Saturday TeaRoom 4/04/09 Spring is in the air?

[Salsero]

Wow, those are eye-popping flowers, Chamekke, and I am very curious to learn more about that tea you bought.

[murrius]

Raining and raining in New York. April showers!

I continue with the Yunnan Gold Tip tea. For some reason, in contrast to the first day I tried it, I'm getting many rich infusions!

I don't understand why this happens. I wish I could remember the magic words I must have uttered over the tea!

Oh, how I completely relate to what you've said. Tea is such a mystery!

[murrius]

[quote="chamekke"]



I second Salseros comment. That is a fantastic photo!

[entropyembrace]

Snow in April. It could be worse. Snow in May?

I went with the Tie Guan Yin this morning, but have since shifted to a 1996 Menghai 8582 puerh. This stuff makes me quite happy.

I remember once when I was little snow in July...I thought it was flower petals at first!

[Chip]

At a Korean restuarant for lunch, we were served a "tea" that I thought was corn tea, our Korean friend thought was barley tea, turned out it was corn and barley tea.

Woah coincidence! Today I persuaded my husband to try his first Korean restaurant meal - a big hit, incidentally. The accompanying tea was tasty, but the waitress seemed unable to explain what it was (I thought it was corn tea), so she gave me a tea bag label and suggested I get more of the same at a nearby Korean grocery. Once I was there, I was pointed to the green tea. So, I bought some (bagged), just to see if it's the same. The experiments will begin tonight...

I bought some roasted corn while at one of the Korean markets, corn tea will pour here!!!

Chamekke, is that a Kwanzan (sp?) Cherry with Pendulous flower clusters ... ?

[murrius]

Spring? Is that the phenomenon where the snow stops falling and flowers bloom? Where I am no green thing has dared show its face yet. It snowed two days ago! Having said that, the snow is indeed melting and I was out doing a little yard work today and had to take off my jacket cos I was too warm. There is hope I suppose.

Today has been a great tea day. This morning I had multiple steeps of a wonderful fukamushi from Den's and a mid day chai tea.

[Chip]

Second attempt of Tenkei Hana organic matcha from Yuuki-Cha with my wife. A little less matcha this time, and I think it was much more balanced and very good!

[daughteroftheKing]

Sort of spring here, but not really. We had 2 or 3 weeks of 50's-70's during the day, then a week and a half ago the much-needed spring snows started. Another snowstorm was forecast for today, but it went north skipping us (yea!). Today has been horribly windy with biting cold and frozen sparkles of moisture in the air (beautiful in the sunlight).
Opposite of the old saying, March came in like a lamb and out like a lion.

My crocus and mountain tulip leaves have started to break through the ground. This is their first spring and I'm looking forward to seeing what survived.

Gosh, Omega, sounds bad where you are.

Tea: Morning started with reliable Darjeeling 22, then for the 2nd & 3rd steeps added some peach flavored black and put on ice to take to rehearsal and afternoon errands. This evening enjoying White Darjeeling.

[Intuit]

Entropy mentioned having snow earlier in the week. We also had the fluffly stuff on Tuesday, snowed for a couple of hours, trying to accumulate, but no show, ground was already too warm. By late afternoon, it had stopped and the sun was out.

Today we hit 55 with sunny skies, not too shabby. They're predicting 70 by Tuesday. Maybe.

Sencha this afternoon. Wish I had some matcha.

[chamekke]

Chamekke, is that a Kwanzan (sp?) Cherry with Pendulous flower clusters ... ?

Yes! You have a good eye. Kwanzan they are

They are actually about three weeks late this year, due to an abnormally cold winter. We're only just seeing the Yoshino cherries now:

[chamekke]

Wow, those are eye-popping flowers, Chamekke, and I am very curious to learn more about that tea you bought.

Thank yoiu for the compliment on the photo {blush}.

According to Wikipedia, Dunggule cha (둥굴레차) is made from the dried root of Solomon's Seal. When I went to the Korean grocery and showed the proprietor this tea bag label:



... he pointed me to this box of tea by Dong Suh:



The English on the box says only that it's "Dong Suh's Solomon's Seal Tea", but the Korean-language label explains that it is actually 80% Solomon's Seal and 20% roasted rice. I'm still not sure who makes the tea sold in the restaurant (first photo) and whether that one is made purely of Solomon's Seal or contains other ingredients. (I found another Solomon's Seal tea online that is 82% Solomon's Seal and 18% roasted rice, so I guess that is not an uncommon combination/ratio.)

Anyway, it's a pleasant, mild taste - although richer in aroma than flavour. Definitely belongs to the roasted-grain family of tisanes! According to what I've been able to find out so far, dunggule cha is supposed to be good for high blood pressure, diabetes, digestion, menopause, "general debility", and presumably lots of other ailments. I'm guessing that the "digestion" part is why it's served at the restaurant

[Dreamer]

Yes, yes, yes...spring is definitely here...but it tends to keep teasing us...one beautiful afternoon, then cold, wind and clouds...one almost painfully beautiful morning then the temp falls in the afternoon and we have sleet/freezing rain overnight. I've taken to wishing for two pretty days in a row. Grass is green and growing FAST, but it finding a decent day to mow has been a challenge!

Today was very nice...high 60s and a bit windy. Tomorrow it is supposed to be cold and cloudy and snowy on Monday.

It appears that our spring here is going to be all strung out...I love it when LOTS of things bloom at the same time, like an explosion of spring, but this year is not going to be like that...we had crocus, then forsythia, then the pear trees, then daffodils, now a few redbuds. Lilacs look like they may be soon and there is no sign of dogwoods blooming yet. (I really like it when the dogwoods and redbuds bloom at the same time...they tend to grow wild in the woods around here and they look so nice together.)

Tea for today: only one cup of Ceylon and lots of restaurant iced tea (at a baby shower).

Thanks for all the beautiful pictures!!! Sweeeet!

Have fun,
Dreamer

[jazz88]

Nice photos everyone! Interesting read about the Korean tea. We used to have a Korean restaurant just a few block from where I live but it was so expensive that I never tried it and now it's out of business ...

It's a very cold and windy day here in NYC. But what do I know about spring anyway – I spend all my time before my computer

Had some Earl Grey and Sencha Premier today.

[GT500Driver]

I wish we had some ethnic stores where I live besides just Mexican stores, but we don't....

Had some Red Diamond All Natural Black Tea with my dinner... Put some cream and sugar in it, was decent.

Just finished a third steep of that Assam Melody, and I think that'll be it for today...

Also been watching Bottles, Blends, & Brews nd Adagio TeaV all day when on the computer. Good stuff