Tea Writings

A blog about tea from the desk of Cecilia Tan
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Suggestion Box

Have a tea, tea house, tea web site, tea supplier, or anything else about tea you think I should check out? A flavor, a brand, a store, a seller? Another blog, article, or book? Please comment below with as much info as you think necessary for me to track it down.

To keep spam to a minimum, you must register for the site in order to leave a comment. I promise I will not use your contact info to spam you in return!

You can also email suggestions to me at ctan.writer AT gmail DOT com.

Thank you for enjoying teawritings.ceciliatan.com!

0 Comments to “Suggestion Box”


  1. yarakot says:

    Have you come across this book? The World of Caffeine: The Science and Culture of the World’s Most Popular Drug

    It explores tea, coffee, and chocolate (and nods a bit in the direction of mate), their similar histories.

    I really enjoyed this book. They write well about the rise of the three great caffeinated beverages (coffee, tea, and chocolate) and their similar trajectories from secret beverage of religious men to the guilty pleasures they are now. She connects the popularity of the beverages to important social movements. I found it amusing that the arguments about coffee and tea that we have currently date back hundreds of years.

    I know that you are primarily interested in tea and there is a great deal of space devoted to the history of tea and how it comes to the west. However, coffee and chocolate also get a substantial write up. To me the most fascinating parts was how similarly they were treated by the societies they entered.

    The last portion of the books is on the science of caffeine, which I found well done and understandable. I was struck by the idea that caffeine’s molecular structure is so similar to the constituents of the nucleotides that form RNA and DNA that it may introduce errors into cell reproduction and yet there is no evidence connecting caffeine with such harm. Also, the idea that caffeine is metabolized differently depending on gender, smoking status and other aspects of the caffeine consumer was also interesting.

    You’d asked for suggestions, so I thought I would bring this to you if you haven’t already read it. I truly enjoyed it.

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  2. It sounds like a fabulous book! I’m definitely going to add it to my wish list (hm, and I may know some people I should give it to as a gift…)

    Your “suggestion” here could practically be a review in itself, if you’d like to guest-blog here on the site? (What are the arguments still going on about tea and coffee?) Just a thought…?

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  3. yarakot says:

    Hi Cecilia,

    It is a fantastic book.

    I would be delighted to guest blog, but as you can see some months I’m completely tied up and can’t even respond in a timely fashion to kind offers. I will write more later. I just didn’t want you to think I had suddenly been scared away from tea.

    Carolyn

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  4. I wonder if you could talk about teas to drink before bed sometime.

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  5. I came across this nice tea journaling/social networking site: http://steepster.com/

    Thought you might be interested.

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    • Ooh, neat. And about the teas to drink before bed. I ought to do a post on that. I drink nearly as much tea at night as I do in the daytime, being a night owl, but I am sensitive to caffeine. So I have various strategies for dealing with that, including sometimes going the herbal route with honeybush or rooibos, and sometimes steeping leaves for a pot earlier in the day and then having the second and third steepings at night (the caffeine is pretty much all used up in the first time around). Plus decaffeinated teas, but that’s really my 3rd choice.

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  6. I have not been happy with the rooibus I’ve tried. It tasted dusty and had a very odd, unpleasant note. Perhaps it was just a bad batch or perhaps I need to order it in a whole form rather than in tea bags. I will have to try the second steeping trick.

    I found some decaf black teas from Upton Tea Imports which are ok but lack the quality and flavor of their caffeinated cousins. I have yet to try the Decaf Darjeeling sample. I tried white tea but even that small amount of caffeine before bed kept me up. I would like to have a green or white tea option.

    And another link. They are starting a tea magazine and are soliciting articles. Naturally I thought of you.

    http://tealove.wordpress.com/2009/08/27/introducing-sip-a-new-tea-magazine/

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  7. haymendaluz says:

    Hey, this is Haymen da Luz from Aroma Tea Shop. I just got bored and googled my store and found your site. Thanks for the awesome review!

    Anyways, you can check out my video about Tie Guan Yin. I made a mini documentary on how to process the teas and went directly to Fu Jian.

    You can check it out at http://www.aromateashop.com

    Thanks, and make sure to check out the video!

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    • Haymen, how awesome to see you here! Drop by anytime. I’ll definitely check out the video. My grandparents were from Fujian and ti kuan yin is one of my favorites. Someday if I have the time and the money I want to take a tea tour to China.

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