These days I drink tea two or three times a day and the tea pot I use is the one in the picture above. It holds almost two cups of tea which is a good serving size for my wife and me, most of the time anyways. I can not remember the name or brand of the first tea I tried in my life nor can I remember when it was. Must have been when I was a little boy and the tea must have been some type of black tea. I know this because the only type of tea my parents used to (and still) drink was black tea and must have been either a type of Ceylon or Darjeeling. I am pretty sure they were not drinking Assam tea.
I started trying green tea maybe from five or six years ago. I liked them more if they had stronger and more distinct aroma and if they had a tangy and bitter taste. I used to think -and maybe still do for some teas- that more bitterness means higher quality. I wasn’t aware that maybe exposure to air and light or heat for extended periods might change the flavors and aromas. I tried some teas casually when I was for a trip in China and bought two packages of Lung Chin tea from Hongzhou train station. I remember the sales lady mentioned that one of them is higher quality tea compared to the other one. When i tried them back home I realized that the aroma of the recommended tea was more pronounced, but “bitterness” was almost the same. I still had a guideline for recognizing better tea in my opinion: Aroma.
On another holiday trip when I was in Japan afterwards, I was more keen about green teas and was looking for green teas from Shizuoka. I had started buying and trying more types of tea back home and had already tried some green teas from Japan like Sencha and Bancha. I bought a type of Gyokuro tea and also tried Hojicha and Matcha. I also liked Japanese cookies made with Matcha powder. I bought a tea pot in Osaka which we still have and use it every now and then (below picture):
In those days green tea was the tea for me. I remember I bought some Oolong tea from Beijing airport last minute just to spent and finish up my remaining Yuans. I went through both packages at home but still didn’t want to believe in richness and complexity of aroma and taste. Nowadays I look forward to trying any new Oolong tea that I can get my hands on! Black tea was pushed aside for the longest time as I always thought I am too familiar with them. Only until I tried Keemun, Lapsang Souchong and Yunnan teas! And further the fermented Pu’er teas. Trying different teas goes on and so does learning and enjoying them. As I try different teas, I want to have them here available too, the ones I like. Whatever I have in the shop section of this website are the teas that I have tried and liked. I hope you will try and enjoy them too as much as I do.
Thanks for reading!
All Star Tea