As the tea hostess of my dorm, one of the fun things I get to do is host tea parties! Woo! Last night was the first one. I wanted to make sure people would definitely like what they tasted there, so I made my super delicious Chai Masala. I don't have a link for this one, since I got it from Uwajimaya and don't really care to go through their product list right now to find it if they even had a product list (I don't think they do). It's certainly very delicious though, using mustard, cloves, cinnamon, cardamon, pepper, and ginger to spice the Indian black tea. The mustard, pepper, and ginger create a wonderful heat that spreads through your mouth and lingers in the back of your throat. When you add milk and sugar (which you're supposed to do while making it, but in case anyone had lactose intolerance or didn't like milk I left it out and left the sugar out separately too so that people could decide how sweet they liked it), it tastes like spicy chocolate milk to me.
This chai is my favorite winter drink. It's not winter right now, sure, but if you were kidnapped one day and kept in a dark box for so long you lost track of the days and was then released into South Hadley right now you would think it was. Hahahahaha. We heard there was a risk for snow this weekend. SNOW. IN MARCH. And not even the middle of March, the VERY END! Crazyness. So spicy chai it was.
I have some pictures, but I need to either get permission or edit people's faces out of them first before I put them up. Forgot about asking about that last night. Oh well. Hahaha.
We all had a great time and I got to teach even more people about the differences between herbal teas and actual ones. Haha. I really need to add an oolong to my collection though, because I really only have pu-erh and green tea. I don't have a white tea either, but I don't really like white tea, so I consider my white pu-erh and pu-erh buds to be good enough. Hahaha. And my chai is the only black I'm ever going to keep in my collection, thank you very much. Ugh. Black tea just tastes so horrible to me. It tastes like orange peels! But not as sweet! Maybe I've only had bad black teas, but black tea is really not my thing. I think I had the purple tea from Phoenix Tea's as a black tea though, so maybe I do like one kind of "black tea" (all these colors and confusing me now hahaha), but I might've had it as an oolong instead. Either way now that I'm thinking about that one I need to add it as well. Haha
I think I need to make a graphic about the different kinds of tea here soon. It seems that enough people read this. And on that note, yay! Thank you all so much!! It makes me really happy and encourages me to keep writing. Hehe.
Today I am drinking my special little 2008 Menghai Hong Yun. This was the first pu-erh that I bought, and I was lucky that it was especially delicious, so that's why it's special to me. It's not the best shu I've ever had, but it's been really kind to me. Interestingly enough, sometimes it tastes better than others. Most times it comes out dark ruby red, and it's earthyness is sweet and smooth. But sometimes it gets that accursed metallic taste! UGH! I hate it so much.
I thought at first it must be because of the water, but changing to spring water didn't help. So then I thought maybe I had ruined it by improperly storing it somehow, but then it came out good the next time. Today I thought it might be because I made the chai in my Breville last night (it's essentially a pot, so I use it like it and even make spaghetti in it hahaha), which left a distinct chai smell to it that I thought I'd gotten rid of until I boiled some water in it and smelled the water after I noticed the tea tasting bad. So I washed it again (both the Breville and the tea haha), and the tea tasted better!!!
But five washes! Five!!! They were all very short, but FIVE!!! I might as well go for the full seven or something now! Hahaha. I say that because I was told by a Chinese friend of mine here the other day that the usual number of washes was at least three, and if you wanted to be really traditional and ceremonial then you'd do like seven or something. I can definitely taste the chai in my tea now though (terrifying!), so I'm going to do a super cleanse on my teapot and boil lemons in it twice or so. That works really well and makes it look really pretty.
But back to the tea. I think I need to start exactly timing how long each of my washes are for, if not the temperature of the water too. Sometimes I think cooler water (190 instead of 200+) works better, but that doesn't exactly make sense to me. Hahaha. That doesn't mean it isn't true though. So I guess I'll have to test for that as well. But I definitely want to know what it is that makes that taste and how to avoid it because I really want to do a pu-erh tea party next, and nothing is more of a real tea turn-off than metallic tea.
Maybe I should start with green tea instead. Hmm.
By the way, RACHEL MADDOW IS COMING TO MOUNT HOLYOKE TONIGHT! Aaaaahhhh!!!!!! It's so exciting! I love Rachel Maddow. She's really straight forward with her opinion and puts together a lot of complicated pieces that others don't seem to do. Plus she has a sense of humor. Sometimes I think her analysis of what some people mean when they say things is a little too simplistic, but I like how on top of the non-mainstream things she is and the direct points she makes about all things politics, and she is always stunning at analyzing the consequences of what people say. From what I've heard about her book, Drift, it sounds very interesting and I'm excited to see her tonight not just because of her, but also because of what she'll be talking about. But all of that is besides the point of tea, so don't worry I'll stay out of politics here except for this one little post. Hahaha. Unless they have to do with tea, which economic related things might, but I sincerely doubt it for now, and I've already basically signed this blog up to do so many things that I figure that unless I take a class about the politics of the tea trade, politics really can stay out of this blog just fine. Hahaha.
