Tea from England?

Hello there,

I hope you have enjoyed tea month at Tea With Me and Friends, we have certainly enjoyed sharing our new tea knowledge and trying lots of different teas...something we are going to continue doing and sharing!

I thought we would end tea month with a look at some homegrown tea - now if you joined us earlier in the month you will know that tea is traditionally grown in China and India. But did you know that there is tea being grown in England too....on the Tregothnan Estate near Truro, Cornwall to be precise!

Cornish grown tea leaves
Photo from Tregothnan website

The estate has been growing and selling tea locally since about 2000, but it is now appearing in more and more places....including it seems Waitrose! Lorna and I discovered this tea recently when Mum decided to order it with her Mother's Day afternoon tea at Browns Hotel, London.

The estate now grows and blends tea creating a range of different teas and herbal infusions, including the Great British Tea, which we sampled at Browns Hotel. This is a blend of Cornish tea leaves and Assam, which the estate created for 10 Downing Street, to celebrate the government's GREAT initiative which is inviting the world to trade with Britain. The tea when brewed has a wonderful warm colour and a great strong taste, which we think could be enjoyed at any time of the day.

Great British Tea - Tregothnan, Cornwall
Photo from website

The Great British Tea is available in both bags and as a loose leaf tea - 10 sachets costs £4.00 or 25g of leaves costs£5.25. 

If you fancy trying the range for yourself or finding out a bit more about British grown tea, pop by the Tregothnan Estate website.

If you've tried any of the Tregothnan teas we'd love to hear what you thought of them.....

Thanks for popping by today,

Rachel

Tried and Tested.....Williamson Tea - Traditional Afternoon

Hello there,

Welcome back to another tried and tested tea article from Tea With Me and Friends, today we'd like to share with you a lovely Traditional Afternoon tea from Williamson Tea.

Now I first discovered Williamson Tea when wandering the tea aisle in a Supermarket, I was approached by a lady who couldn't reach the tea on the top shelf and she asked if I could reach a box for her. It turned out to be Williamson Tea, which she heartily recommended. The tea was on offer at the time and I thought "why not!", so I bought my first box of Traditional Afternoon tea! I am so pleased that the lady passed on this recommendation, as this is definitely one of my "go to" teas!

Williamson Tea are a family owned business who grow, select and blend their teas in Kenya on four different family owned farms. They tea comes in lovely silver cartons, loose leaf caddies and also fabulous elephant tea caddies.

Traditional Afternoon tea from
Williamson Tea

Their range includes a breakfast tea, an afternoon tea, a green tea, an earl grey and some of their own blends to name a few. My favourite has to be their Traditional Afternoon tea, as its easy to drink with a good flavour. The website calls it a classic afternoon tea, with good body. I love the golden colour that it has.

A nice cup of tea with Tea With Me and Friends!

In regards to cost, the tea bags are £2.49 for 50 bags or you can buy 100g of loose leaf tea for £4.05. You can also buy wonderful elephant tea caddies which start from just under £7 for a medium caddie.

Find out more about the range on the Williamson Tea website.

If you have any teas you think we should try, please get in touch!

Thanks for popping by today,

Rachel

Tried and Tested Tea - Bishop's Breakfast

Hello there,

Today's tried and tested tea is called Bishop's Breakfast from Char Teas who are based in Winchester. I first discovered this blend of tea when I enjoyed an afternoon tea at The Exclusive Cake Shop and Vintage Tea Room in Midhurst - this was just one of the teas on their extensive menu.

Bishop's Breakfast from Char Teas

Char Teas are loose tea suppliers that have been sourcing and selling teas since 2006, as well as a shop in Winchester they also have an online store where you can pick from over 150 loose leaf teas! If that vast choice sounds a little mind boggling Char have a section of recommended teas and a tea of the month to inspire you!

