Put Bao-Chung tea in the teapot for about two-third pot ' the pour boiling water (90 C is better) into it for about 20 seconds. In the second times ' pour the boiling water into it for about 30 seconds. It needs about 40 seconds in the third times ' 50 seconds in the forth time and 60 seconds in the fifth times... The flavor of tea could be strong or lightened by personal.

That is the exact wording and punctuation that appears on the packaging. 

Poor translations like the one above run rampant throughout tea literature written in English. And while the translation above is a poor one, it is still easy enough to understand the meaning in english. When the translations get longer, however, it does become harder to know just how much was lost in translation. This, coupled with a severe lack of good books about tea originally written in English, makes it very hard to: 1) find a truly good tea, 2) brew it properly 3) acquire knowledge about the tea growing region and 4) know anything at all about how the tea is grown or processed. Thus one goal for this blog is to find, report and share useful knowledge about tea.

This Pouchong will be discussed again at a later date, now I want to share some photographs of the Pouchong:

1st post cont'd

pouchong and pot 10-20-2008

Richmond Tea

This will be a blog about my tea experiences.