Saturday, March 31, 2012
Monday, March 26, 2012
Who am I kidding?
I don't know enough about aging pu-erh right now nor do I have enough money to go around amassing tea that I'm not going to drink. Hahahaha.
But either way, today I did something really funny. Haha. So yesterday I made spaghetti with friends. And with spaghetti comes marinara sauce! And with marinara sauce comes awesome glass jars with lids! Hahaha. And as every Northwesterner knows, mason jars make for great mugs! And today I have proven that they make great makeshift glass teapots too! Hahahahaha!
That's right! I made tea in a mason jar! Hahahaha! One of my filters for a tumbler fits perfectly in the opening of the jar, so I figured I might as well have fun and make tea in it too. Now I have a large teapot for my pu-erhs which I can't make too easily in my Breville! I love my Breville and all, but it doesn't really do less 30 second brews easily, so it's not the best for large tastings. I was thinking about getting a larger gaiwan (the one I have now is good for 4 people max and at that point your serving is super tiny), but I'm feeling protective of my wallet at the moment and would rather not spend even that much money, thus leaving me without a teapot bigger than 8oz! Until now! Hahaha! Now I technically have a 24oz teapot! Hahaha! I feel super hippie and college student-ish. It's lots of fun.
Isn't it beautiful? Haha. That is also my new Mengku sheng in there too, just to let you know. And it was again a lot less spicy than I keep expecting it to be! Year 5 is definitely an interesting turning point for shengs I guess. Ah, I love this journey.
Oh and I found out something really cool the other day, apparently students can be instructors for classes during our intersession term in January! Hehehe. I was thinking of seeing if I could teach a henna class and a tea class. I know I'm not an expert on tea or a tea master, but I would absolutely love to be able to share my love of tea and what knowledge I have with more people so easily (and get paid! Haha). Plus then I'd have the funding and the excuse to buy more teaware and tea! Hehehe! But we'll see. I feel a little premature to start teaching other people about tea so seriously like that. So maybe I'll just stick with henna. What do you think? I was also really hoping to be in Japan for that winter break time period (we don't have to attend the intersession term), so maybe I won't do that this year... But again, we'll see. Hmm, I wonder if I could visit a tea farm when I'm there this time around! That would be so cool!
Speaking of Japanese tea, I'm considering learning Chado, because I really have a lot of respect for it and would also like to expand my Buddhist practice, but that's just an idea I have arbitrarily floating around right now, and I definitely don't have the time for that this year, and if all goes well and I get into the classes I need for next semester, I really won't have the time for the next 4 semesters either! Haha.
So I don't know if I've mentioned this on here before, but I want to be a biomedical researcher. I LOVE SCIENCE. You might have realized that by now. But really, I LOVE SCIENCE SO MUCH. Almost three years ago now I was extremely lucky and had the amazing opportunity to intern at a university hospital research center. Going in my intention was to explore the research side of medicine and confirm that I did not want to be a part of it. Haha! That's hilarious because I left with exactly the opposite mentality. I fell head over heels in love with research. I'm pretty sure I ended up working like 50 hours on average per week there instead of the required 40 because I stayed after almost every day and I even went in on weekends sometimes. I was extremely happy to get up every morning in order to go to work and didn't really want to leave at the end of the day either. Haha. It was just so exciting to go in and not know what you were going to find when the project was done. It was also really fascinating to learn hands on how cells and the chemicals in the body worked. Just thinking about it all makes me so happy and excited about it all over again! So I left knowing I wanted to be a researcher for certain.
To do this, I would preferably like the MD/PhD combo degree. If I can't get into that, then an MD, if not that then a PhD, and if I can't even get a PhD then I don't know how on earth I'm even alive. Hahaha. And it's not like I want just any MD/PhD degree either, I really want to get into one of the few NIH sponsored programs as well, because then it's F R E E. Woah! A 5 year doctoral degree, free!!! That would be a dream come true. So in order to even qualify to get in the first place, I obviously have to take care of some pre-med requirements. These requirements differ slightly from med school to med school unfortunately. I decided however, that Harvard's would likely be of a very high standard and am going off of theirs. I figure if I can achieve their standard, it will cover whatever requirements other med schools have as well.
I think I'm definitely right because they changed their requirements for the year I'd be entering (2016) this year, and basically added on an extra year of intensive physics classes and biology and chemistry classes. ...THANKS A LOT, HARVARD SHOWOFFS. Hahaha. Just kidding. I would've been taking most of those classes anyways, and they all look really interesting, so I'm sure it'll be fun.
