Harney's Strawberry Milkshake Oolong Tea

The other day, the line was awfully long at my Barnes & Noble, so I decided to go check out in the café area. And on the way to the café, I spotted a new Harney & Sons tea in a pretty pink tin, this Strawberry Milkshake Tea.

Check out the back of the tin!

When I got home and opened the tin, a lovely strawberry scent greeted me. This seemed like a bit of a novelty tea for Harney, so I was intrigued.

And I'm happy to report this is "Strawberry Milkshake for Grown-ups" tea! The oolong flavor is what I detected most, then the strawberry, and not much "milk." It was quite an unexpected pairing of flavors, and I'm a fan! Have any of you tried this one?

A tea talk, tea stories, and a new tearoom!

On Sunday afternoon, I had the great pleasure of speaking to a lovely group, the Atlanta Southern Crescent Alumnae Panhellenic Association (ASCAPA), which was celebrating its 24th Annual Founders Reception. They gathered at the Senoia Historical Society's headquarters in Senoia, Georgia. This town is very dear to me—I have ancestors in the city cemetery, and my great-great-grandfather was postmaster in the 1800s—so I am always honored to be invited to speak there. Here I am with Cele, the lovely woman who arranged my visit through a mutual friend. (The Whistle Stop sign is, I believe, a memento from the movie Fried Green Tomatoes, parts of which were filmed in Senoia.)

I was asked to speak about my books Dainty Dining and A Year of Teatime Tales, which is always great fun for me, and I was delighted to hear of the women's own department store tearoom memories. One woman actually worked at a branch of Bullocks Wilshire in California, and if I got the details right, another woman's ex-husband was related to Georgia's Rich family of Rich's Department Store fame. Another remembered the Lazarus Department Stores based in Ohio, and I so enjoyed hearing all of their stories.

The group raises money for women's scholarships, among other things, and they sold tickets for a raffle for some amazing teatime baskets like these two.

I loved the pink chintz tea-for-one set in this one.

But the granddaddy of them all was this basket with a vintage sterling silver teapot!

It was won by a recent college graduate, Anna, who I learned is a huge fan of tea. That gift basket included copies of my books, and when Anna asked me to sign them for her, I was happy to do so.

During the teatime, each woman got to choose her own teacup to use.

And the teatime food selection was amazing, from the sweets …

To the savories!

I had so much fun at this event, and the icing on the cake was when I overheard one woman mention that a new TEAROOM is coming to Senoia! I drove over to the spot where she said it will be located, and I am eagerly awaiting more news, so stay tuned, indeed—especially if you're within driving distance.

"Mary Poppins" and Teatime

It's been a busy weekend, but the highlight was undoubtedly traveling up to Buford on Saturday to see my granddaughter, Bella, perform the lead role in her school's production of "Mary Poppins," and I was ridiculously proud of her! She has a beautiful voice, and while I may be the teeniest bit biased, I thought her performance was outstanding. You won't be surprised to hear that I had asked her mom to alert me when the teatime scenes were coming up, like this one where Mary Poppins pulls a teapot out of her bag!

And here's another. (No flash photography was allowed, but an iPhone quietly held chest-high can still do a decent job of capturing things.)

I also liked this scene with Mary Poppins and Bert enjoying tea and cake.

During intermission, the high school's theatre boosters sold concessions, and I thought they were spot-on, from the decorative chocolate spoons …

To the cute sugar cookies.

I'll end today with a few more fun photos and say "thank you" for enduring a bit of proud-grandmother gushing!

New teatime napkins at Michaels

I was looking up craft supplies on the Michaels website this week when I came across some of their new spring items, including a lot of tea-themed accent pieces as well as these new paper napkins. A package of 20 is on sale for $1.79 (regularly $2.99) right now, and with the 10 percent senior discount I didn't know I was getting, mine were just $1.61 a package. Yippee! 

To my absolute delight, bows are back in style. Yes, I realize they are often consigned to little girls' bedroom decor, but I have always loved the understated femininity of a simple bow, and I love these napkin designs.

 

These are my favorite ones, and I'm thinking it would be fun to tuck a few into the bag the next time I drop off tea bread or cookies for a tea-loving friend!

And "Spill the Tea" is all the rage right now, but I like "Give me all the tea" even better. Or maybe I should say "Give me all the tea … napkins!"

Throat Coat tea from Traditional Medicinals

A few weeks ago, a friend mentioned that she had tried Traditional Medicinals’ Throat Coat tea and found it really did help soothe her throat. I had a brief cold last week and wished I’d had some of that tea, so when I spotted some at the grocery store the other day, I went ahead and got a box.

First, though … If you saw a perforated tab like this at the bottom of the box, would you have punched it in, assuming you could then slide out the tea bags from the bottom of the box? I did. And I was surprised when the tea bags were stacked vertically, not horizontally. So what was the purpose of that tab at the bottom? Or did these tea bags just get packaged the wrong way? Inquiring minds want to know!

