when the sun goes down

jeff and i had a very productive day today. the best stop was the tea shop. 

[photo from teaembassy.com]

the tea embassy is actually this historical home in the middle of downtown. the rooms are filled with teapots and strainers and tea cups and it has creaky old wood floors. behind the counter, they have bazillions of beautiful shiny silver tins full of tea. today there was only one guy working, tim. we loved him. cute, knowledgeable, rides a scooter.

 he taught us about the difference between the three jasmine teas. it has a bit to do with the quality of the tea leaves.. but the biggest difference is how many times they process it. apparently, jasmine tea is made by mixing fresh jasmine flowers with tea and then they mix it all up, let the oil from the flowers get into the tea, and blow on it with a special fan that blows the flowers away and leaves the heavier tea behind. the more times they mix in the flowers, the stronger the tea, the more expensive it is.

last time, i bought the least expensive one.. jasmine joy. today we bought the next one up, jasmine pearls. it's hand rolled into little pearls. and we brought him some tea to identify. alex had sent it to me, and it had the chinese name on it, but i didn't really know what it was. tim thinks it's a white tipped formosa oolong. ..after a little wiki research and character/pinyin matching on the tag, i think it's dong fang mei jia oolong aka oriental beauty. need to ask alex. 

and maj and i made ina garten's shrimp scampi for dinner. it is so easy/yummy.

(and has anyone read great house by nicole krauss yet? it's our second book club book.)