My latest obsession

Lately I've been obsessed with the whole "Julie & Julia" phenomenon. I had read Julia Child's memoir a couple of years ago, on a trip to Paris, and it was incredibly inspiring. Here was this woman who, at age 37, found her true purpose in life just because she liked to eat. What better inspiration could I have than that?

I love tea, therefore at this point in my life (unfortunately even later than age 37), I'd like to make it my life's work. And since I seem to have been getting signs from the universe that perhaps going back into corporate life may not be my path (see previous post), I'm taking the next month to work on getting my tea dream moving forward.

At the moment, that may be as a part-time, home-based business, with the goal of opening a brick & mortar location in the (hopefully near) future. I'm having some meetings this week to figure out more details on what I need to do in order to get this going. Sounds vague, I know--and I know I need to be more crisp on what I want and what I plan to do. However, at this point, even just saying something that vaguely is a step forward for me.

I need to contact some of my tea connections to talk about sourcing tea, as that is one of my biggest concerns at this point. Then of course there are all the various government regulations to navigate--but I have sources for that info which should be very helpful. And I need to figure out what it will all cost--how I can get things moving with limited funds, and then grow from there. Bootstrap Austin should be a good resource for that info.

And as I stumble through the fog in my quest, I'll keep Julia Child's journey in mind. I know there must have been many points when she questioned why she was doing any of it (eight years to write Mastering the Art of French Cooking!), but she persevered. So I'll use her as my role model. And I'll keep experimenting with recipes for my eventual tea shop--the cherry clafoutis dessert to our Julia-inspired roast chicken & asparagus with hollandaise dinner was a huge success--and hope to find some added inspiration as I bake!

Signs from the universe

This post is not really about tea or laughter, but I need to write it down and get it out there.

I just found out I didn't get a job I really wanted, and I think I need to question whether the universe is sending me signs to open my tea shop. My friends say yes--that I need to either raise the money now, or figure out how to go to pastry chef school and then raise the money--but I'm still not sure.

Maybe I'm just scared--scared to try it and fail, and then have to try to get back into corporate America in a few years with an even bigger gap on my resume. Scared that it won't really be what I wanted in the first place. Scared that it will make me happy but I won't be able to make enough money to make a go of it.

I know that when I think or talk about tea and baking, I get very excited and animated, and feel happy & like I know what I'm talking about. But is that enough to translate into being able to run a business? Would I be able to share my enthusiasm with my customers, and make them feel happy and comfortable when they visit my shop, or will I get so worn down with work & worry that I won't have the energy to be hospitable to anyone?

I know I need to finish my business plan and assemble a team to help me with the things I'm not good at and should delegate. I know I need to get serious about figuring out financing. I know this is a good time to be shopping for commercial real estate. I know all of these things, and yet I hesitate.

I jumped off a cliff when I quit my job with no job in reserve, and that was a huge step for me. Compared to that, this should be easy. This should be a no-brainer: the job market is insane, I have a great idea for a business that everyone I've talked to has shown interest in, a down economy is the best time to become an entrepreneur...why can't I just do it?

I don't have the answer to that question at the moment, but I'm actively trying to figure it out.

In the mean time, I'm drinking Iron Goddess Dark Roast oolong, and eating a glazed chocolate donut. It's comfort food. But it really doesn't go with oolong.

Tea and cake

Today, after what seems like months of 100+ degree heat, we're finally getting a little rain here in Austin. It seems like I only like to write blog posts when it's raining, since the last time I wrote was during another rainy day.

But on a rainy day, I usually want to stay inside with a cup of tea and enjoy the weather. Today's cup of tea is a lovely Darjeeling, with a nice winey, fruity flavor. Actually, there's just a hint of grassiness in there, too, which makes it a summery sort of tea.

I've been on a bit of a baking binge lately--my friend's mother died, and I was baking things for her family all last week--but all I can think about today is baking a pound cake. So I've been going through my recipes, trying to find a pound cake recipe for which I have all the ingredients. I always thought that pound cakes were the simplest, most basic thing to make, but as I've read all the different recipes, I've revised that opinion.

