I am fortunate to have the best tea parlor in Northern California, right here in Newcastle! “An Afternoon to Remember - Tea Parlor & Gifts” serves delicious food, well-brewed teas and has a fabulous gift shop. It is the best place to spend an afternoon or to pop in for a refreshing “cuppa” & a warm scone. Mandarin orange is my new favorite!
The owner, Amy, and her delightful staff are super-friendly, and are ever-willing to share their love of tea and extensive knowledge of “all things tea” with everyone!
This being the case, my first real outing (not to a Drs. appointment, ugh!) after my surgery was to attend an event at Afternoon to Remember: Tea 103 – Oolong Tea Tasting. What a great and informative couple of hours we spent learning about & tasting Oolong tea! Then, just to make it even better, we were served two kinds of scones. Mandarin Orange & Jamaican Banana – Lemon Curd & Devonshire Cream included!
I took a few photos during the tasting. I hope these will give you an idea of how the tasting was conducted and encourage you to find a tea parlor of your own!
Please take the time to visit the An Afternoon to Remember website. You can shop for tea and accoutrements & their wonderful cookbooks, see more photos & sample menus, and view a great video of a tea tasting with James Norwood Pratt, which I also attended. The video is lengthy but very entertaining and if you are interested in the history of tea, you shouldn’t miss it!
This is the entrance. I love the little butler with his tea cup!
Interior View
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Table set for tasting/class
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Amy - parlor owner
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Some teas were brewed in glass pots to show off the color
& served in a small cup. (see next photo.)
This is our individual tasting set up.
Small cup for tasting from glass pots, 3 traditional tea "bowls",
and three individual tea pots.
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Tea brewing in individual pots.
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Then, we tipped the pot onto the tea bowl.
Here are the steeped leaves.
Most Oolongs can be steeped multiple times! Some prefer the 2nd or 3rd steeping.
I learned so much and tasted such wonderful Oolongs at Tea 103! If you'd like to hear more, leave a comment and I'll post a mini-class about these delicious Oolong teas!
Enjoy! Chris
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