Tag Archives: tea education

5 quick changes before Valentines Day that will make your life better

The internet is full of articles about making your life stronger and better. Companies will try to sell you stuff which you don’t need or will promise you a short cut to an easier life. We are disappointed when they do not live up to their promise and sink further into despair.

The following five tips are from my own life, they are proven and have done amazing things for me. And most importantly they will not cost you a fortune, some of them are even free, and will improve your live in significant and long lasting ways. We are looking for big changes but sometimes the best improvements are right under our nose.

Hydration

The game changer. One of the areas that will have the biggest impact on your life. Chances are that you drink water once you are thirsty or you have a beverage with your meal. You don’t think about water on a constant basis, even though you consist of 70% water. We focus on so many things in our life but we ignore the most important aspect of our body because we believe it is working and does not need much attention. Many meetings and places I go to, I am the only one carrying around a water bottle with me. If you are one of the few people who bring (hopefully reusable) water bottle, you are ahead of the game. Just by sipping water through the day you support your body and your brain in many functions, you provide the oil for your engine. Try the 8 x 8 rule, 8 glasses of 8z per day, easy to remember. After a few weeks of sipping water on a constant basis, you will not even notice it anymore, sip on autopilot and your body will be up and running.

While many people reach for the faucet in the morning, you can kick start your day in a much better way. Drink a glass of fine mineral water first thing in the morning and you tell your day that you mean business. Your body will receive a jump start portion of minerals to fire up all vitals. Your organs and metabolism will thank you. You can even add a spritz of lemon to the water for an extra boost of vitamin C.

Fine Water at Dinner

The conversationalist. With most people using water from the tab, using water for dinner becomes uninspiring, dull and boring. By having an interesting, exotic and unique mineral water at your dinner table will enhance your experience, you can add something special to your evening at small cost. We will have the opportunity to talk about where the water comes from with our family, dream about an exotic location at a rain forest or mountain area. We will experience a unique taste from a different part of the world. Life is all about special moments and creating unique experiences, even during a normal, routine work day. The more you can enhance your normal day and make it special, the more value the day will have to you and your mood will increase. Life for me is to create a growing mosaic of meaningful moments.

With valentines day around the corner, you can make your dinner special by ordering a wonderful bottle of fine still or sparkling water along side your food. Impress your date with stories about where the water came from, the romantic environment of a rain forest or mountain stream. Water is life and it is good sometimes to dream.

Fine Water Tea

The enhancer. Most people make their tea with tab water. You work hard, you invest everything you got into your life,you purchased an amazing high quality loose leaf tea, you deserve the best cup of tea possible. Using the right water for making your tea will bring out the best flavor and your taste buds will thank you for that. Tea water is a vessel to bring our the best in tea as the tea master has intended. Use high quality spring water for tea water. I know it will be a bit more pricey then running it from the filter or tab, but you deserve a good cup of tea and not just an average one. Look at the label. Select a water with a super low TDS level (below 50 if possible) and a ph level of 7. Any other water will not give you the best possible experience. A water with a high mineral level will interfere with the minerals in the tea itself and the ideal taste will be off.

Life is too short to drink a bad tea.

Tea of the day

Diversity. We are living in times where diversity and cultural connections are more important than ever and that’s good. Diversity will make us stronger and we can only learn more from each other. The most interesting thing about tea is the thousands of different types and blends and mixes which are available around the planet. We could drink a different tea for the rest of our lives and just have experienced a fraction of what is available. And new types are coming onto the market every day. Sommeliers are here to identify the best solution for you. You like a certain taste. You might like it more fruity, more sweet, more milky or like me ultra pure. Make it a habit to include a new tea every day, learn about different tastes, research the tea, ask sommeliers more about a certain tea type. I am here to help you to make the best out of your day and make your day special.

Fine Water and Friends

The socializer. Water and tea are great platforms to share new experiences with friends and family. Next time you go to a restaurant, see what waters or teas are on the menu. Ask the waiter what they have. You can share this new experience with your friends and you can impress your family with your knowledge about a certain water or tea. Like any knowledge there is so much around us which we have not experienced yet, which is just waiting for to be explored.

You can gift that knowledge. You can gift a special someone in your life with a water 101 course at the fine water academy to learn more about water.

I hope these tips have send a spark of inspiration your way and make you think about trying one of these tips out for yourself. They are small ideas and changes but can have a big impact on your life.

Stay thirsty.

