Contests and tea buying and travel...oh my!

Hi tea friends!

I've been receiving lots of announcements about tea events and contests that I wanted to share with you.

First, a couple of reminders. You can now find Tea Pages on Twitter. Follow along with my 140 characters of semi-lucid rambling! Also, there is now a Facebook page for the Tea Memories anthology. Search for "Tea Memories" to find me. I'm getting ready for the Fall release of the book. Also, in order to better serve your voracious tea reading needs, I'll be spending the next few weeks updating the blog list AND recreating the Tea Pages website. I love getting organized. 2011 is going to be a great year!

Now, in no particular order:
TEA BUYING:
Our friends at Indonique have launched a new business model. Instead of offering a catalog of available teas, they've created an auction. Each week a different tea, selected by owner George Constance, will go up for bid. Sounds like a really fun way to discover something new.

EVENTS:
The Mount Vernon Hotel Museum & Garden, in honor of National Hot Tea Month, is hosting a lecture on the history of tea. Details follow:

"History of Tea"
Thursday, January 27^th, at 6:30 pm
Mount Vernon Hotel Museum & Garden
421 East 61^st Street
New York, NY 10128

Certified English Tea Master and author Elizabeth Knight will lead a captivating program on the history of tea in America. According to Knight, tea is as individual as the culture from which it’s produced, and this presentation will explore that notion from an American perspective.

For tickets or additional information visit www.mvhm.org or call 212-838-6878.

CONTESTS:
* TEEKANNE Herbal Wellness Tea is hosting a contest - “My TEEKANNE Moment." Write about your "TEEKANNE moment," in 200 words or less and provide a photo to accompany the piece. DEADLINE: March 31, 2011. An online entry form can be found at www.favoritetea.com,

along with contest details and guidelines. PRIZES: One entry from each of the 3 categories (Energizing, Relaxing and Soothing) will win a $5,000 American Express gift card, an autographed picture of TEEKANE brand ambassador Steffi Graf and 50 coupons each good for a FREE box of tea. Six runners-up will receive a TEEKANNE tea chest filled with an assortment of TEEKANNE teas, an autographed picture of Steffi Graf, and 25 coupons each good for a FREE box of tea. TEEKANNE website

* Bigelow Tea is celebrating Hot Tea Month with a Win Tea For A Year Sweepstakes. (The winner chooses the tea.) The sweepstakes is hosted on their Facebook page at www.Facebook.com/bigelowtea.

You can visit Bigelow Tea at Bigelow Tea website

TRAVEL:
Wild Qi is planning a May trip to explore "Tea, Taoist culture and Qigong." Travellers will stay at the Zen Sky Heart Temple and Master You will be teaching about the spirit of tea. Tea master Zi Lin Lin, who has recently published a book in China on Wuyi Mountain teas, will be teaching various aspects of tea including harvesting, processing methods, tea tasting and much more. Every morning organ and meridian Qigong and Tai Chi will be taught. There will also be hiking at a Da Hong Pao plantation, riding down the 9 River Bend on a bamboo raft, and more.
Details are available here.

MORE TO READ:

Artist and writer Marianne Coyne is announcing a blog site for her new series, The Knittington Fairies - fairies who knit and also take time for tea. Check it out at: Knittington Fairies.

Winter tea

I had a falling out with winter at some point in my life, but I think we've finally made up.

I grew up in Maine so when I say "winter," I really do mean winter. Snow, snow, snow, and a little more snow and wind to top things off. Ironically, I didn't ski. I might be the only person to have grown up in the state of Maine who has never skied...Except my brother. He didn't ski either. But I still loved winter. There was sledding and hot cocoa and building snowmen and snow forts. There were snow days with no school - time to read a whole book, curled up on the couch under a blanket. Even when I went off to college there was still the fun of late night snowball fights and sliding on cafeteria trays down the Presidents' Lawn. Then "adulthood" took over. Snow meant white knuckle driving on commutes to work or standing for longer and longer times waiting for the commuter rail. It meant shoveling and canceled plans. Blah. Then I had kids...

Now it's back to the winter of my childhood. Yesterday we ended up with about 16" of snow. I went out with the older two and we played and made snow angels and laughed and laid in the snow looking up at the gray skies and the tree branches that looked black as night. It was fantastic. And, of course, I ended the day with tea. It was the most wonderful cup of tea that I've had in awhile -- not because of what it was, but because of how it was experienced.


Photo 1: The 2 older kids explore the snow.
Photo 2: After we opened the garage door.


Before my baby sabbatical, I received a huge collection of samples from Boston Tea Company
that I have not been able to review for you. I want to thank them for the samples and for their patience!

I don't have my whole big photo shoot for these because, well, I figure you're almost photo'd out on this post. But here's what I think:

1) Just a point of fact: The Boston Tea Company is in Hackensack, NJ. As a resident of the greater Boston area, this amused me. It really doesn't mean anything. It just made me smile.

2) Bombay Chai - I noticed on their website that they listed this under their Flavored Black Teas. It made me think about the fact that most companies have a separate Chai category. Actually, in some ways, listing it with the black teas makes a great deal of sense. Their chai is an Indian black tea with cinnamon, cardamom, anise, ginger, and cloves. It is a nice basic chai blend. I didn't pick up the anise flavor, but certainly recognized the traditional cinnamon, cloves, and cardamom. I tend to favor a slightly more spicy blend - I felt the flavors were a little muted when I brewed it in my traditional way. (I usually put the chai tea blend in a pot of milk and bring to a near boil, then let it steep for five minutes or so and sweeten with honey.) This one was more flavorful when I steeped as a traditional tea and then added a bit of sugar and a small amount of milk. It was certainly an enjoyable chai.

3) Earl Grey Citrus - I must confess that I've been ruined for all Earl Greys by a couple of absolute stand outs. Many just strike me as either lackluster or too flowery for my taste. I've had a few that have a particularly strong bergamot flavor that have been simply outstanding, but generally, Earl Grey isn't that interesting. Now that I have expressed my bias, I will say that this Earl Grey is better than most. The additional citrus flavor adds some complexity. (Bergamot is also a citrus, but the added citrus in this tea is more like an orange or grapefruity flavor.) I've actually enjoyed this particular Earl Grey on a few occasions and I will definitely keep it around for guests who are looking for something interesting.

4) Pineapple Paradise Green - This one had me worried. I'm kind of a purist about green teas. (Boy, I'm beginning to show just how picky I can be.) If you're going to flavor a green, you'd better do it really well or don't do it at all. I wasn't sure if I thought I pineapple green would work. This was a pleasant tea made of Chinese green with pineapple and some lemon peel. I really didn't pick up much of a green tea flavor but the pineapple was quite nice. It actually reminded me more of a tisane than a green tea. I think it would be pretty wonderful iced with some fresh orange slices.

5) Ginger Peach Black - This is a highly flavored black tea. It actually reminded me a great deal of the Republic of Tea's ginger peach which I used to enjoy in my early tea drinking days. It's quite sweet and combines Indian and China black teas. I'll likely be passing this along -- a bit to flavored for my taste -- but certainly tastes as described.

Believe it or not, there were other samples as well, but this is what I've gotten to for now. Thanks again to Boston Tea Company for their generosity.

Best wishes to all of you. It feels great to be back in blogging mode.

And, for those who asked (and those who didn't) here's a photo of my newly enlarged family.