So after figuring out which classes I'll therefore absolutely have to take I realized that I will qualify to basically be a Biochemistry major with a Physics minor. Hahahahaha. And not only that, but for the next two full years I will have to take at least one biology, chemistry, and physics class per semester. Technically I could put off one or another for a year and ease up the load a little, but I work better under a bit of stress and when I'm extremely interested in a subject. I feel that I definitely need to have a balance though, and so I'm trying to decide between Asian Studies, Economics, International Relations, or Buddhist Studies for my 2nd major or my minor. I'd rather do a double major instead of a minor (and I only need one music class to take care of my last distribution requirement because this year was so well rounded! Woot!) and I have like 13 class spaces that I could put whatever I want to in, more than enough for a 2nd major, so it's not like I won't have time for it.
But anyways, the future is certainly packed isn't it? Yup. And now I need to go do homework like usual. Hahaha. Time for more tea!
But either way, today I did something really funny. Haha. So yesterday I made spaghetti with friends. And with spaghetti comes marinara sauce! And with marinara sauce comes awesome glass jars with lids! Hahaha. And as every Northwesterner knows, mason jars make for great mugs! And today I have proven that they make great makeshift glass teapots too! Hahahahaha!
That's right! I made tea in a mason jar! Hahahaha! One of my filters for a tumbler fits perfectly in the opening of the jar, so I figured I might as well have fun and make tea in it too. Now I have a large teapot for my pu-erhs which I can't make too easily in my Breville! I love my Breville and all, but it doesn't really do less 30 second brews easily, so it's not the best for large tastings. I was thinking about getting a larger gaiwan (the one I have now is good for 4 people max and at that point your serving is super tiny), but I'm feeling protective of my wallet at the moment and would rather not spend even that much money, thus leaving me without a teapot bigger than 8oz! Until now! Hahaha! Now I technically have a 24oz teapot! Hahaha! I feel super hippie and college student-ish. It's lots of fun.Isn't it beautiful? Haha. That is also my new Mengku sheng in there too, just to let you know. And it was again a lot less spicy than I keep expecting it to be! Year 5 is definitely an interesting turning point for shengs I guess. Ah, I love this journey.
Oh and I found out something really cool the other day, apparently students can be instructors for classes during our intersession term in January! Hehehe. I was thinking of seeing if I could teach a henna class and a tea class. I know I'm not an expert on tea or a tea master, but I would absolutely love to be able to share my love of tea and what knowledge I have with more people so easily (and get paid! Haha). Plus then I'd have the funding and the excuse to buy more teaware and tea! Hehehe! But we'll see. I feel a little premature to start teaching other people about tea so seriously like that. So maybe I'll just stick with henna. What do you think? I was also really hoping to be in Japan for that winter break time period (we don't have to attend the intersession term), so maybe I won't do that this year... But again, we'll see. Hmm, I wonder if I could visit a tea farm when I'm there this time around! That would be so cool!
Speaking of Japanese tea, I'm considering learning Chado, because I really have a lot of respect for it and would also like to expand my Buddhist practice, but that's just an idea I have arbitrarily floating around right now, and I definitely don't have the time for that this year, and if all goes well and I get into the classes I need for next semester, I really won't have the time for the next 4 semesters either! Haha.
So I don't know if I've mentioned this on here before, but I want to be a biomedical researcher. I LOVE SCIENCE. You might have realized that by now. But really, I LOVE SCIENCE SO MUCH. Almost three years ago now I was extremely lucky and had the amazing opportunity to intern at a university hospital research center. Going in my intention was to explore the research side of medicine and confirm that I did not want to be a part of it. Haha! That's hilarious because I left with exactly the opposite mentality. I fell head over heels in love with research. I'm pretty sure I ended up working like 50 hours on average per week there instead of the required 40 because I stayed after almost every day and I even went in on weekends sometimes. I was extremely happy to get up every morning in order to go to work and didn't really want to leave at the end of the day either. Haha. It was just so exciting to go in and not know what you were going to find when the project was done. It was also really fascinating to learn hands on how cells and the chemicals in the body worked. Just thinking about it all makes me so happy and excited about it all over again! So I left knowing I wanted to be a researcher for certain.
To do this, I would preferably like the MD/PhD combo degree. If I can't get into that, then an MD, if not that then a PhD, and if I can't even get a PhD then I don't know how on earth I'm even alive. Hahaha. And it's not like I want just any MD/PhD degree either, I really want to get into one of the few NIH sponsored programs as well, because then it's F R E E. Woah! A 5 year doctoral degree, free!!! That would be a dream come true. So in order to even qualify to get in the first place, I obviously have to take care of some pre-med requirements. These requirements differ slightly from med school to med school unfortunately. I decided however, that Harvard's would likely be of a very high standard and am going off of theirs. I figure if I can achieve their standard, it will cover whatever requirements other med schools have as well.
I think I'm definitely right because they changed their requirements for the year I'd be entering (2016) this year, and basically added on an extra year of intensive physics classes and biology and chemistry classes. ...THANKS A LOT, HARVARD SHOWOFFS. Hahaha. Just kidding. I would've been taking most of those classes anyways, and they all look really interesting, so I'm sure it'll be fun.