How to Find Tea and Water Inspiration In Stunning Japan

With the holidays now behind us (☹ ) , it is time for me to reflect on the past few days and weeks. For me travel is always a journey of inspiration. Our Christmas trip this year brought us to Japan, a country that has such a deep tea culture. I had also been in Japan in 1993 and was looking forward to showing my family around.

The holiday period also gave me time to look forward to the new year and to think about where to take my sommelier experience. My goal in the tea and water world is to continue to inspire as many people as possible and to raise awareness and excitement for high quality tea and fine water. I want to continue working with the Myanmar hospitality industry to make an impact on raising awareness of fine water and learn more about high quality tea. I am in need of practical tea making experience and hope that 2019 will be the year I can work on a tea plantation. We have only reached the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the best water and tea experience.

My tea and water blog

From now on I will blend both industries into this one blog. My experience in the tea world can benefit the fine water industry. And my amazing experience learning about fine water will help to inspire the tea industry to use better quality water when brewing tea. I aim to further develop my skills to become a bridge ambassador between the water and tea industries and bring value to both. I do not want to have ‘just another tea and water blog’ but want to ‘oooh’ and ‘ahh’ you with my entries. Sometimes thinking about one industry helps me to understand the other one better. They are certainly not in isolation, but are linked to other areas and categories in the hospitality industry.

Tea in Japan is everywhere. It is firmly embedded in traditions, in the culture and for sure in any restaurant you will eat at. Japan produces and consumes 90% green tea. I was excited to find Japanese black tea at a shop on the bottom of Mt. Fuji together with amazing green teas.

It was great to experience the combination of tea as a drink and as a food. Two of my favorite things: freshly brewed Japanese green tea and green tea ice cream.

The first tea experience when we arrived in Tokyo was at the Hama Rikyu Gardens. We found ancient tea houses, some of them have been rebuilt with amazing materials and a passion for original details. A tea house in the gardens offered matcha tea with sweets. I had to think back to my first visit to Japan in 1993 and how we were privileged to experience a traditional tea ceremony. My wonderful tea educator, Donna Fellmann has studied the tea ceremony for decades. It is a world of tea rituals and procedures which work together to create the best experience for its guests.

For the kids there was a different kind of fun – tea cups in Disneyland!

I just love how readily tea is available in Japan. Everywhere there are vending machines dispensing ready to drink tea. I loved this matcha as a morning drink!

In the evening I would order Oolong tea in a restaurant, served in a wonderful tea pot and tiny tea cups. In the western world it is not common yet to drink tea together with a meal, it is rather a dessert option. I found it wonderful to pair my teas with the respective dish. An Oolong with a roasted and complex flavor pairs well with a meaty and hearty dish.

While being inspired by the peace and tranquility of Japan, I was able to reflect on the fine water category as well. The hotel we stayed in had a water dispenser machine. It got me thinking that the relationship of people with water is impacted by such machine. We see wine as precious coming out of a fancy bottle. However we are used to water coming from a tap or a dispensing machine.

How do we change this relationship? How to we make people feel more interested in fine water and the benefits it comes with? These are questions I will ponder more in 2019.

I will leave you with my wish that you spend 2019 a bit more mindful about water and tea and get inspired to try the best of the best for a little piece of affordable luxury.

Stay Thirsty!

30 Minutes of Tea Liberation

I often reflect back to the beginning of my tea studies.

Here I was in my kitchen in Rome, Italy, holding a thermometer in one hand and a tea timer in the other hand, nervously anticipating the right mix to get the optimal brew.

Fast forward now to my kitchen in Yangon, Myanmar, were I grab some tea leaves and throw it into hot water to get a wonderful cup of tea.

In a way the past year has liberated me from following the instructions on the box and use scientific instruments to make tea.

However the one area where I never felt liberated is how I always experienced buying tea.

In most shops a nice tea salesperson would carefully open a tin box based on my request and would allow me to have a careful glimpse into the box. In good stores they might let me smell the tea from a safe distance.

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How to Let Go of Your Tea Bag

(and explore a new dimension…)

Many people around the world who love tea every day engage in the same ritual.

Grab a tea bag from a box, drop it into a cup and pour hot water over it. Wait until there is some uniform color appearing in the cup and pour some more ingredients into it like sugar, milk or a slice of lemon. Then take a sip and hope that this mixture will not be terrible.

Or sit in a plane and after the meal service the flight attendant will come around announcing the arrival of the tea (or coffee) to be poured into your little plastic cup.

And many of us who are attending a conference or workshop, grab a teabag from a ‘selection’ box and hope for the best.

