What on blooming earth is Blooming Tea?

You may have seen it and thought what is a flower doing in a teapot…I’m not drinking that! But don’t be fooled – these beautiful flowering creations are indeed tea and they are drinkable!

Known to some as Flowering Tea, Flowerball tea or simply Flower Tea these wonderful balls of tea will blow your mind!

Fall of Fragrance – Blooming Tea

So what are they? Well to being with you are presented with something actually a little uninspiring – confusing even. It’s a big ball of green tea. The magic only begins once it has been immersed in boiled water (let the water cool for a minute or two first so that you don’t damage the green tea.  So you’ve let the water cool, pop the ball in a glass teapot (you can use anything glass or transparent here, a wine glass can look nice!) and add the water. Continue reading

LuLin Teas Update

A lot has been going on at LuLin Teas lately so I thought I would just do a little blog to update you with some of the major things:

We have become a member of The Guild of Fine Foods which “is the UK trade association for anyone making or selling top quality local, regional and speciality food and drink.” So we fit right in!

We have a few new stockists and are putting together a webpage for you to be able to check who stocks us or where you can go for a cup of our tea and a piece of cake!

We have also moved premises. We are now operating out of our own warehouse which means we will be able to offer more services than before, including international shipping so watch this space for more news on that! Not that this effects the tea but the setting for our new premises is beautiful – there is a stream running beside the warehouse so we have happy staff who can’t wait for summer picnics during their lunch breaks! Continue reading

Tea for one?

Tea is a brilliant drink to enjoy with friends and loved ones. The stories and gossip that will have been shared over teapots and cake stands must be innumerable – I have certainly told my fair share of secrets while balancing a cup on my knee. I love sharing tea with my friends but I’ll let you in to a (not so) secret…I revel in those quiet moments when I have nothing else to do but sit down and have a cup of tea.

I actually enjoy tea most when I drink it by myself. I get so wrapped up in what I’m discussing with my friends that I don’t take the time to really think about what I’m drinking – the scent, the flavours, the origin of the leaves!

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Tisanes explained…

Tisanes are what many people will refer to as Herbal Tea. Interestingly, tisanes/herbal teas do not contain any tea (that is leaves from the Camellia Sinensis) but are often referred to as tea anyway. I recently had a drawn out debate with my partner over whether or not you could refer to tisanes as tea! Tisanes are caffeine free infusions typically made from herbs, fruits, spices and other plants. Just like with regular tea you can have pure Tisanes and blended Tisanes.

There are certain health benefits associated with Herbal Teas but they are a lot more difficult to pin down than with Green, Black, White tea, etc (see here) because the range of ingredients used is so vast! For example our Peppermint Tisane has completely different health properties to our Goji and Chrysanthemum. Peppermint is known for aiding with digestion so we recommend drinking it with a heavy meal whereas Goji berries are packed full of anti-oxidants and Chrysanthemum helps you sleep so this is the perfect tisane to drink if you are feeling under the weather.

There is a multitude of Tisanes available on the market – some I think sound appalling Mint Chocolate Chip Honeybush seems to take the whole blending thing a bit far in my opinion (I’ve never tried this tea for all I know it could be delicious!) but there is literally something for everyone!

Here is a list of my favourite things about Tisanes:

  1. Tisanes are brilliant for cold winter evenings when you need an early night so having a caffeinated drink is out of the question but you need a hot drink in bed to keep you snug. A nice cup of peppermint or lavender tea is the perfect solution to this dilemma! There is something so comforting about a hot drink in bed.
  2. You can use them to blend your own teas. A few days ago I took some of our Rosebuds and added them to our Imperial Court No1. The result was my own delicious concoction! We don’t focus on blends at LuLin Teas (although our Puerh with Lavender sells really well!) but with the Tisanes we do sell some really great blends can be created. The point here is to experiment with different teas, tisanes and ratios! You can create your own favourite tea!
  3. They are nice cold! I have to say that I hate cold tea – if I don’t drink my tea with 15-20 minutes of making it – chances are I won’t drink it. Black and Puerh tea needs to be hot in my opinion – Greens, Whites and Oolongs I can palate at a lower temperature (so I can appreciate the flavours more) but never cold! My only exception to this is Tisanes – give me a cold Rosebud tea any day. They are great refreshing drinks during hot summer months.

My Rosebud and Puerh blend

The best thing to do here is explore drink and enjoy!

Thanks,

Hannah

Why we don’t sell fair trade teas…or do we?

A lot of tea companies sell tea using Fair Trade labelling. This is great – I am in FULL support of paying everyone a fair wage. I often choose fair trade products over non fair trade especially with coffee and chocolate. The reason that we don’t market our teas as fair trade is because the term doesn’t really exist in China.

Of course that doesn’t mean that fair trade does not exist it’s just the term and the labelling of trade as such. China produces a lot of tea (in 2009 they produced approx 1,359,000 tonnes the highest producer of tea in the world!) but China also demands a lot of tea as does the rest of the world. So it seems unlikely that we could approach a farm to buy tea directly from them (which is how we operate), offer a low price and have them accept it despite that meaning they couldn’t make a profit. No they would simply tell us goodbye and move on to the next interested party until they get the price they need.

San picking Long Jing

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