We have been asking you lovely teapigs fans to pack you favourite teapigs tea and take it with you on you summer hols this year. Near or far, teapigs real tea is an essential item as you can never be sure what kind of slop you are going to be served out of home!
In June I jetted off to Istanbul in Turkey and of course I didn't forget my pack of teapigs Darjeeling Earl Grey. When I visited The Spice Market I came a stall selling hundreds of fresh spices as well as lovely whole leaf Turkish teas! Over there they are big fans of apple tea which they drink very sweet and you get offered it wherever you go. After good chat about tea, I left heavily armed with lots of amazing spices and a garland of chillis! I gave up my last few precious tea temples for the man to enjoy a taste of England!
If you are off on holiday this month then remember to take your teapigs tea, get a snap of you and your tea and send it to me at hannah@teapigs.co.uk with the subject title 'holiday'. The best 3 entries will win our teapigs real tea bundle and a teapigs teapot! Get snapping!
Recently in tea stories Category
Iced teas are the best summer drink in our opinion. Why?
- less than 3 calories
- delicious and refreshing
- easy peasy to make
easy-peasy iced tea method...
Put your chosen teapigs temples into a jug - allow 1 temple per person/serving. Cover the temples with hot water (about an inch high) and brew for 3 minutes to release all the flavour. Top with cold water, remove the temples and serve iced.
Try serving with slices or squeezes of lemon or lime. Cucumber slices work really well with the minty and green teas too! If you'd like to sweeten your iced teas, elederflower cordial or honey/syrup works a treat!
teapigs recommends...
We have tried all of the teapigs range on ice and love them all. We think you should experiment with all the blends you have but to get you started here are our favorite recipes
as it is! This is naturally sweet and very refreshing.
this is yummy and fruity. Try with a slice of lemon and lime for kick.
sweet citrus. Try it with a dash of elderflower cordial and a slice of ginger
refreshing. Try with cucumber slices.
delicate. Serve with a slice of lemon.
Have some fun with it and experiment away. You'd be surprised but the chocolate flake and chai tea taste scrummy iced! Buy tea for icing now.
White tea season is in full swing now! Tea pluckers are busy in the spring mist around Fuding in Fujian plucking the very finest silver needles to go into our white tea.
Why does white tea make all other teas feel like big brother contestants in a room full of Hollywood starlets? What is all the hype about?
We love all the teas equally ( pa - ha!) but there is a certain excitement which a new seasons white tea generates. The taste of this tea is super pure and super delicate, the taste really represents how the leaves have been treated - true, honestly!
The tea comes from the same plant as black tea (a slightly different variatal) but only the spring buds are picked by hand and delicately dried. It is the closest you can get to picking the finest shoot from the plant and putting it straight into your cup.
Genuine white tea is only grown in Fujian China and the best grade is the silver needle or silver tips tea. The appearance in the cup should be watery with a hint of peachy yellow colour. If your brew appears green, you are not sipping a decent white tea, more likely to be a green tea masquerading as a white.
Andrew Lane a teapigs white tea drinker says...
'' I drink white tea every day, so tried this one - it was delightfully different from what, previously, I had thought to be tea at its best. It was refreshing, soothing and had so much more flavour than the powder I'd used before!''
For me white tea isn't a wake me up morning brew much more of a sophisticated afternoon cuppa. try it here....
I'm sure, like me, most of you can enjoy a cup of freshly brewed teapigs at any time of the day (or night!) but for fans of 'afternoon tea', The Langham Hotel in London has been named the best place to enjoy a spot of the traditional lifestyle! 
Every April, Irene Gorman of The Tea Guild - an organisation representing 100 of the UK's most prestigious tea places - casts her beady eye over establishments across the UK and decifers a winner of both Top Afternoon London Tea and Top Tea Place. Palm Court at The Langham joins a whole host of previous top-knotch winners including the The Dorchester, The Lanesborough and Browns Hotel.
Starting at £35.00 per person, it's not a cheap treat but we love the fact that tea is getting so much attention! Whether you like to splash out on a whole afternoon, or curl up on the sofa with your favourite teapigs brew - tea is terrific and we love it!
(by Hannah)
Love it or loath it, we all know that it is Valtentine's day this Sunday.
Named after early Christian martyrs called Valentine, the day was established by Pope Gelasius I in 496 AD. Traditionally it's a day on which lovers express their love for each other by giving flowers, choccies, cards and maybe even some lovely teapigs tea!
A pack of 'HOT' chilli chai, delicious mao feng and a beautiful scented candle - perfect for a cosy night in with a loved one. But don't panic you lovely singletons out there, our valentine's cheeky deal is great for anyone...and if it's just for you - there's more to go round! Happy Valentine's Day everyone!
(by Hannah)
Due to it's energy boosting properties I'm quite partial to yerba mate but I'm not sure whether I'm up to plastering it all over my face. However any men out there (and I'm sure women too) who fancy a yerba facial click on this link and get scrubbing.(posted by Nick)
gentleman's ultimate scrub
Thanks very much to Paul, a matcha tea drinker who emailed us saying "So far this summer I haven't taken any of my usual assortment of hayfever
pills/sprays/drops and didn't realise why, then I read somewhere that green
tea is a natural anti-histamine. I think the key to this is that you drink
the whole leaf in Matcha, not just brew it. Every morning now I wake up with
my usual summer hayfever feelings but within 20mins of drinking a good slug
of this they've gone for the day ! Result."
So, if you suffer, then maybe a daily matcha shot will help you too.Super power indeed. (posted by Nick)
a more dramatic hay fever solution
Lou and I had a great day-of-fun (!) on Friday that started with a trip to the Whole Foods Market on Kensington High Street to play around with the first ever teapigs window display... hooray! can you tell we're excited?
So if you find yourselves in the general vicinity go and take a look in the window. You'll even get to see a picture of Lou picking tea in China - no small thing since she hates having her picture taken or being in the public eye generally (which I guess is why her sun hat hides her face in the China pic). Hopefully she won't hate me for posting this photo... our very own tea taster (face and all) in the teapigs window at Whole Foods Market.
Click here to see more pics from our day of fun!
We're going to be at the Real Food Festival this weekend. We think it's one of the most enjoyable shows to visit 'cause it's really bustly with a farmers market feel to it.
As part of our real tea mission, we'll be putting on a brand new real tea taste challenge at the show - we'll be asking you to blind test a teapigs real leaf cuppa against a normal paper bag cuppa (oh the pressure!).
We'll ask you to vote for your favorite and the results will be published on the blog next week... do you know your real tea from your dust?!
Oh and we're very excited 'cause we got a new banner and t-shirts printed especially for it - here we are posing with them:
Ever since this news story broke about a £10m insurance policy taken out on a coffee taster's tongue, Louise has been sticking her's out at all and sundry claiming it to be worth far more. She says that the fact that we in the UK get through some 165 million cups of tea a day compared to just a paltry 70 miliion coffees means her tongue alone has a value above that that of a top Premiership footballer. A tea taster's tongue or a hyped up egotistical footy player. Which would you value more and why? (posted by Nick)
Louise's tongue is too valuable to photograph so here's an illustration instead
