Hello!

Hi Tea Lovers!!




How have you been? It's been awhile since I've updated you all. I currently live in California, however I'm moving to my home state of Michigan at the end of the month. If only I could have moved in the Spring- moving in the wintertime is very unpleasant. Here in San Francisco it's been very rainy lately. Nobody likes moving heavy items in the rain. No offense to Californians, but they really are not good drivers - add rain and it's a disaster!!




I still drink tea. There's a place in Burlingame, California that my boyfriend and I go to a lot and it's a beautiful tea house that does afternoon tea with traditional tea sandwiches, scones, and lovely Madelines. I usually get Black vanilla bean tea with milk and sugar with cucumber sandwiches.


Oh, before I forget to tell you. I have a new promo code for Canton Tea Co. You can use my promo code as many times as you want for 10% off your entire order. Don't worry- if the products you want from Canton are on sale, the promo code for 10% off still works!!!

Leah2017 is the new 10% off promo code for my Tea blog readers!!!!!!  Get some amazing tea from Canton Tea Co today. PS- I love their Matcha- I had a matcha latte today.


What is your favorite go to winter tea? Do you ever have tea lattes? I love a good tea latte in the winter time.


Have you seen what I'm doing with my life recently? I made a business out of my artwork. I'm having a blast. If you like art, please visit my page. Here's the link. Below is a painting I did called "Viva"

Thanks for stopping by!

Leah

Tea art and Lovejoy's Tea Room in San Francisco

Hi tea lovers!


This weekend my boyfriend and I went to Lovejoy's Tea Room in San Francisco for a rare treat. I discovered the tea room online by accident a few weeks ago  and wanted to go, but noticed there were no open reservations for 3 weeks. We put our names in and the day finally arrived, we drove up to the city from the peninsula and got really lucky with the parking and walked right into a tea wonderland. Every space in the building was decorated with tea related items. I must have seen 300 teacups in that room. The decor was amazing, but the best was yet to come!!

I ordered vanilla lavender black tea and oh my goodness it was amazing. In fact, I can't stop thinking about it. As well as the tea I had the "savory tea" which includes two finger sandwiches and a scone with cream and jam, the good ole English way. My boyfriend was not impressed when I put cream on both sides. Apparently, in England you only put cream on one side, then jam on the other and you put the two halves together like a sandwich.

The sandwiches I ordered were probably the best sandwiches I've ever had in my life. I'm not exaggerating, either. I had coronation chicken- which is also a common British sandwich made of chicken in mild curry mayo. If you're American and reading this you probably just thought "gross." That's what I thought too, until I tried it when I was living in Wales and I became slightly obsessed. The combination of that, lettuce and soft bread is absolutely delicious!

I also had a salmon, cream cheese and caper finger sandwich and those were really excellent as well. My boyfriend had horseradish and roast beef and turkey with English mustard. I didn't try the turkey, but the roast beef and horseradish was pretty good.

After we came home from the tea room I felt really inspired so I decided to paint a tea pot. It turned out so well that I think I'm going to put it on my etsy store. After I painted this I decided that I wanted to do more tea related art in the future. What is something you'd like to be painted? Let me know what you think of my painting!! PS if you like the painting below, you can buy it Here!!

Tea Review: Canton Tea's Green Dragon + Discount

Hello tea friends!

If you haven't already noticed, during the month of May I've been absent. My graduate degree is almost coming to an end and I had 3 papers to write, totaling at 12,000 words. You can bet that I devoted all my time to my studies. Although my blog had to suffer, it's for a good cause. In the next couple months I'll be writing my dissertation, but since I'll be managing my time well, my blog will still be updated like it used to be. How about we review this amazing green tea blend from Canton Tea now.

I was really excited when I opened the bag, because so many amazing scents overwhelmed my senses. What really stood out to me was the citrus and I love citrusy tea. Now, this tea is sencha from Hunan, China and once I opened it I was really excited to see the giant pieces of lemongrass and lemon peels. Lemon + Green tea = love.

As you can see, all the individual ingredients in the blend are really big, generous helpings. You can clearly see the tea leaves, the lemongrass, licorice root, lemon peel and little bits of ginger. I was hesitant because I despise ginger, but I honestly was willing to give it a try. If it was just ginger and green tea I would have had serious reservations about it.

As you can see, in the photos above you can see the tea steeping and then the tea steeped and ready to drink. It's important not to use just boiled water, because with green tea it's really delicate and if you use water that's too hot, it will compromise the taste. I usually boil my kettle and let the water sit for a few minutes so it can cool. It only needs 2-3 minutes of steeping time. This was a 2 minute steep.

Like I said, I was nervous about the ginger in the tea, but it was extremely complementary to the other ingredients in the tea. It worked in harmony with the licorice root, (another thing I don't care for, but it worked well) lemongrass, lemon peel and lemon oil. Basically, a lemony goodness drink that is perfect for summer. It's a very light tea, which I appreciate because I love a light green tea, typically. I do like Matcha, but I struggled with the Matcha challenge because it's quite strong. This Sencha is very light and the citrus ingredients make the taste really lovely. It's also noteworthy that this tea is not astringent at all. It kind of reminds me of an oolong, which is great because oolong is my favorite. I rate this tea 5/5 stars because there's not a thing I would change. It's just so refreshing and well-made. 

If you remember, I do have a partnership with Canton Tea. If you use the 10% off discount: Leah2016 at checkout, I get 10% commission of your order and you get 10% off your order, which is win win. It's not much, but it helps. I'm happy I partnered with them because their tea has an ethnical certification and they get their tea straight from the source, making it socially and environmentally friendly. 

Thanks for reading. 

Leah

Iced Tea: Recipes for Spring!

10 Teas for 10 moods! An infographic