teakkurim

21 tamuz 5782 it is summer here in the PNW and although the season started off cool and   cloudy, the sunny hot days are finally here. this means i am trying to spend as much time outside as i possibly can. Part of doing that is by going camping on all my weekends and i finally got to do my first camping trip of the summer. i have weird days off so i wasn’t able to go with anyone on such short notice but going by myself is just as good (and sometimes even better… i like my alone time). this time of year is when i also like to connect with all of the beautiful plants that are around me. something i always do when i go camping is to start my mornings with an herbal tea made with the plants around me. it gives me something fun to keep in the back of my head while i am exploring and getting to know the area where i am. it feels like a good way for me to get in touch with the place and to start to build a relationship with the land. when picking wild plants, a rule that i like to fo...

recently, i have been experimenting with making some non-traditional kugels. i didn’t grow up eating many kugels (some, but not many) and i haven’t made any until recently. they’ve been great to add into my weird diet that tries not to eat too many grains, is gf, dairy free, and legume free. it’s nice to make a big ol’ kugel and have it to easily heat up and add to my meals throughout the week when i don’t have as much time or energy to cook. this recipe i made up takes inspiration from one of my favorite dim dum dishes (which is the reason i feel it is reasonable to post on this tea blog). i love those crispy on the outside and gooey on the inside daikon cakes served with many dim sum meals. the real daikon cake, Luo Bo Gao , is a lil too complicated for my daily meal prep, so i made this rip-off kugel version that’s a lot quicker. *i don’t measure when i cook, so these measurements are approximations, but i think it’s still pretty spot on ingredients: -one large russet pota...

   

1 tevet 5782 i don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the titles of my blog posts have some words that are hard to pronounce. yup, that’s right, they are Hebrew (well, Hebrew words ‘transliterated’ into the English alphabet…). i actually put a good amount of thought into what i want to title these blog posts. the Hebrew words are not the direct translation of the English blog post but they are references to something jewish be it a quote form the tanakh, chasidut, kabbalism, or aggadah. sometimes they’re just puns because i love puns (lots of jews love puns). in my ideal world people would google these words and try to figure out what the references are because they’re pretty clever and offer some nice niche insights into parts of jewish culture. so now that you’ve read this, come on, give it a try. don’t you like a little extra layer of word games and literary references in your tea blogs? feel free comment for hints if you aren’t able to find the connection. xoxo, atzei besamim ...

s ivan 7 5781 just the other day was shavuote, the jewish festival of weeks, one of the three pilgrimage holidays. this holiday celebrates the barley harvest. the barley was planted at the end of Passover and now it is ready to reap. a common teaching is to talk about the transformation of seed to plant and concurrently the transformation of wheat into bread (lots of metaphors there since this is also the day that, mythically, the torah was revealed to the Israelites at mt sinai. transformation for this collection of wanderers into a nation and the transformation of information into mature knowledge which the study of torah is supposed to encourage).   this is similarly the time when spring puer is being picked, processed, and pressed. there are definitely some nice connections to be made in terms of thinking about the transformation of raw leaf into tea and the transformation of puer overtime as it ages and evolves.   shavuote is about celebrating, appreciating, and learning....

  as i wrote in a previous post , i contacted white2tea about an issue i had with their artwork. i did not hear back. i wrote a more formal letter and sent it to their website and instagram. i still haven’t heard back.   this is bothering more than i wish it did.   here is the letter i wrote:   i would like to ask you to change the art you choose to use for your censer white tea cakes.   as a jew, and a kohen at that, i think it is not fitting to have a picture of a kohen gadol (a jewish high priest) on a product that has nothing to do with the jewish faith or culture. additionally, it is upsetting that the artwork you chose is done by a non-jew.   as a company who talks about being dedicated to social justice issues, i think it would be good to choose different art for your future censer tea cakes. if you want to be extra cool, i suggest also putting a footnote on the pages for your current censer cakes saying that you will be changing the art and the reas...

15 shvat 5781 today is the jewish new year of the trees. yaaaaaay!  like mnay jewish holidays it occurs on the full moon for extra magic sparkles.   why is today the new year of the trees you may ask. the tradition holds that during this time of year is when the sap in the trees starts flowing. this is a transition for the trees’ life cycle and is the beginning of them ‘waking up’ for spring.   this holiday was originally a time for israelites to mark when trees were planted or started bearing fruit for detaied tithing reasons that i dont fully understand... in the 1500s, kabbalists started to reframe the holiday in a new light choosing to focus on fruits and the beauty trees bring to our world. these sages developed a seder similar in style to Passover where people would gather to eat fruit, drink wine, and share teachings about nature. incase you didn’t know, there are a lot of teachings in Judaism about trees. the foundational ‘tree of life’ being just the beginning....