From the traditional 1-2-3-4 cake to pound cake with sour cream, yogurt, or more butter than you can imagine, the recipes are just all over the map. And, something I didn't know either, apparently pound cakes can be quite difficult to make--something about the fact that the ingredients are supposed to be all at room temperature, and if they're not, the batter curdles. That's not something I've ever encountered, and after my coffee cake debacle of last week, something I'd much rather stay away from!

The coffee cake debacle was rather surprising--I was using an America's Test Kitchen recipe that had 1 tablespoon of baking powder, and it overflowed the pan almost as soon as I'd put it in the oven. Then it took forever to even get close to fully baked--when I finally took it out after almost twice the recommended baking time, it still wasn't done in the middle. And no, it wasn't my oven, as everything else I baked that week came out fine. I've emailed America's Test Kitchen to ask them if possibly there was an error in the cookbook (since you have to pay to see their recipes on line), but they haven't responded with anything more than a form e-mail (and an offer email to buy more of their cookbooks!)

So that little adventure has made me a bit gun-shy in trying new recipes, where usually I just jump right in and see what happens. After careful perusal and consideration of my options, I think I'm going to go with my tried-and-true recipe from the "Paris Sweets" cookbook by Dorie Greenspan (one of my absolute favorites). It's actually a recipe for a lemon or orange cake, but she includes an option to make it a vanilla cake instead. I've made all of them before, and they always come out just perfect, with a fine grain and great flavor.

The only thing that had been stopping me from making it was that I didn't have enough cake flour, and had no heavy cream. So it looks like I'm off to the grocery store in between showers. Then I'll be able to sit down later and enjoy another pot of Darjeeling with a fabulous vanilla pound cake, just like I've been craving!

Rainy Afternoon

I've been sitting here listening to the rain and drinking a nice spice tea for the past few hours. Listening to the rain is a big deal here in Texas, since we're in the middle of a huge drought. Right now, there's a lake out behind my house, but it will be gone by morning, I'm sure.

While I've been listening to the rain, I've also been thinking about where I want to go with my career. I'm in the middle of a job search, for a new project management position, but things seem to be going very very slowly, to say the least. So I'm trying to think of ways to get some income going, and get closer to my long-term goal of opening my own tea shop.

I've come up with many options, although I'm not sure how to achieve any of them. I have been working on my tea shop business plan, learning about tea, and meeting people in the tea industry for the past year or more, but I don't seem to be moving quickly enough toward my goal. I would love to be an apprentice to a tea buyer for a major tea company, but I don't know if I'm pushy enough to make the connections to get to that goal. I'm working on getting that way, though--I've been to so many networking events in the past few months that I can walk up to anyone and introduce myself and start talking. So I should start working on the ability to introduce myself over the phone or via email.

A lot of people I've talked to have told me that now is the perfect time to start a business, since there's lots of space for rent at good rates due to the state of the economy. But I just don't feel ready to jump into my tea shop business yet, even though I have the vision of it in my head. I've conceptualized it, but I need to understand the details better before I begin. That's probably not the way of the true entrepreneur, but it's what I need to do.

Somehow I need to figure out how to bridge my supply chain and project management skills into the tea industry...but jobs there seem to be few & far between. And none of them are here in Austin. So I may be packing up my stuff and selling my house and moving on, even though I love it here. For a tea job, I think I would leave. For anything else, probably not.

Tea with the Brits

Well, it's been almost a month since I last posted...things have been a little crazy here. However, I'm ignoring all that, and am just going to write about a lovely tea I had with some friends just about a month ago.

My friend Mollie invited me to come over for tea one Sunday, with her (British) husband David and two other (also British) couples. Mollie was trying her hand at making pies, so she asked if I would bring something savory to complete the menu...along with a selection of teas for the group.

I wanted to use ingredients that I already had on hand, so I looked through my fridge, freezer, and cabinets to see what inventory I had. The combination I came up with was mushrooms, goat cheese, and puff pastry...but I didn't have a recipe for those items together. I did have a recipe for a mushroom & goat cheese bruschetta, though, and found a recipe on line for some goat-cheese-stuffed puff pastries, so I decided to combine them. Nothing like experimental cuisine!

