Posts Tagged: taiwan

NYC / Oolong / Puerh — 1 Comment
3
Jun 10

A Visit to Yumcha — The Cha

I usu­ally pride myself in being able to rat­tle off the 8 to 10 teas we drink dur­ing the course of a meetup. How­ever, in the com­pany of Dae and David I finally met my match. Dae says she hasn’t drank this much tea since her trip to Tai­wan — I am indeed strug­gling to remem­ber every tea. I’ve done my best to recall them in no par­tic­u­lar order.

1996 Huang Yin — Sun Sing
1997 Meng­hai 8582
1980s Xiaguan Tra­di­tional Char­ac­ters
2004 Sil­ver Tip Puerh — The Tea Gallery

1950s “Raisin Bread Aroma” Shui Xian
Wuyi Baozhong

Sun Moon Lake Assam
Win­ter 09 Shan Lin Shi Jade vs. Shan Lin Shi Medium Roast

2010 Shin­cha — Ippodo

A tea or two may have been for­got­ten, but an amaz­ing Memo­r­ial Day week­end with friends will be remem­bered for a long time.

Food / NYC — 2 Comments
2
Jun 10

Passport to Taiwan — Food

Besides tea, music, and arts & crafts, the fes­ti­val offered plenty of food options. We made sure to sam­ple as many as pos­si­ble. Before dig­ging in, we cooled off with some chilled noo­dles.

Then, grilled fish balls on a stick.


Short ribs in broth.


Rice and tofu?


Tai­wanese bur­rito — sticky rice and beans.

We were hardly the only ones try­ing to get our hands on the deli­cious eats; some of the ven­dors ran out of food before we made it to the front of the line.

NYC — 7 Comments
21
Mar 10

A Dream of Taiwan (via Flushing, NY)

Dogwood Blossoms

Spring has arrived on the east coast, finally allow­ing us to enjoy tea in a more nat­ural envi­ron­ment. Few peo­ple are more adept at blend­ing nature and tea cer­e­mony than the Tai­wanese, so it makes lit­tle sense not to emu­late them now. A 2009 win­ter Li Shan fits the weather perfectly.

This morning’s tea recalls a week­end spent among friends in Flush­ing, NY. Both times I have been here I often felt I had been trans­ported out­side the US for a few moments — I think this is the clos­est you can get to Asia with­out leav­ing the North East.

We had a grand time drink­ing young puerh with Kai at the Fang Tea Expo — 2008(?) Bulang Shan, mao cha from 1000 year old Yiwu tea trees, and a mid-roasted Tai­wanese oolong.

After refill­ing the park­ing meter for what felt like the 5th time, we were treated to end­less gen­eros­ity by Annie and her hus­band at Luh Yu Tea Empo­rium. We drank a Da Yu Ling and their cus­tom label 2008 Nan­nuo puerh cake. A very good old arbor tea that we expect has some excel­lent aging poten­tial based on some early experiments.

We feasted with a gaijin’s attempt at Shabu Shabu — deli­cious, but we expected we can get bet­ter results next time. Our bril­liant and delight­ful 4 year old com­pan­ion Doris (who we know to boss adults around in at least Eng­lish, Man­darin, Can­tonese and Fujianese) decided that she was in no mood for hard boiled eggs that day.

We ended the evening with a stop by Benito’s, where he wowed us with his own pri­vate col­lec­tion of Tai­wanese arti­san teaware, paint­ings and com­pe­ti­tion teas. The mod­est gen­tle­man sent us away with sam­ples, as usual.

I expect to return to Flush­ing again before spring is over. Be sure to enjoy the gen­tle warmth and soft light before the sun turns too harsh.