But of course that’s a minor point. The main thing was, does the Throat Coat in fact coat one’s throat? I’d say it did. With an arctic blast in Georgia for a second time this winter, I’ve been sipping loads of hot tea just to stay warm and keep any sniffles at bay. This tea tasted like it was packed with herbs, and indeed, the ingredients, all organic, include eucalyptus leaf, licorice root, spearmint leaf, marshmallow root, slippery elm bark, and licorice root dry extract. It had what I’ve heard described as a “thick” mouth feel, so yes, I’d say it coats the throat, and while this herbal tea is indeed heavy on the herbal flavors—rather than fruity or chocolatey or spicy or what have you—I liked it.

And I liked the quotations on the tea bag tags too! So there you go. Have any of you tried Throat Coat tea?

The Cook With Color Sandwich Cutter

It's been a while since I've experimented with a new kitchen gadget, so when I found this heart-shaped sandwich cutter set at T.J. Maxx over the weekend, I decided to give it a try. I had a plastic set similar to this one years ago, but it has long since disappeared. (Did I loan it to someone? Can't remember!)

When I got home and was ready to try it, I discovered how many tiny plastic ties were holding these pieces together. Can that really be the most efficient way to package something? I mean, I haven't seen this many plastic ties since my nieces were little and it practically took a pair of bolt cutters to free their Barbies from the packages!

Once you manage to set everything free, you end up with all this: a heart-shaped sandwich cutter and a heart-shaped sealer, two small pink pieces with tiny heart-shaped cutters on the end (for making hand pies, I later learned through some online research), and six heart-shaped picks.

I was surprised to find there were no instructions in/on/with these pieces! So I went to the company's website, and it doesn't list the sandwich cutters. I googled sandwich cutters, and someone had made a sandwich using a similar mold, so I figured mine would work the same way. You use the larger heart to cut out two pieces of bread, add your filling (I used pimiento cheese), and make a sandwich. You plop the sandwich back inside then press down on it with the heart-shaped piece with the little ridges around the edge.

I liked the result, and I decided not to add a pick since it might make the pimiento cheese squirt out. I'm planning to host a few friends for tea next month, so I'm glad I got this set, even if it did take a bit of work to figure out how to use it!

The Second Lady and the tea service

You just never know what you'll come across when perusing the photos on the Library of Congress website. I thought this one was wonderful, and it shows "Lois Kimsey Marshall, wife of Vice President Thomas R. Marshall, standing next to a silver tea service."

This photo is from 1920, and Marshall served under President Woodrow Wilson.

I noticed the beautiful silver tea service (actually, it appears to be a tea and coffee service) and Mrs. Marshall's fabulous feathered hat! What catches your attention?

Aloha Tea's Lava Papaya Tea

I met some girlfriends for dinner the other night, and when I arrived, my friend Amy immediately handed me this bag of tea she got for me in Hawaii. I don’t know about you, but I am always so touched that someone was thinking of me on their vacation!

Not surprisingly, a burst of happy tropical scents greeted me when I opened the bag.

But very surprisingly, there was something tucked inside the bag of tea: these tea bags.

And they were nice drawstring tea bags!

I quickly filled one with the tea, plopped it in a teacup, and added boiling water. I knew from the yummy scent alone that I would enjoy this tea, and I did. It was a bright-pink color, and the taste was pleasantly sweet from the mix of apple pieces, hibiscus, rosehip, papaya pieces, strawberry leaves, pomegranate pieces, cornflower petals, passion flowers, and natural flavors. I loved the tea, and the fact that fillable tea bags were included was such a lovely surprise!

A snowy weekend at last!

Those of you who are blessed with snow every year can't imagine how excited Georgians get when we hear that snow is on the way! I prepared early in the week and made sure I had all the necessities on hand, so by Thursday, I was just doing a final load of laundry, making sure I'd gotten a nice hot shower in, and settled in to wait on the weather. When I woke up on Friday, I looked out through my bedroom window and didn't spot anything at first. Then I went downstairs and opened the front door to find it was snowing and had covered the driveway, and from the second floor (and without my glasses on), that snow blended with the driveway. It snowed steadily for several hours, and while I forgot to measure it, I'd say I got a good three or four inches of snow.

I was curious to see whether my teacup rain chain had collected any snow, but it was mostly just icy by midmorning when I went outside.

The color was definitely more pronounced in the snow, though!

I wandered around for a bit to capture a few photos of things like this mahonia bush, but the frigid temperatures and sleet soon had me headed back inside.

I was headed upstairs to work on organizing my craft room, and I decided that was a good time to test drive the new Lily Pulitzer tumbler I received from my friend Deberah for Christmas. The lid was perfect for keeping me from sloshing tea around amongst the crafting papers, and the tumbler kept that tea hot for hours!

I also tried scoring my latest loaf of sourdough bread in a snowflake pattern. It sort of resembled a snowflake, I suppose, but I need to go light on the flour next time so the scoring pattern will be more pronounced. Still, I was grateful for the beautiful snow and especially grateful that I had electricity and running water the whole time! So who else got snow over the weekend?