Steep Stories

Tag: Tea

  • Confessions of a Tea Cake Artist

    This all started because of a tea cake. No, not that kind of tea cake. An actual cake. The kind you eat; not drink. Instagram has been a useful tool for several reasons. One, it put me in contact with new tea people across the world—some personal, others professional. But it has also helped me…

  • Attack of the Adorable Tea Vloggers

    One of the biggest challenges to tea blogger productivity . . . is the Internet. Yes, all of it. While social media is the biggest time-suck—keeping me away from what little writery discipline I possess—YouTube is a close second. My addiction to that streaming site is as old as my tea habit. However, there weren’t…

  • The Harendong Estate

    Four years ago, I “discovered” the Harendong estate. I put “discovered” in air-quotes because . . . it’d been there for eight years by the time I ran across it. Perhaps I should say, it was new to me. They had a booth at the 2013 World Tea Expo—under their Banten Tea brand—and the thing…

  • Should “Tea” Be a Safe Word?

    Let’s talk about tea, oversharing, and consent. Of course, in order to do this I will have to—y’know—overshare. So, continuing past this point, or clicking the “Read More” button, will be considered a form of consent. Understood? Are we all on the same page? Great, let’s begin.

  • Tea Will Change the World

    In the not-too-distant past, I was reading one of my fictional stories to a friend. He stopped me within the first paragraph and asked a very simple question, “What are you trying to say?” Not as in, what was I trying to say in the story, but rather, what was I trying to say as…

  • The Parts of Portland’s Tea Culture that The Oregonian Missed.

    In the summer of 2015, the unthinkable happened. I scheduled an interview with an honest-to-Lu-Yu newspaper. Our local rag, The Oregonian, to be precise. They wanted to talk to me in my natural habitat, as a tea drinker. The reason? A soon-to-be-established feature on Portland’s tea culture. Lauren “Mizuba Tea Co.” Purvis recommended they talk to me,…

  • Effie’s Tea Offerings

    Australian Tea Week, Day 2: “Effie’s Tea Offerings” This is Effie Gidakos . . . She’s a tea nerd, like I am. She even takes to social media (and local radio) about her love of tea. She’s also obsessed with Christmas (obviously). And—per this week’s theme—she’s also Australian.

  • Tea Tales and Mocktails

    Two weeks back, I received an invite to go here: Okay, I go to both Smith Tea locations quite a bit on my own, but this was a special occasion. Like last year, this was their media-only holiday pre-release party. They were going to be showcasing their upcoming blends, partnerships, and limited edition holiday offerings.…

  • Hugs, High-Fives, and Farmer Style Sencha

    A couple of years ago—on a visit to the Jasmine Pearl Tea Merchants shop— I tried a Japanese tea (that wasn’t sencha) that just . . . blew me away. It was a black tea blended with yuzu rind. Yes, the Japanese orange. When I described it to people, all I could muster was, “It’s…

  • A Transparent Tea Liquor

    This is a white tea called Doke Silver Needle. I . . . may have written about it several times. I know exactly where it comes from. (The Doke tea estate in Bihar, India.) I know who owns the estate. (Rajiv Lochan.) I know who makes it. (Rajiv’s daughter, Neha “Dolly” Lochan.) And I know…