Archive for the 'My Tea Life' Category

Picking Black Tea

Monday, August 9th, 2010

On the second morning of our Black Tea Workshop, we  went up to some of the Assam tea fields in the Yu Chr area to pick tea.  It’s in a very unassuming area – just a narrow concrete road winding into the hills. There wasn’t even room to turn the car around!

Gettin’ Our Kicks on Route 66

Monday, August 9th, 2010

       No, not that Route 66! On our trip to make Taiwan Black Tea with Tsai Lao Shr (see Making Black Tea), we stayed at a small bed & breakfast in  Yu Chr Township, near Sun Moon Lake. Since the big earthquake in 1999 (I was here for that!), the area has struggled to recover, [...]

Making Black Tea

Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010

Master Tsai offered me space in one of his Nantou tea-making workshops, so of course I jumped at the chance. We rode the high-speed train to Taichung, then by car to Yu Chr, a black tea growing area around the north end of Sun Moon Lake.  The first day consisted of actually producing our own [...]

Formosa Garden Tea Room

Tuesday, May 25th, 2010

To those of my loyal readers who’ve been wondering what happened to me the past few months, thanks for your concern. No, I wasn’t on an extended tea-picking trip to Nantou (although reports on that are coming soon), and no, I wasn’t flattened by a city bus running a light on Chung Shan N. road (almost – [...]

Organic Taiwan Teas Now Available

Wednesday, January 27th, 2010

Teaguy is very happy to let you know he now has his own line of organic teas from Taiwan available through this site. You can check out the Mystic Grove Teas under the ‘Tea’ heading on the left side of the page there.   We are also going to carry ChaTei brand teas, and the [...]

2009 Zoo Exhibition

Thursday, November 5th, 2009

Ran across these photos the other day, and realized I hadn’t posted this up from last June! The Mucha Farmer’s Association sponsored an event to showcase the area’s agricultural goods, so of course Aliang and I were there representing Tie Kuan Yin (Iron Goddess) and Bao Jong teas.

2009 Spring TKY Competition (Pt 2)

Thursday, August 27th, 2009

After getting the tea samples ready and delivering them to the Mucha Farmer’s Association offices (see Part I), it was simply a matter of hanging out while the judges made their decision.

2009 Spring TKY Competition (Pt 1)

Monday, August 10th, 2009

I recently (actually, several months ago – hey, I’ve been busy!)  helped Aliang get his TKYs ready for the Spring Competition. I had stopped by for an after-tutorial cup of the world’s favorite brew, and ended up bagging tea samples until 2:00 in the morning (which is one of the things I do love about [...]

‘Spooning’ Tea – Taste-testing in a nutshell

Sunday, August 9th, 2009

I had an email recently from a friend in the US. He was looking for sets of aroma cups to use for tea comparisons, and was asking me if I could find him some. I told him that, for convenience, we usually use ceramic spoons to compare tea, and that gave me the inspiration for this [...]

Jong Tz Party (Sticky Rice Dumplings)

Friday, June 19th, 2009

Well, another Dragon Boat Festival has come and gone, and I’m sorry to be so late posting up on it, but I’m also behind on a lot of other posts now, as well (long story).  At any rate, instead of rehashing what I posted last year, you can just go check  out   Dragon Boat Festival for [...]