TeaChat

Hello all,

Been lurking for a few weeks as I've gotten more interested in loose leaf tea... figured I'd finally register.

Lately I've been getting more into black tea and starting wondering about blends. I mostly buy my tea from teastore.ca (in person) since it's close to my office and I can just take a short walk and have someone help me find teas I'd be interested in.

The store sells several blends, but I get bored easily and like to switch a lot, so it dawned on me that I could buy different teas and blend them myself (or have them on their own).

Any particular favorites in terms of blacks (or even flowers, spices, greens, whites, etc.) that seem to go well together? Any suggestions? Proportions?

I was wondering about this myself. Not that that helps you...oh, well. If anything, it bumps up the post.

I like to mix flavored teas occasionally. My favorite is chocolate tea with cinnamon tea. Sort of a Mexican chocolate.

Some folks like Chai and Pumpkin tea -- never tried it, so can't vouch for it. Gingerbread and chocolate is another favorite.

I've never mixed fruit teas, but I suppose you could do it.

Ratio? Try half and half and then refine it.

Sky, your chocolate cinnamon sounds good. May have to try that with breakfast this morning. Do you use sweet cinnamon or hot cinnamon (like H&S hot cin spice)?

henley wrote:Sky, your chocolate cinnamon sounds good. May have to try that with breakfast this morning. Do you use sweet cinnamon or hot cinnamon (like H&S hot cin spice)?

I prefer sweet cinnamon, but Adagio's cinnamon is more along the hot side. So, I do 1 1/2 tsp chocolate to 1/2 cinnamon for 20 oz water.

I stumbled on a way to bring out the chocolate flavor. Steep 7 minutes in boiling water and remove the tea. Pour about 6 oz in a mug. Add 2 oz of boiling/hot water to that and about 6 oz of water to the rest of the tea.

I know this is odd but it seemed to work. Let me know how that tastes.

We welcome you!

Lately I've been mixing some Ceylon (Courtlodge) and Yunnan (Ying Ming) about half-half (slightly more Ceylon) for my morning tea and I'm enjoying this mix quite a lot. While the Courtlodge is good on it's own, I'm still not sure about the Yunnan (maybe I need to try some Yunnan Gold) -- together, however, they are great.

I think I'll go buy some Assam and Nilgiri later on and play around with those too.

Chai and Pumpkin sounds like something i'll have to look into as well.

exm wrote:Any particular favorites in terms of blacks (or even flowers, spices, greens, whites, etc.) that seem to go well together? Any suggestions? Proportions?

One of my staple teas is a black blend sold by http://www.indigo-tea.com called Mt. Everest Blend which is a blend of Assam and Yunnan. I love the complexity of this blend and usually have one or two cups every morning.[/url]