Blooming tea

As promised last week, I am now going to create a tea blossom. This tea was sent to me as a gift from Cath, my blog friend who lives in Cyprus. I actually created this blossom yesterday because I was not sure how it would turn out and wanted a spare day in case something went wrong.

Materials used (from left):
Potholder to absorb the heat on my kitchen table
Heat resistant glass
Filtered tap water
Tea blossoms
Potholder to remove boiling water from the microwave.


The water is poured and the blossom bud is ready. I don't own a tea kettle (sad to admit since I am a member of a tea group), so I usually prepare my tea water using my coffee maker. However, this called for boiling water, so I knew I had to use the microwave.

After 1 1/2 minutes in the microwave,


the water was sufficiently bubbly enough to accept the bud.


I know! This is a horrible photo, but I have no better picture, even though I took about 30 at this point. Blame it on me, or blame it on my camera, but I simply can't get close-ups with it.


Oh look. The background is in perfect focus. The blossom is not.


Within seconds, this bud had blossomed. Then I remembered the instructions said to steep for three minutes, so


I grabbed my hourglass 3 minute timer and


proceeded to watch the water begin to turn color and the bud expand even further.


At this point, the bud is constrained by the size of the glass.


I have now cleaned up most of my supplies and am ready to remove the bud from the glass. You can see the blossom is beginning to break up, and any further time in the water would only serve to break it down further. By this time, I was able to add some heated water to another cup and got two cups of tea from this blossom.

Ruminations:

Although the glass was heat resistant, it was hard to grip coming from the microwave. That means a mug with a handle, or stemware is a better choice for my hands.

The width of the glass constrained the bud, and although I was able to get an enjoyable blossom, it is my belief it would have bloomed even further had I used a wider vessel.

I have a horrible camera, which does not take good photos, especially close ups, and realize I need a better one before I try this again. At least I have five more buds to play with.


Speaking of blooming, here is a photo of the sunflowers from last week, which are now starting to bloom, too. It's been a blooming tea day, that's for sure.


And here is a sneak peek at a box of goodies I received from Pat at Artfully Ooglebloops, a fellow tea friend, which I will unveil tomorrow.

If you want to view other tea (or drink of the day) stories, please visit Kimmie for links to the rest of my tea drinking friends.