Day 67: Whittard's Spiced Fruits

I mentioned earlier that I am beginning to run out of teas in my house.  I do have a whole sampler of Whittard's teas that was given to me as a gift, so I've got a few days out of those still!

I was making a card for a friend who is in hospital, and decided I'd share some of the joy of tea whilst doing it.  I've seen these cards before, with the little slot in them for a tea packet, so I decided to make my own, and was quite pleased at the results!  I spent a lovely hour with pens and paper and colours and craftiness and then slotted in a tea packet and away went the card!

My absolute favourite of this sampler is the Spiced Fruits. It tastes just as it ought to...fruity, but not overwhelmingly so or with a thick aftertaste, as many combination-fruit teas have; and with just a little tang, as though someone added chili powder and lemon, or some sort of odd addition like that. It's very different, but it works!

My walk today was to the train, from the train, to someone's house to look at a camera, back to the train, back home!  I was pretty exhausted actually! Those hills in Edinburgh get fairly steep, especially when carrying around my camera and lenses on my back.  I was glad to get home and chillax for a bit before going out to see a film in the evening.

Walk length: 1 hour

Day 5: Whittard's Rosehip & Hibiscus Tea

Today was a day borrowed from summer. Or, from Arizona in October. The air was warm, warmer than I expected when I went out. I had seen small children running around in shorts and bathing costumes, squirting each other with water guns and splashing around, but this is Scotland. Even the slightest patch of blue sky and the children run around in shorts and grown men take off their shirts as if to say "I say it's summer no matter what the weather tells me". (And it's not just the chill air that causes me to wish they'd put those shirts on again.) But I digress. This was NOT one of those days - it was genuinely warm. Pleasant. I walked to a friend's house and after 20 minutes felt almost too warm. How nice! :) The sky wasn't blue anymore (it had been bluer in the morning), but the cloud cover was such a pale colour that it hardly seemed cloudy. I'm pretty tired tonight, so I don't feel I'm describing this at all in a way that expresses how it was, but that's how it was. :)

So today's tea was chosen from a Whittard's sampler that was given to me for my birthday. It came with a huge, and I mean massive, teacup and saucer...I love them, but it's actually hard to drink a cup of tea in it, because by the time I take a few sips the hugeness of the cup has cooled down my tea. (So I went for the RP Theological Seminary mug, which has faded significantly since I got it free at a conference.)

Rosehip and hibiscus. I thought it was a good choice for a summer's day. It's a surprisingly strong tea, brewing a dark red when you would expect perhaps a light pink colour. It needs to steep for quite a while - even after five minutes the full flavours haven't been completely released. I could see taking this tea and making it iced, with sugar, for a summer's day....but that will need to wait for America! I'm looking forward to some incredible iced teas when I'm in the States next month.

Hibiscus is a flower with some good connotations for me. My mum used to grow these at our house in Arizona, where we moved when I was seven.  Our house in California, where I lived before that, had an abundance of good memories - the huge garden, the fruit trees, the flowers, the strawberries...and when we moved to our house in Phoenix I missed all of those things.  But our new house had an orchard of grapefruit trees, and it also had a massive hibiscus plant. I remember those hibiscus flowers, bright red, sweet - and lasting for only one day. No matter what you did - leave it on a counter, put it in a vase, change fresh water, put it with other flowers, leave it on the bush - those flowers only ever lasted one day. I used to think it was sad, but after a while I came to enjoy that.

Because no matter how hard you try, you can't make that flower live longer, but you can't cause it to die early, either. You can enjoy it for what it is and for the beauty it brings and the summer you see in a flower, and then it is gone.  "For what is your life?" says the Apostle James. "The glory of man is like the glory of the grass.  The grass withers and the flower fades, but the Word of God lives forever", says the Apostle Peter.  This life is very fleeting. This summer's day, which felt like we got it on loan, has fleeted away. (I don't think that's a word, but like Humpty Dumpty, "a word means what I say it means".) And my cup of tea is fleeting, too.  But I have enjoyed it. I enjoyed the warmth of the sun as I walked, talking with friends about their upcoming wedding, the food from a barbeque, a conversation with a friend on prayer.  My hibiscus flower was beautiful today.  It is dying now - the day is dying, and my tea is cooling, and I'm tired.  But God's gifts go long beyond today, and I look forward to a day of rest and worshiping Him tomorrow.

And now I'll settle in with my rosehip tea and enjoy the last remnants of a Saturday before the Lord's Day tomorrow.

Enjoy your tea.

Walk length: 40 minutes

Day 4: Chocolate Chai

This was a brand-new tea for me! Pin and Audrey went shopping tonight and came back with a Chocolate Chai from Whittard's. I've tried a few different chai teas before, but never one with chocolate in it. I'm just perusing the ingredients now as I sip it...cocoa, chickory root, cloves, ginger, cardamom, cinnamon, coconut, pink pepper...it's like an Indian Christmas, if there is such a thing!

The bag says it's "best brewed fairly strong and served with milk"...I'm trying it on its own so that I can attempt to taste all the flavours within it. It's a fairly powerful tea - I find it interesting that the bag says, "Ideal for bedtime" when just taking a sip of this chai seems to wake me right up...or send me to several different countries and cultures in a moment!

In order to bring out the best of my new tea, I delved into the depths of my tea cupboard and scrounged out a little tea-house strainer that I remembered having. It's just the perfect size. I filled the house with all manner of flavours and spices, and let it steep for a little while. I took a sip after only a minute or two, and enjoyed the light, fragrant taste...then let it steep for several minutes and am now being blown away by the intensity of this tea!

 
I'd hardly even call it a tea, once it's steeped and milk has been added to make a 'proper' chai...there are so many additional taste sensations combined that my senses don't really know what to make of it.

But it's brilliant for a Thursday night in when I should be going to bed, but I'm enjoying a night off, spinach-and-artichoke-dip and sparkling white wine with my sister (and watching old 80's films on YouTube for free). You can't buy that kind of happiness.

Oh - my walk! I almost forgot! I headed to the grocery store earlier to get the makings of the spinach-artichoke dip. A fresh, breezy, cool-but-not-too-cold night, with the sun setting in golden-peach colours on a blue background. At the time of my walk it made me think of something sharp and citrusy, but I couldn't resist the chocolate chai.

So I'm off to finish my tea of the day...perhaps add some milk in the next cup ("ideal for bedtime").  What are you drinking tonight?

Walk length: 15 minutes