Monday, August 6, 2012

Celebration Tea

It is a stunningly gorgeous morning.  The birds are singing, the sun is shining on rain sparkled flowers and it is cool!!!!!!  All my windows and doors are open to catch the breezes, the cats are stalking mice, the front garden smells delicious and the compost piles are cooking.  Asters and golden rod are carpeting the fields with purple and gold and my tomatoes are almost ripe enough to pick.  Hooray for today in all its glory!

I am celebrating with a special tea from Steepster.  It comes from Verdant Tea and is Laoshan Black tea.  This tea comes from the small 15 acre farm of the He family on Laoshan Mountain, which is already famous for their Laoshan Green tea.  The leaves are black , slender, twisted. Their dry aroma is first chocolate, then autumn forest, nuts and dry or drying leaves. 

I brew it for 3 minutes with boiling water.  The scent now has shifted to a strong, oakiness with some chocolate, but it is also sweet.  The liquor is a pale medium amber.  It feels silky and it has a rich, sweet taste of chocolate with an overlay of acorns and oak.  It's a lovely tea and I am going to get more.  This one is special.

Oh, speaking of acorns, we can also celebrate the summer acorn drop, which occurred this week.  That will make room for bigger ones in the fall.  it is not nearly as abundant as it was last year.  But this has been a drier and hotter summer, on the whole.

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