Tea Tasting at Ooh Cha Teahouse
April 13th, 2009 by monnibo | Food & Drink, Out & About
A couple weeks ago I arranged a tea tasting and food pairing at Ooh Cha Teahouse. Karen Duffield, the owner, treated us to a spectacular display.
I am sad to say that within the last week, Karen has shut her doors at this lovely little teahouse due to the economic situation. She will be maintaining Ooh Cha as an online tea store, but I do hope that Karen will be able to have a bricks and morter location again soon!
So I would like to share the experience of our tea tasting with you, in memory of the lovely little Ooh Cha Teahouse! The tea tasting include the following teas:
- Lapsang Souchong (smokey tea)
- Assam (high grade black tea)
- Balzac Black (black Oolong)
- Matcha (ground powdered tea)
- Mate Chai (Chai tea)
- Ayurvedic Cleansing Tea
These were all paired with a sample of the food that best suited the tea and some information on each tea and the qualities it has.
Here are some photos from the lovely meetup we had:
Karen Duffield, in her shop (formerly located at 63 Kingsway, Vancouver, BC)
Our group of seven. Relax. Laugh.
Goat cheese paired with Lapsang Souchong
Assam tea (standard black tea) – comparing the brewed leaves, to the dry leaves, to the colour of the tea.
Serving each other Oolong tea
Matcha ceremony
Lovely green matcha colouring
Herbal cleansing tea paired with fresh fruit!
Before we began, Carol from ChaChaCha teablog asked permission to film some of the tea tasting for her blog. She posted this great video on YouTube and her blog. Click over to see a video of our Matcha ceremony.
Things to watch for: You can see my turquoise sleeve on the side of the video; You can hear the click of my camera at points; Chelle, Kerry Ann, and I joking about bamboo yarn.
Related posts:
This entry was posted on Monday, April 13th, 2009 at 9:34 am
and is filed under Food & Drink, Out & About.
.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
Both comments and pings are currently closed.
Entries (RSS)
BookCrossing
Delicious
Etsy
Flickr
GoodReads
Ravelry
Twitter
YouTube
April 13th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
So, what is YOUR reaction to Lapsong Souchong? I rank it right next to Russian Caravan, which I lovingly call “old sock”. That ought to give you a fair idea of what I think of both the smell and taste of smokey teas!
April 13th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
I don’t care for “smokey” teas either… Do tell!
April 15th, 2009 at 10:29 am
ohhh…that’s really sad about the shop closing. i don’t really drink coffee or tea, but the custom of tea seems so relaxing that i may just have to get into it. the pics are great. :)
April 15th, 2009 at 11:41 am
I am sorry to hear the tea shop had to close. Times are tough everywhere, so sad
April 15th, 2009 at 3:50 pm
*sob* I’m so sad that Ooh Cha is closed! I was planning on heading there before I leave for Oregon to bring some tasty teas with me. Now I have to find another tea shop that has lovely tea and those awesome 30g resealable bags. I actually just recommended it to my s-in-law’s awesome Polish boyfriend, *sigh* I’ll have to tell him it’s now online only. I hope Karen and her father are able to set up a brick and mortar shop again in the next year or so once everything calms down. I had so much fun at that tea tasting and I was glad I was able to enjoy the shop while it was there.
April 20th, 2009 at 6:51 pm
Looks like y’all had a good time! I wish we had a tea house that would do a tasting like that.
May 11th, 2010 at 9:39 am
[...] sat near someone who looked very familiar and introduced herself as Carol, later we figured out we knew each other from a Tea Meetup Group. Small [...]