A little counterspace for my morning ritual

Last year for Christmas, I received a beautiful teapot from WMF — a German design company that specializes (and has for 150 years) in home pieces, and I love my “Kult” teapot.  It consists of three pieces: a ceramic pot with a drip-free spout, a fine mesh, removable strainer that brews directly into the pot, and a stainless steel, removable cover insulated with felt to keep the tea hot for an hour. 

With my fancy-pants tea pot, I get to try similarly fancy loose leaf teas.  Walking home from the Morgan Library yesterday, when I found my petit fours, I also passed a wonderful store dedicated to tea lovers:  SubtleTea. An oasis in the shadow of the Empire State Building, they have fifty odd flavors of loose leaf teas and you can sample sips of each while you decide what you’d like!

You first decide what time of day you’re going to be sipping (morning, afternoon or evening), what kind of leaf (black, green, rooibos, mate, oolong, etc.), and then flavor.  I drink tea all day, but I already had a decaf version at home, so started with an afternoon tea. I sampled the pomegranate, but it was too tart, and the almond cookies green tea was too taste specific — it wasn’t something I’d want to brew everyday.  I finally settled on Pumpkin Spice (which also happens to be my favorite Starbucks flavor in the autumn).  It’s a black tea base with actual pieces of dried pumpkin, cinnamon sticks, nutmeg, cloves, and it’s lightly sweet; definitely a tea I’ll enjoy, regardless of the season!

Thanks for reading and happy drinking! EE