So I sauted the mushrooms with garlic, shallots, and wine, then mixed them into the goat cheese. Then I rolled out the puff pastry & cut it into squares, filled them with a dollop of the mushroom mixture, and closed them up like little purses. I still wasn't too sure how they would come out, but when I tasted one of the first batch, I knew I'd hit the jackpot. They just melted in your mouth!

Next challenge: tea selection. I didn't want to get too exotic, and since the group was mostly Brits, didn't think that flavored teas would be the best option. So I chose a Lapsang Souchong, a Chinese green tea, a white tea flavored with champagne and berries, and a plain black tea.

When I got to Mollie's, we polled the group on which teas they would prefer. To my surprise, almost everyone voted for the Lapsang Souchong! I think the smoky flavor was appealing as a counterpoint to the sweets we were having--but it also went very well with the savory dishes. I started making the tea, and everyone else started nibbling on the goodies.

The mushroom & goat cheese puffs went over very well, so I will definitely add that recipe to my tea shop menu when I open it! I also served them at a party last week, and everyone liked them so much they requested the recipe, so I guess they're pretty good! Dot had made some lovely little tea sandwiches, too, so we had a nice selection of treats.

The Lapsang Souchong also got good reviews...I think we made two or three pots. I love the way the smokiness has a sort of palate-cleansing effect. It makes it an excellent accompaniment to all kinds of foods.

And Mollie's pies were wonderful--she made a mixed-berry pie with a fabulous home-made crust. The filling was just tart enough, and the crust was flaky and buttery, and a great contrast to the berries. We had some other goodies, too, but at this point I can't remember what they all were!

All in all, it was a nice, relaxing afternoon, with lots of good food, tea, and conversation. It was just the type of gathering I'd like to have at my tea shop, and gave me some great ideas for menus and tea/food pairings. Now I just need to figure out how to get such a great group of people to hang out there all the time, and bring in more customers!

Tea Evangelism

In my guest-blogger role on T Ching this month, I wrote a post about "Familiarity", talking about how people are more comfortable with coffee, and asking how tea lovers can promote tea as a more universal beverage. I got a lot of great comments on the post, including one that said, "Tea has a perception of ‘old/female’ and that’s a bit hard to break but not impossible, as more and more young men get hooked and the ‘red hat’ image is broken. Tea is cool." Which is absolutely true, but I'd add to that by saying that tea is for everyone--young, old, male, female, from any country, of any economic strata.

So the question is, how do we promote the image of tea as the new, cool beverage, replacing a latte or a capuccino? How do we make tea more accessible to everyone? By highlighting the health benefits of the catechins, flavonoids, and other anti-oxidants that tea is packed with? Or by talking about the huge range of flavors available from different types of tea? Or simply by saying "Coffee is over. Drink tea!"?

One of the sticking points may be that many of the tea blogs that are out now concentrate solely on reviewing teas, and I think the plethora of detailed flavor descriptions (alluding to fruit, mushrooms, leather, etc.) may be a bit overwhelming to a novice tea drinker just looking for a bit of info.

“Aha!” I thought, “This may be why people are so intimidated about drinking tea.” If you think you need to be able to articulate the mouthfeel, astringency, and aromas of the tea, not to mention describing why the leaves remind you of your childhood searching for truffles in the south of France, you might be prone to say, “I’ll just run to Starbucks and get a cup of coffee. At least no one will expect me to write a book about it.”

When I read the details of the water temperature, brewing times, and first, second, and third steepings, it seems like in order to enjoy tea, you have to have such a huge base of knowledge that it’s not worth the price of entry. Of course, if you’re interested in tea and lucky enough to know someone with a bit more knowledge—or can find a welcoming tea shop where you can learn—trying your first Darjeeling or oolong can get you hooked for life, and blogs like this are like reading a great novel (or at least a short story).