So after figuring out which classes I'll therefore absolutely have to take I realized that I will qualify to basically be a Biochemistry major with a Physics minor. Hahahahaha. And not only that, but for the next two full years I will have to take at least one biology, chemistry, and physics class per semester. Technically I could put off one or another for a year and ease up the load a little, but I work better under a bit of stress and when I'm extremely interested in a subject. I feel that I definitely need to have a balance though, and so I'm trying to decide between Asian Studies, Economics, International Relations, or Buddhist Studies for my 2nd major or my minor. I'd rather do a double major instead of a minor (and I only need one music class to take care of my last distribution requirement because this year was so well rounded! Woot!) and I have like 13 class spaces that I could put whatever I want to in, more than enough for a 2nd major, so it's not like I won't have time for it.
But anyways, the future is certainly packed isn't it? Yup. And now I need to go do homework like usual. Hahaha. Time for more tea!
Friday, March 23, 2012
Update on the Mengku Rongshi Sheng Round 2!
It's even smoother than I made it out to be in my last post. A smooth sheng! I don't know quite what to do with myself. It must be because it's already 5 years old. Most shengs I've had were usually very young, between either 1 and 3 years old. I had an old one once or twice I think, somewhere around 15 years old I think. It's still very yellow, but maybe more orangeish than truly light yellow, and it's definitely not as sheng spicy as I keep expecting it to be. Haha. Heck, it's got a hint of floral in it even, and I feel like it's definitely creeping up on that lovely earthy flavor of older ones and cooked ones. I'm getting more and more curious about how it'll turn out in another 5 or so years.
Library Green, Basil Sheng
First off, I would like to mention here that if I could drown in any spice, my choice would be that of basil.
I. Love. Basil.
Basil is the heart of food. A world without basil... is chaos!
And sadly my school does not use basil very much in anything but soup it seems. And even then, it still doesn't use as much as they should. So I bought my own thing of basil. And now I'm making split pea soup from scratch (it was a mix, but a mix of scratch ingredients! Lol), and it has a ton of basil and is making the entire first floor smell absolutely wonderful. I love it so much!!!! I just want to bottle this scent up as perfume. Hahahahaha. Eau de Basil. Or something like that. I speak not a word of French, sadly.
Speaking of languages, I need to decide which one to learn. It's almost definitely going to be Mandarin, because an extraordinarily amount of research now days is coming out of China, especially in areas I'm interested in. So that should help me there. Also, there are economics programs in China, so if I double major in Biology and Economics, then I'll have a program I could go study abroad with and get credit for! But on the other hand, more countries speak French or Spanish, and I really also want to learn Korean.... But that's alright. I will learn them all one day!!!
Anyways, on to the purpose of this blog. Haha.
Today was like 80 degrees out. Way too hot! I like it 50-60 and cloudy. At 80 and sunny my eyes are blind! Blind! I need clouds. Otherwise I look like I'm about to unleash the fury of the seven hells on everyone and everything around me. Hahaha.
So I brought my portable tea tasting set, a clean water bottle, and some green tea with me. Hehehe. And then I filled up my water bottle with the filtered, cold fountain water at the library, and made delicious green tea for me and my macroeconomics study buddy. I'm very happy to announce a new tea convert!! Hahaha! She thought that green tea was normally bitter. Augh! The anguish! So I had her try my Gyokuro (yes, its been a while since I got it now, its on its very sad last legs, but its still good for at least 3 brews!) and she loved it! Yaaayyyyy! So that was fun. And I got to explain all the different kinds of tea to her, so we had a good time. And then we studied macroeconomics, and I had even more fun. Haha.
Then I went home, and decided to try my new sheng pu-erh. That's right! I finally have a sheng in my possession!!!
On Wednesday my friends and I decided that we wanted to escape the clutches of campus. I love Mount Holyoke campus. It's beautiful and peaceful and quiet and pressure free. Other people though tend to see it differently it seems. Many of my friends refer to it as a "bubble" and always talk about how bored they are and how much they want to escape the bubble. Haha. I don't like going shopping because it reminds me of money I do not have, so I don't really mind staying in a pretty much store free bubble where there are lot of events to go to and clubs to take part in and people to talk to. Sometimes the food gets kind of dull, but I just need to hit up Goodwill here one of these days and pick up some pots and pans and things and sneak over to the Big Y too so that I can get some ingredients and just start cooking to alleviate that stuffiness. If I have things to do, I'm a very satisfied person. Boredom is the worst thing in the world. I'm saving up my money to go back to Japan here soon, and I'm making sure to bring some sleeping pills with me this time because there is no way I'm riding that 11+ hour flight conscious again. Never never never never.
