I Like My Tea With Honey

One of the many artisans at Ballenberg museum. She is bringing
bread "to market"


Owego, NY is supposedly the"Coolest Small Town" in America. I'm not sure who says so, but it's fun to know, as this is now my hometown. We are fortunate in having several places in town where you can order well-made hot or iced tea and 2 merchants of loose leaf tea. One of the latter is the Briar Patch, where the tea is not only loose, but blended in Owego. I bought a few samples yesterday and today I am trying one. I have one complaint, however. The shop is quite small and filled with scented things and I noticed that when I got the tea home, the bags all smelled of the shop. It is probably impossible to do anything about it, given the size constraints. The teas themselves did not seem to be affected.


This delightful tea is Honey Lemon. When I opened the sample, I was really bowled over by the scent - wonderful wildflower honey with enough lemon to keep your feet on the ground. Just an amazing aroma! The leaves are mostly black, but some look green and there are chunks of lemon peel as well. I could hardly wait. I was rewarded for my patience, such as it was, with wonderful flavor of honey and lemon with some floral overtones. The tea was really smooth and very full feeling with a slight tang from the lemon, but no bitterness, which can be a problem with lemon peel. The taste lingers just long enough to be really appreciated, but not too long.

My only problem with this tea is that as it cooled it became far too sweet for me. You sweet tea folks would probably love it.

If you want to see some fancy tea pouring, go on over to http://tavalon.com/blog and scroll down to the second entry and click on the picture. If you want to learn to do this, I would suggest you do it outside. I know I am too much of a klutz to attempt it, but I will do what I do best - appreciate.