That’s why I'd like to have a tea shop that is an open and welcoming place where people can come and relax over a cup of tea…whether or not they know the difference between a sencha and a souchong. I know there are shops like this—I’ve been in a few of them—but there aren’t enough of them in the US to make tea the ubiquitous beverage that coffee has become here.

We need to keep pushing forward until there is a tea shop opposite every coffee shop. Until you can order tea at a restaurant, and get an actual tea pot with loose tea, instead of a cup of lukewarm water and a box of tea bags. Until you’re not looked at like a freak if you say to a flight attendant, “I’d like hot tea, please.” (Of course, that applies only to US airlines—airlines like BA or Singapore Air actually ask you if you’d LIKE tea.)

But the only way that’s going to happen is if tea lovers and tea purveyors work to demystify tea for the general public. Kind of like what’s happened with wine: there are still plenty of people who are incapable of drinking a glass of wine without rhapsodizing over the rich berry-toned bouquet of a Cab, or the oakiness or lack thereof of a Chardonnay, but the man or woman on the street now seems to feel that they know enough to enjoy drinking wine without being intimidated.

So I say to my fellow tea drinkers: share your love of tea...and sneak in the education when you can. Get people hooked on it first with the fantastic flavors, then gently work in some tidbits on health benefits, types of tea, brewing pointers, history, processing, etc.

Or, in the spirit of tea evangelism: "Tea drinkers of the world, unite! Go forth and multiply! Spread the word among the non-believers!"

That Sunday Morning Feeling

I love Sunday mornings. I always make a big pot of tea--flavored tea, for the weekend--and listen to some classic tunes like Ella Fitzgerald singing Cole Porter, or Frank Sinatra singing anything, or a little Peggy Lee. And if I've planned ahead, I might even have some fabulous baked goods to round out my morning--this morning I have some yummy lemon-blueberry oatmeal muffins with my spice tea.

Sunday mornings always seem like a pause in a busy week--a time to reflect on the past week, plan for the following week, and just take a breath. When I was working at my last job, it was always the last bit of fun and relaxation before the Sunday evening blues set in, but now it's just my time to think about what I'm doing before acting on it all week.

I think a big part of the meditative feeling I get is from making and drinking my pot(s) of tea. As many others have pointed out, just the activity of making tea gives you time to slow down and reflect while it's brewing. And yes, I may be a Godless infidel who doesn't go to church every week, but I think that many years of going to church instilled in me a need to take time out on Sunday for contemplation.

So, what am I contemplating this week, you might ask? I'm trying to figure out how I could translate that Sunday-morning feeling into the overall atmosphere of my tea shop. I'd like my tea shop to be a place where people can take time out from their busy lives and relax. Whether that's reading a book with a cup of tea, chatting with a friend over tea and scones, or getting together for a small celebration, I'd like to have a place where people could come and take a break.

I've talked to quite a few people about what a tea shop would mean to them, and even though most have a slightly different view of exactly what the details are, everyone seems to be looking for a relaxing spot with a feeling of community and welcome. So, if anyone is out there reading this, I ask: what would you look for in a tea shop (tea room, tea cafe, whatever you want to call it)? Inquiring minds want to know!

Positive Reinforcement

I'm drinking up the last of my first-flush Darjeeling from last year, and today I'm enjoying the wonderful one from Tindharia Estate that I bought from Upton Tea Imports (http://www.uptontea.com/ ). Fabulously fruity aroma with winey undertones, and a soft, almost peach-like flavor and very little astringency. (See, I'm practicing those descriptive words.) It's kind of like drinking wine, with none of the aftereffects.

As I drink my lovely "Champagne of teas", I've been smiling over all the positive reinforcement I've been getting on my tea shop plans. I've been to 2 or 3 meetings and a networking happy hour in the past few days, where I was introducing myself to people and telling them of my plan to open a tea shop. The overwhelming reaction was "Oh, that sounds great!" At one large meeting where I stood up and introduced myself to about 100 people, there was a collective "Oooohhhh" from the room when I said I was planning to open a tea shop.