So we went to Northampton! Northampton is the home of one of our little sister colleges, Smith College! (I say little sister because Mount Holyoke was the first of the seven sisters hehehe!) We obviously didn't go to Northampton to go to Smith though. In Northampton, there are a lot of really cute little restaurants and shops. So we went to go look at all of those. We stopped by some piercing places (pictures soon! Just kidding, hahaha), a frozen yogurt shop, had lunch at a Japanese restaurant (I'm feeling really homesick for Japan funnily enough), and just generally walked around and had fun with each other. At one point, just after I'd been talking to one of my friends about the virtues of loose leaf tea and being sad that there wasn't any loose leaf tea stores in the area, I caught sight of something amazing! A culinary shop that also advertised loose leaf tea! Oh my goodness. You have no idea how excited I was. Actually, you might be able to imagine. But either way, I was really, really excited. So of course we stopped by over there.
The store is called Cooks Shop Here! and the tea company located inside it is called Tea Trekker. I like their name. I also loved that what I found on their website which I glanced at briefly before going in (ah, the magic of modern smart phones), which was that they go to the farms themselves in many different countries to secure their stock. Plus, they had Pu-erh in it's own category! I should really expect that of tea stores by now, but way too many still put it under black tea. UGH! The tragedy of it all.
I was really hoping that they would be like most of the shops in Seattle and do on the fly tea tastings for my friends, but sadly this was not that kind of store. They have more scheduled tastings instead, that you sign up for online it seems. But that's alright because at least they did sell very small samples of tea for very reasonable prices, and the owner was very knowledgeable about all of his teas. Plus one sign that I really liked about his store was that he had the same Red Label Dragon Phoenix Constellation (
As you probably know already, I'm a really big lover of the dark earthy rich shu pu-erh. Mmmmm. Just thinking about my 2898 makes me happy. Because of this, I've focused mostly on expanding that part of my library as opposed to the sheng side, leaving me with well, no sheng. Hahaha. And this wasn't a problem when I was just serving myself and sometimes family members, but now that I'm at college where I have a lot more people over more frequently (and I'm now the tea hostess for my dorm! Strangely enough, this is a legitimate position hahaha), so I want to show them as many sides of tea as I can, which means I've come to need a sheng.
Right before I left Seattle I did a little bit of sheng searching. I went over to Healeo since McIntosh Tea is more or less located there as far as I understand it. There I found one really REALLY great little sheng that I absolutely loved. It's hard to get me to actually buy anything though. I typically need at least 3 days before making any purchase over $15, and honestly it was just a little small for me and felt a little too high quality for something that I was probably going to go through fairly quickly in college. So I passed it by and kept on searching. Obviously I did not find my sheng before I left Seattle. But that was also a space issue. I already had so little space, there was really not a good possibility of me being able to take much more with me. Hahaha. So I figured I'd search for something in real life, and then think about what I'd tasted, and then maybe buy it online once I'd gotten into South Hadley. This didn't really happen either, so again, I was left without a sheng.
But when I stopped by Tea Trekker, I found a really nice sized sheng that was within my price range and actually even older than the shus I have! So happily, I purchased this cute little 2007 Rong's Mengku (勐库戎
Honestly, I'm a bit surprised now that I look at the other teas by the Mengku tea factory that I liked this one. Though maybe that's not so surprising, I don't know. But either way, this is apparently the company of my absolute worst ever experience with a pu-erh. Hahahaha. I think it was the 2008 Mu Ye Chun "99801" (but don't hold me to it!) that I tried from Uwajimaya (it was the 2nd one I'd ever bought! Go easy on me! Haha) and it was HORRIBLE. Ugh. I don't want to think about it at all. It was so bad. Seriously, let's not go there right now. Hahaha.
So of course now that I have this sheng, I have to try it out and share it! So I made it while making my basil crazed split pea soup, which I didn't really get to eat with it because it took freaking two hours to cook and by then I'd given up on eating that soup and just ate some leftover udon and drank my tea. Hahaha.
I was really surprised by the first brew, because it was a lot smoother and sweeter than I expected. In fact, I really didn't consider it to have that much taste at all. But it did smell wonderful! Haha. But then, in the second brew, helloooooo sheng! Yup. That's when it finally woke up. I don't think I washed it well enough maybe. Either way, the next few brews were really delicious. I got at least 3 more good ones before I started to need to keep it in for longer, and eventually I got I think 6 brews out of it before I decided it was done.
Those 4 after the first one were wonderful. This was a mellower sheng, but it still had a what I will always associate with as tobacco zippy spicy flavor that I really enjoy. I don't like smoking though! Once I tried to convince my mother to make a bet with me that if I could go through high school without doing drugs then she'd have to give me a few hundred dollars. She laughed and said, "Yeah right, like you'd do drugs." And it's true. Hahaha. I don't need anything to make me more outgoing or happy so there's no desire to use them and adding on the fact that I like using my lungs too much makes it even less likely that I'd ever do anything like that. But I still like that smell and taste in my tea! Haha. One of the girls I was sharing it with described it as smelling like henna too! I was really surprised, but it makes sense because henna usually has tea tree oil in it (from the melaleuca plant, not camellia haha) which has the same sort of spicy kick to it that this did. It was also slightly sweet and reminded me of spring sunshine.
I actually like it so much that I'm considering getting one to let age. But I'll keep drinking this one for now and we'll just see where that goes.
