Thank you Stacy for this juicy tea sample!
I can understand why Stacy stocks this tea so that she has plenty on hand for herself! It’s really good tea!
This morning, when I saw the words ‘Black Tea’ on the sample packet, I casually picked it up thinking, "OK, a nice Black Tea for my morning kick in Le derrière ".
The leaves were long and beautiful. Chocolate brown twisty fingers.
With such dark leaves the liquor was lighter than I expected,
very clear and fragrant, with a scent like apricots and honey.
Before tasting my tea I went to the freezer and took out a few of my prized dried California Apricots (the plump ones that are hard to get ) and cut them up to gather the aroma. ‘Sniff’
The scent was the same as the tea!
I took a sip and the black tea was honey apricot without any maltiness. The mouth feel was rich and full even though you would have imagined at first that the tea was light as a feather.
The smoothness hides the slightest tingle of astringency as the tea cools. There is plenty of juiciness and sweetness, but it’s really all about the golden apricot honey which is hypnotic and swishes you away.
Being raised in Northern California, Apricots were plentiful and never cold packed like the kind you find in the stores today.
My mom (Pat) canned them, grandma (Lolita) made jam, and I picked them off trees to eat fresh, made desserts, and froze them for my kids as popsicles.
Before Silicon Valley was ‘Silicon Valley’ it was agricultural and had orchards and Canneries. Sunkist, Del Monte, S&W, Hunts, Libby’s, and Marianni’s all were there, and in the Summer the teens from my High School worked cutting ‘Cots’.
(Yes, there were no McDonald’s jobs because in the earlier 1960’s there were almost NO fast food restaurants!)
You cut ‘Cots’ (apricots) and got blisters on your hands for minimum wage, and were glad for it! If you were frugal, you might earn enough in a Summer to buy a $100-$200 used car!
Years later, (1980’s) across from the Apple Computer World Headquarters in Cupertino, I noticed an acre of huge drying flats of apricots laying in the sun at Marianni’s Cannery. The old and the new were side by side (and now gone).
A last remnant of what was once a lush valley of 100,000 that had been replaced with concrete and a population of over a million people.
Some have never tasted an apricot fresh off the tree when the sun has ripened it with a blush of red on the skin. The sweetness at just the right moment is juicy and bursting with life.
Try to stop at a stand where they are fresh if you can.
This youtube is somewhat bizzare, shows a 1955 film of Silicon Valley agriculture (a silent movie with soundtrack). Makes me want to cry because it’s gone! I lived for 12 years across from a Prune orchard and vineyard which are part of a freeway now. http://youtu.be/-PacfbdTIms
This tea for me was one reminder of my childhood and I want pass this kind of flavor memory forward like my family did with me.
One of the reasons that I love the organic farms and buying local!
Thanks Stacy! (I know Stacy tastes PEACHES but I taste APRICOT)
That’s adorable, and it sounds like a fantastic time! Would you mind sharing the poppyseed shortbread recipe?
Sure! I just need to get it typed up and I’ll message it to you.
Could I get a copy too? Shortbread and poppyseed sound like a divine combination :)
Awesome! My husband thanks you in advance ;)
Awesome thrift store find!!! Your tea party sounded lovely too :)
cute pot! :)
That pot is adorable.