Right.....back to our tried and tested tea - Bishop's Breakfast is a broken leaf black tea, with a beautiful copper colour when brewed. The teas are from Assam, Ceylon and Sumatra and make a really warming cup of tea, that I think could be enjoyed at any time during the day.

Time for a spot of tea with Tea With Me and Friends!

The flavour is quite spiced, but not at all unpleasant and as you can see from my photo I enjoyed my tea black. I used the recommended one level teaspoon of leaves per cup, and brewed my tea for approximately three minutes. 

 Bishop's Breakfast is currently available from Char tea for under £4 for a 100g silver foil pouch.

Have you tried this tea? We'd love to hear what you thought!

Thanks for popping by today,

Rachel

Tea Customs...

Hello there,

Carrying on with tea month, I thought today we would have a little look at how tea has been enjoyed over the years since it first became popular. If you have popped by Tea With Me and Friends before you will probably already know about afternoon tea and high tea, but I have discovered a couple of other tea customs.....

Lets start with Tea Gardens - these were public "pleasure gardens" which were designed for drinking tea and strolling, which were very popular in the late 18th century (sounds lovely to me!). These gardens were different to other public gardens are they were used as entertainment venues and would often feature bandstands. One such tea garden I have read about was called Cuper's Gardens, which was situated on the south side of the River Thames in London, overlooking Somerset House. Cuper's Gardens were popular during the 17th-18th centuries, and included an orchestra and often held firework displays. Rapid urban growth led to the closures of lots of tea gardens.

Time for tea with Tea With Me and Friends

Tea dances evolved from the tradition of afternoon tea, where as well as the refreshments we'd expect at an afternoon tea there would also be dancing. People attending tea dances would expect live music from either a small orchestra or a band, and various types of dances were performed including foxtrots, quicksteps and cha chas. Tea dances are still popular today, with various events taking place including Tea Dances at the Royal Opera House.

Can we interest you in some tea and cake?

Apparently the manageress of the Aerated Bread Company is thought to have established the first commercial Tea Shop in around 1864 when she persuaded her superiors to allow her to serve food and beverages in their shop. Tea shops spread in popularity across Britain as a lady could meet friends unchaperoned in a tea shop without sullying her reputation.

Tea breaks came about because workers initially began their working days very early - between 5-6am. Therefore employers allowed a mid morning break for these workers, when tea and food would be served. However, between about 1741 - 1820 some employers tried to put a stop to these breaks, believing that they made their workers lazy!

Have you been to a tea dance recently? Do you still have a morning tea break at your place of work? If you do we'd love to hear from you.

Thanks for popping by today,
Rachel

Tried and Tested Tea - Blue Chai

Hello there,

Next in our tried and tested tea series we are sharing with you something that is rather different to our standard cuppa!

A little while ago I was sent a sample of Blue Chai tea from Thailand. I had never heard of this tea before and so I decided to do a little investigating on their website...it turns out that Blue Chai is 100% dried butterfly pea flowers making it a herbal tea which is caffeine free. Even more unusual is the colour of the tea....

Blue Chai herbal tea

...yes it's blue!

To make this herbal tea butterfly pea flowers are harvested during bloom in the early mornings and then dried - no chemicals are used in the process...that blue colour is natural!

To brew the tea I followed the instructions and used approximately 6 flowers, adding boiling water....

Butterfly pea flowers ready to infuse!

I allowed the the infusion to brew for about five minutes, watching as the beverage turned blue before my eyes.......

Although I was a little apprehensive about drinking a blue drink I was pleasantly surprised when I tasted the tea. It had a rich, slightly earthy taste to it - a flavour that was good both hot or cold. The website gives you lots of details about the health benefits of the tea and other flavours that you can combine with Blue Chai.

One interesting fact is that you can further change the colour of this tea...simple by adding a splash of lemon......

Magical colour changing herbal tea!

...yes...now its a purple colour!

If you fancy trying this herbal tea, its currently available via the Blue Chai website, each 40g pouch will cost just under $15. Take a look at the website for more information about shipping.