Now comes a big question, should I try this one out in my Yixing pot or not?
I. Love. Basil.
Basil is the heart of food. A world without basil... is chaos!
And sadly my school does not use basil very much in anything but soup it seems. And even then, it still doesn't use as much as they should. So I bought my own thing of basil. And now I'm making split pea soup from scratch (it was a mix, but a mix of scratch ingredients! Lol), and it has a ton of basil and is making the entire first floor smell absolutely wonderful. I love it so much!!!! I just want to bottle this scent up as perfume. Hahahahaha. Eau de Basil. Or something like that. I speak not a word of French, sadly.
Speaking of languages, I need to decide which one to learn. It's almost definitely going to be Mandarin, because an extraordinarily amount of research now days is coming out of China, especially in areas I'm interested in. So that should help me there. Also, there are economics programs in China, so if I double major in Biology and Economics, then I'll have a program I could go study abroad with and get credit for! But on the other hand, more countries speak French or Spanish, and I really also want to learn Korean.... But that's alright. I will learn them all one day!!!
Anyways, on to the purpose of this blog. Haha.
Today was like 80 degrees out. Way too hot! I like it 50-60 and cloudy. At 80 and sunny my eyes are blind! Blind! I need clouds. Otherwise I look like I'm about to unleash the fury of the seven hells on everyone and everything around me. Hahaha.
So I brought my portable tea tasting set, a clean water bottle, and some green tea with me. Hehehe. And then I filled up my water bottle with the filtered, cold fountain water at the library, and made delicious green tea for me and my macroeconomics study buddy. I'm very happy to announce a new tea convert!! Hahaha! She thought that green tea was normally bitter. Augh! The anguish! So I had her try my Gyokuro (yes, its been a while since I got it now, its on its very sad last legs, but its still good for at least 3 brews!) and she loved it! Yaaayyyyy! So that was fun. And I got to explain all the different kinds of tea to her, so we had a good time. And then we studied macroeconomics, and I had even more fun. Haha.
Then I went home, and decided to try my new sheng pu-erh. That's right! I finally have a sheng in my possession!!!
On Wednesday my friends and I decided that we wanted to escape the clutches of campus. I love Mount Holyoke campus. It's beautiful and peaceful and quiet and pressure free. Other people though tend to see it differently it seems. Many of my friends refer to it as a "bubble" and always talk about how bored they are and how much they want to escape the bubble. Haha. I don't like going shopping because it reminds me of money I do not have, so I don't really mind staying in a pretty much store free bubble where there are lot of events to go to and clubs to take part in and people to talk to. Sometimes the food gets kind of dull, but I just need to hit up Goodwill here one of these days and pick up some pots and pans and things and sneak over to the Big Y too so that I can get some ingredients and just start cooking to alleviate that stuffiness. If I have things to do, I'm a very satisfied person. Boredom is the worst thing in the world. I'm saving up my money to go back to Japan here soon, and I'm making sure to bring some sleeping pills with me this time because there is no way I'm riding that 11+ hour flight conscious again. Never never never never.
So we went to Northampton! Northampton is the home of one of our little sister colleges, Smith College! (I say little sister because Mount Holyoke was the first of the seven sisters hehehe!) We obviously didn't go to Northampton to go to Smith though. In Northampton, there are a lot of really cute little restaurants and shops. So we went to go look at all of those. We stopped by some piercing places (pictures soon! Just kidding, hahaha), a frozen yogurt shop, had lunch at a Japanese restaurant (I'm feeling really homesick for Japan funnily enough), and just generally walked around and had fun with each other. At one point, just after I'd been talking to one of my friends about the virtues of loose leaf tea and being sad that there wasn't any loose leaf tea stores in the area, I caught sight of something amazing! A culinary shop that also advertised loose leaf tea! Oh my goodness. You have no idea how excited I was. Actually, you might be able to imagine. But either way, I was really, really excited. So of course we stopped by over there.
The store is called Cooks Shop Here! and the tea company located inside it is called Tea Trekker. I like their name. I also loved that what I found on their website which I glanced at briefly before going in (ah, the magic of modern smart phones), which was that they go to the farms themselves in many different countries to secure their stock. Plus, they had Pu-erh in it's own category! I should really expect that of tea stores by now, but way too many still put it under black tea. UGH! The tragedy of it all.
I was really hoping that they would be like most of the shops in Seattle and do on the fly tea tastings for my friends, but sadly this was not that kind of store. They have more scheduled tastings instead, that you sign up for online it seems. But that's alright because at least they did sell very small samples of tea for very reasonable prices, and the owner was very knowledgeable about all of his teas. Plus one sign that I really liked about his store was that he had the same Red Label Dragon Phoenix Constellation (
As you probably know already, I'm a really big lover of the dark earthy rich shu pu-erh. Mmmmm. Just thinking about my 2898 makes me happy. Because of this, I've focused mostly on expanding that part of my library as opposed to the sheng side, leaving me with well, no sheng. Hahaha. And this wasn't a problem when I was just serving myself and sometimes family members, but now that I'm at college where I have a lot more people over more frequently (and I'm now the tea hostess for my dorm! Strangely enough, this is a legitimate position hahaha), so I want to show them as many sides of tea as I can, which means I've come to need a sheng.
