2019 was a very weird year for tea.

Or rather, a very weird year for how tea was covered in the press. And by “press”, I mean, mainstream media, not the usual tea or beverage-centric haunts that won’t hire […]

I waited way too long to tell this story. So long, in fact, others have already told it. Because of that, I have to approach this from another angle—a sipping angle.

The Great Mississippi Tea Company f […]

In January of 2019, I wrote about this garden.

Latumoni.

It was a 7-acre garden that bore the name of the small Assamese village it hugged against. Throughout 2018, their name was everywhere. Mainly […]

Vietnam has an unfortunate reputation in tea circles.

Not entirely undeserved. Like countries such as Thailand, one of the ways they’ve tried to establish a tea growing/producing identity is by emulating t […]

At the Portland Tea Festival in July (of this year, the time of this writing), Oolong Owl dragged me to a Japanese tea vendor booth. This was markedly weird for two reasons: one, the Owl rarely dragged—more l […]

At the end of October, I did something completely out of character. I traveled to a city I’d never visited . . . for a tea festival. Stranger still? I flew out for said unknown (to me) city on Halloween. Nothing a […]

I think it’s high time I talk about the Castleton estate.

Again.

I say “again” because, if you’re no stranger to this blog, you’ll know that it is one of my favorite gardens from one of my favorite […]

A week ago, an article made the rounds in the greater tea community sphere. At the time it came out, it rubbed me the wrong way. So much so, I originally meant to pen a rant pointing out where it went wrong, and […]

Over a week ago, I attended Northwest Tea Festival.  Again.

It also happened to fall on my birthday.

I decided at the end of summer that the best way to ring in my 43rd year on Earth was to make a […]

Sometimes, in my search for new teas to try, I get drawn in by mentions of particular producers.

This is Wei Zhong He. I first learned of him through my dealings with Kevin Gascoyne (Camellia Sinensis Tea […]

Earlier this year, a fellow tea blogger sent me information on an Indian tea growing region I’d never heard of.

A place filled with old(er) growth, semi-wild assamica forests, which bordered Assam to the E […]

Over a year-and-a-half ago, I wrote an article discussing the nature of sheng cha.

It didn’t go over well.

I used a Vietnamese sheng puerh-style tea from Son La province as a part of my thesis, and it a […]

Five days ago, a vendor friend posted this article on Facebook:

I didn’t read it, which is usually what not to do, but I’ve seen such tea topical articles before. The direction they were going in was n […]

I should probably get around to talking about World Tea Expo 2019, huh?

To be truthful, my delay in doing so wasn’t related to my usual brand of procrastination, but rather some trauma. Stuff I’ve had dif […]

As some of you have seen—via my social media—in June, I was at World Tea Expo.

For those who don’t follow me on those platforms . . . I don’t blame you. But that’s beside the point. In the middle of June, […]

Well, it’s spring again, and with it comes warmer weather. That’s how it is in the Pacific Northwest. I’m . . . not a fan. The reason? With warmer weather comes seasonal chronic migraines; a fun little diagn […]

I don’t consider it spring until I’ve had a first flush Darjeeling in my mouth. This year, though, it took me a little longer to get to my “stash” of first flush Darjeelings. Most years, the family Lochan sends m […]

Several months ago, I had a conversation with a fellow tea nerd about the origin of the tea tree. Y’know, small talk. During the dialogue, he uttered the following assertion that made my imagination boil over l […]