If you have tried this tea we'd love to hear what you thought!

Thanks for popping by today,

Rachel

Tried and Tested Tea....Bellevue Tea

Hello there,

Welcome to a new series of articles from Tea With Me and Friends - since it's tea month in March we thought we'd start sharing some tried and tested articles with you. If you read our resolutions post at the beginning of the year you'll know that I wanted to spend some time in 2014 learning about tea and trying out different types of tea.

In these "tried and tested" articles I will be sharing with you some of the teas I have tried and what I thought about them!

I'm kicking off with several different teas from bellevue Tea, which is an independently owned family business based in London. Bellevue was founded by Clare Jones and her tea trader husband Mike...both have a love of tea a an extensive knowledge which helps them source high quality tea.

Clare and Mike very kindly got in touch with me and sent us some lovely tea to try out......

A selection of Bellevue Tea

We were really spoilt by bellevue who sent us Ceylon black tea bags, Rooibos tea bags and a pouch of the bellevue belter (a strong, loose leaf blend). The teabags all come neatly packed in a box, each is stringed and has a tag - there are 25 individually wrapped bags in each box. The bellevue belter comes in pouches of either 100g or 500g.

Nicely packaged bellevue tea

I decided to start my tea tasting with a cup of Rooibos tea......which proved to be a lovely, rich and smooth "red bush" tea. The tea had a gorgeous mahogany-red colour, and a slightly sweet flavour. I drank my cup without milk or sugar/honey...but you can add all of these to taste.

A tasty cup of bellevue tea rooibos tea

This tea costs £2.50 for 25 individually wrapped teabags.

The next tea I tried was the Ceylon black tea, which was also in teabag form. Now, I am a bit of a fan of  Ceylon tea, I love the refreshing flavour and its often my default choice when I am out for a spot of tea!

A Tea With Me and Friends favourite - a nice cup of Ceylon tea!

bellevue tea's Ceylon tea is hand-picked in Sri Lanka and has a lovely, fresh taste. Again, I enjoyed my cup black without any sweetener. This tea is also £2.50 for 25 individually wrapped teabags.

That just left me the bellevue belter to try, which is the bellevue house blend tea. This tea got its unusual name when a friend of bellevue tea was drinking it on holiday declared that it was ‘a real early morning belter’. This is a good strong blend, including teas from India and Africa.

A belter of a cup! May I introduce the bellevue belter!

Now I read all about this tea on the bellevue website and decided I would enjoy this tea first thing in the morning as an alternate to the cup of the coffee that I sometimes require to kick start my day! The tea had a wonderful aroma to it and was a lovely dark colour. It turns out that I'm quite a fan of stronger teas and this was a lovely cup of tea! Not too overpowering, I really enjoyed my cup of belter!

The bellevue belter is available as a loose leaf tea at £3.00 for 100g and £12.60 for 500g.

I really enjoyed my tea adventures with bellevue teas (thank you again for spoiling us!) - if you'd like to know more about the teas available pop by the bellevue tea website.

If you have tried any of these teas we'd love to know what you thought!

Thank you for popping by today,

Rachel

I didn't know that about tea!

Hello there,

As you know it's currently Tea Month here at Tea With Me and Friends...we've already shared a little tea history with you...but I've also come across some other tea facts for you! You might never look at your humble cup of tea in the same way again.....

Can I interest you in a spot of tea?

Did you know that after water, tea is the most widely consumed beverage in the whole world! Its thought that approximately 3 billion cups of tea are drunk around the world each day!

We all know that tea is popular in Britain, but according to the UK Tea Council 66% of the British population enjoys a cup of tea every day and this equates to approximately 165 million cups of tea being drunk every day in Britain! For anyone who thinks Britain is becoming a nation of coffee drinkers (an easy conclusion to come to with the amount of coffee shops on our high streets!)... only approximately 70 million cups of coffee are enjoyed in Britain each day.