Right before I left Seattle I did a little bit of sheng searching. I went over to Healeo since McIntosh Tea is more or less located there as far as I understand it. There I found one really REALLY great little sheng that I absolutely loved. It's hard to get me to actually buy anything though. I typically need at least 3 days before making any purchase over $15, and honestly it was just a little small for me and felt a little too high quality for something that I was probably going to go through fairly quickly in college. So I passed it by and kept on searching. Obviously I did not find my sheng before I left Seattle. But that was also a space issue. I already had so little space, there was really not a good possibility of me being able to take much more with me. Hahaha. So I figured I'd search for something in real life, and then think about what I'd tasted, and then maybe buy it online once I'd gotten into South Hadley. This didn't really happen either, so again, I was left without a sheng.
But when I stopped by Tea Trekker, I found a really nice sized sheng that was within my price range and actually even older than the shus I have! So happily, I purchased this cute little 2007 Rong's Mengku (勐库戎
Honestly, I'm a bit surprised now that I look at the other teas by the Mengku tea factory that I liked this one. Though maybe that's not so surprising, I don't know. But either way, this is apparently the company of my absolute worst ever experience with a pu-erh. Hahahaha. I think it was the 2008 Mu Ye Chun "99801" (but don't hold me to it!) that I tried from Uwajimaya (it was the 2nd one I'd ever bought! Go easy on me! Haha) and it was HORRIBLE. Ugh. I don't want to think about it at all. It was so bad. Seriously, let's not go there right now. Hahaha.
So of course now that I have this sheng, I have to try it out and share it! So I made it while making my basil crazed split pea soup, which I didn't really get to eat with it because it took freaking two hours to cook and by then I'd given up on eating that soup and just ate some leftover udon and drank my tea. Hahaha.
I was really surprised by the first brew, because it was a lot smoother and sweeter than I expected. In fact, I really didn't consider it to have that much taste at all. But it did smell wonderful! Haha. But then, in the second brew, helloooooo sheng! Yup. That's when it finally woke up. I don't think I washed it well enough maybe. Either way, the next few brews were really delicious. I got at least 3 more good ones before I started to need to keep it in for longer, and eventually I got I think 6 brews out of it before I decided it was done.
Those 4 after the first one were wonderful. This was a mellower sheng, but it still had a what I will always associate with as tobacco zippy spicy flavor that I really enjoy. I don't like smoking though! Once I tried to convince my mother to make a bet with me that if I could go through high school without doing drugs then she'd have to give me a few hundred dollars. She laughed and said, "Yeah right, like you'd do drugs." And it's true. Hahaha. I don't need anything to make me more outgoing or happy so there's no desire to use them and adding on the fact that I like using my lungs too much makes it even less likely that I'd ever do anything like that. But I still like that smell and taste in my tea! Haha. One of the girls I was sharing it with described it as smelling like henna too! I was really surprised, but it makes sense because henna usually has tea tree oil in it (from the melaleuca plant, not camellia haha) which has the same sort of spicy kick to it that this did. It was also slightly sweet and reminded me of spring sunshine.
I actually like it so much that I'm considering getting one to let age. But I'll keep drinking this one for now and we'll just see where that goes.
Now comes a big question, should I try this one out in my Yixing pot or not?
Monday, March 12, 2012
Shhh! L-theanine post coming soon still.
Why does college keep me so busy? If it's not homework it's events events events! I really do love it, but it's a little overwhelming and definitely exhausting since I keep getting so involved in so many areas. Today for example, in addition to having a quiz in Biology, I also have to write a paper due as soon as I can finish it, I am going to lunch with a researcher from Duke University who's studying the evolution of speech looking at humans and birds, I'm going to his lecture later on in the day, I'm attending a calculus study session, and then I have a student government meeting with the school president in the evening, not to mention I have calculus and biology and history homework to do (not all due Tuesday though, but it's a lot of work so I have to get started early)!
Oh, and I forgot to mention that I've started doing henna again! I'm trying to save up money to go to Japan next winter. Money is so hard to save as a college student, but I really want to go, and I've been wanting to do henna again lately, so here's one way of making money then! Did you notice the mehndi inspired designs in the background? I really hope you did because I worked very hard to develop a tiger and a camellia flower in mehndi style! It's not easy making up your own designs, especially when they're abstract instead of realistic. I have a lot of respect for Picasso now days to be honest, more so than even my favorite painter (who's name I've forgotten anyways haha). It could be just me, but I think that doing something abstractly is much harder than doing something realistically since you can't really work within the guidelines presented for you by nature.