This is the daily reality, mostly in the western world, and there is nothing wrong with that. It is a beverage you made for yourself, you like it, it comforts you, and so of course that’s good for you.

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How to Make Tea Without Hot Water – Cold Brew

What is Cold Brew?
I have been receiving some queries from my tea friends on how to properly cold brew tea.

Personally I am a big fan of this tea brewing method as it gives you a unique tasting experience and you get to know a different, relaxed side of your favorite tea.

When you brew tea hot, over 400 different components are released into the water and some of them are released quicker at higher temperature. You will have noticed that if you brew a hot tea at a too high temperature or for too long it becomes bitter. Not so with cold brew tea, which will be more mellow, more balanced and sweeter as the high temperature components are less dominant.

Cold brewing gives you a whole new range of preparing tea. But you will need patience, as this is not your quick tea bag dunk for 2 minutes. Good cold brew tea will take several hours, if not even overnight to release the wonderful magic that is cold brew tea.
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Reflecting on the 2016 World Tea Expo

Since it ended in July, I’m probably the last person to be writing a blog about the 2016 WORLD TEA EXPO, but the event was just so important and amazing that I still need to write down my thoughts.

Born as a Christmas Market idea in Germany, ManwithaMug.com became reality early in 2016 as I was approaching the finish line of my 52 week training to become a tea sommelier.

The program included a final graduation ceremony held during the World Tea Expo in Las Vegas, USA. First I dismissed this idea due to the tremendous logistical challenges this was presenting (I was living in Rome, Italy to be assigned somewhere else in the world). But somehow with a lot of moral support from Ms. Tea we shifted our agenda around, planned our family visit to Boston around that time to hand over the kids to the grandparents and took the plunge and made reservations for the Expo.

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Establishing my new life in Myanmar

After a few weeks of broadcast silence I am finally back behind the keyboard to continue my blog from Yangon, Myanmar.

You might think I lost interest or have achieved everything I wanted with this blog, but quite the opposite is true.

In the past weeks I had to set priorities as the move from Rome, Italy to Yangon, Myanmar, which is quite substantial. My focus was on settling the family into a new house, getting the kids used to a school routine and have a successful start into my new assignment as the Head of Finance and Administration for the World Food Programme in Myanmar.

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What is a Tea Sommelier?

TEASOMMELIER_SLIDER A big heated debate is currently running through the tea industry – what is a tea sommelier and how can these people compare themselves to highly skilled wine sommeliers?

As I am on the path to become a tea sommelier myself I thought it might be a good moment to add my five cents to this discussion.

In ancient times, the job of a sommelier (derived from the middle French “saumalier”) was to keep the provisions (food and drinks) of a royal house well-stocked. It also included tasting and taking sips of wine to ensure they are edible and not poisoned.

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Darjeeling – A Mystical Tea Region

23247819_train As I have mentioned in many blog entries before, I am passionate about the Darjeeling tea region. It has a special place in my heart as this relatively ‘small’ tea region has a unique structure but most importantly produces amazing teas.

This region strives to produce high quality loose leaf teas to amaze the tea community. I am not quite sure if this comes from my cultural DNA, as Germans in general have a strong connection to this tea region and this type of tea. This blog entry by no means is meant as a complete and conclusive overview of the Darjeeling region but more of a reflection of personal experience I had with these wonderful teas. Continue reading →

Tea Reflections – Dark Teas, Like a Fine Wine

Dark Teas

I have experienced this type of tea both on my own time and in my studies, but it’s not a favorite type for Ms. Tea. I have a feeling that I will spend more time with these great brews in the future as I find the process of creating dark teas fascinating. It is also the only type which has a fermentation process included in the creation of the tea. It’s also the only type of tea which can be collected and stored to become better over time just like a fine bottle of wine.

52507585_puerh A large component of this category are Pu-erh teas and they come in all forms and shapes. Normally seen as little cakes or bird’s nests they have their own way of being brewed.

Some call it an ‘acquired’ taste, but several times I was able to prepare the most amazing tasting cup of tea. This tea benefits from multiple infusions similar to Oolongs and it is also advisable to use a Yixing clay tea pot to get the best results. Normally the first infusion or even infusions gets discarded to wash the tea and to wake up the leaves. I have also seen some exact opposite reports claiming that the first, unwashed infusion is the best and the purest. Some teas can give more than 30 infusions! I have read stories from tea houses that people gave up drinking but the tea leaves would still give flavor even after 30+ infusions!

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