3 tevet 5781  my go to teas in the winter are puers and aged white teas. im here for the fresh sheng as well as the aged. this doesn’t sound like a big revelation because these are already teas i really like independent of the season. these are my go to teas in addition to dan congs so there is nothing too astounding about this revelation. so why do i like them during this time of year in particular? im about to get kinda woo, look out.   in the winter i spend more time indoors than i wish i did. i still go out into the woods and go for walks, but i have a hard time with the cold. its not bad out here in the PNW, but im still indoors more than i wish i was. i need the woods and being outside to not get too depressed. it makes me happy and helps me connect to the world and the things i love in it. the less im outside, the less i get to connect in that way and i have to find other ways to connect. tea is one of those ways for me.   puer and white tea both hold a certain qi ...

  25 tevet 5781 i bought some things from white2tea recently. people online like them so i felt i should give it a try. their prices seem pretty high and their design style looks like they are marketed for a boujee-er audience. but i wanted to check out the cheaper end of their catalogue and see if their more affordable options were still decent. i bought some 2020 sheng and some dan congs.   after my purchase i came across an unsettling eye sore. a white tea cake with a picture of a kohen gadol, a jewish high priest. what?! not only that, but the kohen gadol looks like it was drawn by a someone who is a New Age Esotericist illustrating a Tarot card after reading a book about “Q”abbalah.   why is this on a tea cake? what does a kohen gadol have to do with this white2tea cake from Yunnan? did they ask anyone jewish whom they know? i very much doubt it was picked or processed by a jew. i also doubt that it was given a heksher.    the cake is named “Censer” for the...

17 tevet 5781   i needed to make sure the name for this blog was properly fitting. it needed to be an accurate reflection of myself and what i want this blog to be.   this is one of the big things that holds up the weird stories i write. i want every character‘s name to be dense with layered metaphors and allusions and to have layers upon layers of hidden meanings. when i cant think of a good name i get stuck in my tracks. it's silly. thankfully, my blog writing is a little less uptight.     nevertheless, the name i chose for this blog had to fit that criteria. it had to be layered. it had to be jewish. and it had to have a cheesy tea pun in it. well readers, i am proud to say that i accomplished my mission.   teakkurim. where does ‘teakkurim’ come from?     the first part comes from the word ‘tea.’ ahhhhh. 'tea' is the American English word for the British English word for the Chinese word ‘Tu/Te,’ which means ‘bitter herb.’ ‘Tu/Te’ is one of the many...

 

17 kislev 5781   welcome to our continued segment of getting to know the tea drinker behind the screen. scratch that.   IN the screen … i am avoiding writing a tea review because the tea i am most excited to try is some aged sheng puer i need to re-humidify. they are samples that came in a plastic bag that i want to make sure are in decent shape before i try them.    i am still new to puer and have ruined some i bought by not knowing how to store it and wondering why something that tasted good when i first got it now tastes flavorless and has no aroma. the main reason was that i was not storing my tea properly. valuable life lessons.    i lived on a converted school bus until a month ago when i upgraded to a travel trailer. believe it or not, but a school bus in the pacific northwest is a terrrribbblllle place to store tea.   right now, i have the samples in an airtight tupperware with a boveda humidity pack for 69% RH. before putting them in there, i ...

  14 kislev 5781   i am going to start a tea blog.    i don’t think i deserve to (it wont take you long to learn of my booming self esteem—- self esteem which only increases as the amount of daylight i get decreases. daylight that only comes in rain scattered sprinkles this time of the year in the pacific northwest).    i am not a tea expert. i do not know Chinese. i am not rich and i cannot afford high end and rare teas.    what i am is someone who loves tea. that is one reason i am writing this. i am also a nerd. i am a plant nerd  and  i am a word nerd. i have a handful of story projects im working on but those juices just aren’t flowing right now and i really miss writing. i need something more to do in the winter than read, drink  tea, and mope. i want to use this blog to help me learn form the teas i drink. yes, i am utilitarian to a fault sometimes, but i swear i am a sappy romantic who watches lots of romcoms and likes ...