Also, I need to mention that yesterday was the 1 year anniversary of Japan's triple disaster. Japan is still obviously facing very difficult times, and it's only going to get harder since people are avoiding traveling there with the nuclear contamination scare. I can't ask you to risk your health's without doing your own research first, but please at least still look to the south of Japan as a safe and amazing place to go. Kagoshima prefecture in Kyushu is where I stayed when I lived there, and you have no idea how beautiful it is until you see it with your own eyes. There is an amazing aquarium there, as well as the cool volcano, Sakurajima, and the scenes from the movie Princess Mononoke were based off of the mountains and forests there. The black pig ramen is delicious, and you haven't really lived until you've tried a shirokuma. So please support Japan in it's recovery and don't go out of your way to avoid it!
Oh, and I forgot to mention that I've started doing henna again! I'm trying to save up money to go to Japan next winter. Money is so hard to save as a college student, but I really want to go, and I've been wanting to do henna again lately, so here's one way of making money then! Did you notice the mehndi inspired designs in the background? I really hope you did because I worked very hard to develop a tiger and a camellia flower in mehndi style! It's not easy making up your own designs, especially when they're abstract instead of realistic. I have a lot of respect for Picasso now days to be honest, more so than even my favorite painter (who's name I've forgotten anyways haha). It could be just me, but I think that doing something abstractly is much harder than doing something realistically since you can't really work within the guidelines presented for you by nature.
Also, I need to mention that yesterday was the 1 year anniversary of Japan's triple disaster. Japan is still obviously facing very difficult times, and it's only going to get harder since people are avoiding traveling there with the nuclear contamination scare. I can't ask you to risk your health's without doing your own research first, but please at least still look to the south of Japan as a safe and amazing place to go. Kagoshima prefecture in Kyushu is where I stayed when I lived there, and you have no idea how beautiful it is until you see it with your own eyes. There is an amazing aquarium there, as well as the cool volcano, Sakurajima, and the scenes from the movie Princess Mononoke were based off of the mountains and forests there. The black pig ramen is delicious, and you haven't really lived until you've tried a shirokuma. So please support Japan in it's recovery and don't go out of your way to avoid it!
Saturday, March 3, 2012
Midterms are over!
Yay! With my last Macroeconomics midterm today, my midterms are now over! I feel so accomplished! Now I can finally do that scientific paper review for you guys! It's either going to be on caffeine content in tea (because I am unsatisfied with source citing on other resources about this), or L-theanine, my favorite amino acid ever.
But more importantly, my fairness pitcher finally arrived today! It took a while because I bought it from China on ebay. I would have bought it locally, but I don't know where any local reasonably priced and quality tea shops are in the western Massachusetts area, so ebay was my next best choice. Please keep in mind that I'm also a very poor college student (who probably unfortunately loves tea more than money). Either way, it's really funny because I'm glad I know Japanese! Since all the care instructions for it are in Japanese on the box. Haha!
Also, I finally got to try Gyokuro brewed by ice! MMMMMMMMM. This is why I love Gyokuro so much. Oh my goodness. It was like walking into paradise. Or rather like paradise slapping me in the face. It's such a shocking taste, really. Haha. But sooooo gooooooooood. And my friends really loved it too. ^^ You know though, this was actually difficult to do as a college student, because of the problem of ICE. Haha. I'm really lucky my roommate has a mini fridge, but that really doesn't provide me with a lot of ice! And ice is horrible about absorbing scents and things, so there was a moment of panic before I knew my roommate's mini fridge had an icebox when I thought my only option would be the communal fridge's ice, which had BROWN THINGS in it. Why would ice have brown things stuck in it??? What do these college students do??? Hahaha. But really. It was extremely disturbing. But then I found out my roommate's mini fridge could make ice, and the rest is now history.
But more importantly, my fairness pitcher finally arrived today! It took a while because I bought it from China on ebay. I would have bought it locally, but I don't know where any local reasonably priced and quality tea shops are in the western Massachusetts area, so ebay was my next best choice. Please keep in mind that I'm also a very poor college student (who probably unfortunately loves tea more than money). Either way, it's really funny because I'm glad I know Japanese! Since all the care instructions for it are in Japanese on the box. Haha!
Also, I finally got to try Gyokuro brewed by ice! MMMMMMMMM. This is why I love Gyokuro so much. Oh my goodness. It was like walking into paradise. Or rather like paradise slapping me in the face. It's such a shocking taste, really. Haha. But sooooo gooooooooood. And my friends really loved it too. ^^ You know though, this was actually difficult to do as a college student, because of the problem of ICE. Haha. I'm really lucky my roommate has a mini fridge, but that really doesn't provide me with a lot of ice! And ice is horrible about absorbing scents and things, so there was a moment of panic before I knew my roommate's mini fridge had an icebox when I thought my only option would be the communal fridge's ice, which had BROWN THINGS in it. Why would ice have brown things stuck in it??? What do these college students do??? Hahaha. But really. It was extremely disturbing. But then I found out my roommate's mini fridge could make ice, and the rest is now history.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)