A spot of tea with Tea With Me and Friends!

But how do we make and enjoy our tea......Britain it seems loves a tea bag...the convenience and accessibility means that 96% of British tea is brewed from tea bags. Milk is extremely popular, with 98% of British people taking their tea with milk (I really am in the minority as I enjoy my tea without milk!) however, only 30% of people have sugar in their tea.

There are at least four different types of tea, these include white tea, green tea, oolong tea and black tea. The difference between the types of teas is all in the tea processing the tea undergoes. All these teas come from the same plant - the Camellia sinensis.

Tea contains numerous antioxidants and considerably less caffeine than coffee. Tea is also a natural source of fluoride!

We hope you enjoyed these tea facts - feel free to share them with your friends over a nice cuppa and a piece of cake!

Thanks for popping by today,

Rachel & Lorna

Time for a little his-tea-ry!

Hello there!

Well, as you know its officially tea month here on Tea With Me and Friends and what better place to start then at the beginning!

I knew that tea had come originally from China....but that was the extent of my tea history so last week I did a little research that I thought I would share with you. So put on the kettle, make a cuppa and sit back while I explain where it all began!

Time for a cuppa?

We all know that tea is incredibly popular in Britain, in fact its been drunk here for over 350 years...but we need to look much further back in history to discover when it actually first began. Legend has it that in 2737 BC the Chinese Emperor Shen Nung was sitting under a Camellia Sinensis tree while his servant boiled water to drink. Now you might not know (I didn't!), but this tree's leaves and leaf buds are used today to produce tea. Now some of the leaves from the tree blew into the water that was being boiled, and this intrigued Shen Nung, who was a known herbalist. Shen decided to try the accidental infusion - the rest is his-tea-ry!

Who knows if this is actually true, but I think its a lovely beginning to have! I'm glad Shen decided to sit under that Camellia Sinensis tree! We know that containers for tea were found in the tombs from the Han dynasty (206 BC - 220 AD) and it was during the Tang dynasty of 618 - 906 AD that tea drinking really became popular in China.

Time for a second cuppa?

But how did this popularity spread across the world? Tea was introduced from China into Japan by the Japanese Buddhist monks who studied in China. The Portuguese traders and missionaries probably first mentioned tea in Europe, as they would bring samples of tea back with them from their travels. However, it was the Dutch who first commercially imported tea into Europe at the end of the 16th century.

The popularity of tea soon spread across Europe, but it was very expensive and therefore remained the preserve of the wealthy.

So, how did tea make it into Britain? At the time the British were quite suspicious of the continent and therefore the popularity of tea did not spread quite so quickly in Britain. It was the marriage of Charles II to Catherine of Braganza that really cemented tea drinking into British society. Catherine was Portuguese....and rather partial to a cup of tea! Her tea drinking habits made the beverage very fashionable in Britain and the East India Company finally began to import tea from about 1664.

I don't know about you, but I love the story of Shen Nung! I hope you have enjoyed our little trip into the history of tea, join us throughout March for more tea articles!

Thank you for popping by today,
Rachel

March is tea month!

Hello there!

If you popped by Tea With Me and Friends during January you might have read about our resolutions for 2014....and you might remember that one of them was to learn more about Tea!

We all know that I love a good cup of tea with my cake, but at the moment I don't know much about it. I have already started expanding my taste buds, experimenting with different tea leaves and blends...not always picking the same tea when I'm indulging my sweet tooth in the afternoon!

Time for a cuppa?

Next month I am going to take this a step further and will explore more about the humble cup of tea....where did it come from and how did it get to be such a popular beverage in Britain? 

I declare that March will be tea month at Tea With Me and Friends!

Afternoon tea with Tea With Me and Friends

We hope you will join us to share in a little of the history, look at the different leaves and tell us about your favourite cuppa! We might also drool over the odd teacup or too! If you have anything tea related that you would like to share with us just get in touch!

Thanks for popping by today,

Rachel & Lorna