I also got very good reactions to my proposed business name, so I'm feeling very good about that right now, too. I'm actually a little surprised that I've been getting such an overwhelmingly positive reaction when I talk about my plans--everyone is interested, everyone has a good experience with tea to relate, and everyone seems to think that there is a need in the market for this business. No one has said, "That will be hard to do with the economy the way it is."

One of the meetings I attended was a discussion of what it takes to be an entrepreneur and get your business going, and one of the things the presenter said really hit home with me. He said that when he is considering whether to invest in a business, he wants to know that the person who is asking for the money is totally committed to making their idea succeed. He wants to see that they have invested in themselves before he's willing to invest his money.

The reason this hit home with me is that even though I have a vision for my tea shop, and feel that there is a need to be filled with it, I've also been a little hesitant to throw everything I have into it, because I'm afraid it won't succeed and I'll be left destitute. The idea of starting all over again in my forties is NOT a pleasant one, believe me.

However, as the Cowardly Lion once said, "I DO believe, I DO believe, I DO believe"...in my idea. So even as I continue to look for a full-time job, I'm going to be doing a lot of soul-searching and even more research to figure out how I can make my tea shop dream a reality.

Because if my idea is hitting such a chord with most of the people I've spoken to about it, I think the time may be right to move forward with it, the economy notwithstanding. So I'll let my lovely Darjeeling tea help me ruminate on this, and try to come up with a path forward. Stay tuned!

Old Friends

One of the things I did today, along with trolling a million websites for job postings, was meet my best friend from grade school's best friend from college for coffee. I know, it should have been tea, but it wasn't. It was very interesting to meet Liz, who I hadn't met before even though we've been living in the same city for a year or so. We had a great time talking and getting to know each other, and filling each other in on gaps in our friend Cindy's life.

Of course, I also spent an inordinate amount of time complaining about the flat spot in my hair that seemed to result from going to a new stylist over the weekend, which Liz kindly said she didn't notice. These are the kind of friends you want to keep!

Before I went out, I had brewed a pot of a tea called "Natela's Gold", which is one of my favorites. I hadn't been drinking it lately, after my oolong tea indoctrination in San Francisco, but this morning I wanted something familiar and relaxing. Clearly it didn't help enough, since I still got agitated over my hair, but I think it helped to make me just a bit more zen.

"Natela's Gold" is a black tea from Georgia (the country, not the state) that I bought at a local tea shop called Tea Embassy (http://www.teaembassy.com/ ). Although it's a black tea, it's very mellow, with an almost sweet flavor to it naturally. The liquor is a clear coppery color, and the aroma has just a hint of nuttiness (kind of like me, my friends would say). See the slightly blurry picture above. I'm not very good at coming up with adjectives to describe tea flavors--my favorite being "like an orange stuffed with capers"--so I don't know if my descriptions will ever want to make anyone drink the tea I like. I guess that's something I need to work on if I ever want to have a tea business of my own, huh?

Anyway, I always love drinking this particular tea, and today it felt singularly appropriate, as I was meeting an old friend of an old friend, and I feel like this tea is an old friend. One whom I love to spend time with, whether I'm working away at my job hunt and business plans, or just relaxing with a book in front of the fire. It's not a demanding tea, but one that gives quiet rewards every time you brew it, and therefore always has a place in my tea cabinet.

An Abrupt Start

I've been meaning to start my blog for quite a while now, and finally sat down to do it this morning...ten minutes later, here I am, with my own blog! How did that happen? Wow, now I actually have to have something to say.

So I'll introduce myself: my name is Nancy, and I love tea. Wine & chocolate, too, but primarily tea. My dream is to start my own tea shop--well, actually a tea cafe or lounge would more properly describe it. So I hope that this blog will document my progress toward that dream, and that it will come to fruition. And somehow I think there will be plenty of laughter as I stumble toward my goal. (Or gaol, as I just typed!)

I'll also be talking about tea that I'm trying, tea spots I've visited, the tea industry in general (what I know so far), and my adventures as a budding entrepreneur; as well as other random things that cross my mind. I hope you'll join me on my little journey as I navigate through a whole new world.