DAVIDsTea’s Glitter and Gold tea, Sparkling!

If you aren’t familiar, DAVIDsTea’s Glitter and Gold tea is a Chinese black tea blended with gold sugar balls, gold sugar crystals, lemon peel, cloves and vanilla. True to its namesake, Glitter and Gold does sparkle. Admittedly, if you brew this tea normally you might not see the tea sparkle. I owned 50 grams of this tea about 3 or 4 years ago and only once or twice saw it sparkle, an only when I used a glass tea mug. Not too long ago, I was gifted a couple servings of Glitter and Gold tea. One sleepy morning I decided to have a cup of Glitter… Continue reading, hoot!

Oolong Owl’s Tea Favorites of 2014

The Tea Owls and I had a lot of awesome tea in 2014! What I find the most interesting when I think about the teas I’ve had in 2014 is how my tastes have changed. I still love trying new teas – sometimes opening a tea package gives me more joy than drinking an old favorite. Drinking a wild tea blend is still exciting. However, now I don’t mind astringency these days whereas before it was a big turn off. I remember last year brewing raw pu’er with lower water temperatures of 185F, now I use boiling water. Come at me… Continue reading, hoot!

Tea Candy – Oolong Owl 2014 Halloween Edition

Happy Halloween Tea Peeps! I love Halloween, mostly because of all the spooky stuff, candy and my birthday being a week away. The Tea Owls are dressed for trick or treating. However, I think they want tea treats. I guess I could give them individually packaged tea bags that they’ll hate So, what to give to a Tea Owl? Tea Candy! At my local Asian grocery store (99 Ranch Market) I found a small line of Tea Candy under the brand “Bali’s Best”. I had to get all the flavors for the Tea Owls in order to prevent a violent trick… Continue reading, hoot!

Discontinued Teas – Finding old favorite teas and heartbreak

I write this as I sip at one of my favorite teas – Good Morning Sunshine – a guayusa citrus blend from Butiki Teas. Not too long ago, Butiki Teas announced she is closing up shop. My undergrad major is psychology. In a marketing psychology class I came to realize what drives me to buy stuff – limited quantities. If I have the feeling if I miss out on something, I freak out. When I heard Butiki Teas was closing down, I ordered a bunch of my favorites (and some new teas that I would regret not trying), not waiting for any… Continue reading, hoot!

Memebox: Oolong Owl’s Tea Cosmetics unboxing

Hello Tea peeps! Today’s post will be something a little different. Usually here at Oolong Owl there is tea samplings, tea ware and chubby tea owls. Today we will be looking at TEA COSMETICS! Similar to monthly tea subscriptions, I enjoy monthly subscription beauty boxes – I get Ipsy and Birchbox – both are great to try new makeup, skin, and hair products and experiment with products you’d never buy normally. I heard about Memebox and was interested. First off – everything is Korean products! Korean skin care products are quite popular, with lots of really cute packaging. Memebox isn’t… Continue reading, hoot!

Unflavored Traveling Tea Box – An Unflavored Tea Paradise

Themed Traveling Tea boxes are becoming a favorite of mine – an unflavored themed one is even better! This traveling tea box was put together by the Steepster Community and has traveled around the USA. As with other tea boxes, you put in tea in the amounts you have sampled, though they do start getting big as the longer the travel as the added new tea packages take up more space than the tea taken out. Traveling tea boxes are great for sampling new teas without having to buy a bunch, with the only cost of shipping and teas from your collection. If… Continue reading, hoot!

Teeny Tiny Traveling Tea Box with Tiny Tea Owls

Another traveling tea box! After participating in a couple big Traveling Tea boxes, I wanted to try out some of the themed traveling tea boxes that are going around in the tea community. If you are unfamiliar about traveling tea boxes they are a community put together (sometimes tea seller assisted) box filled with tea that is chained mailed to other tea lovers across the country (sometimes world). This box is a Teeny Tiny Traveling tea box – one of many tea boxes going around the Steepster tea community. With similar rules to other tea boxes such as replace as much tea as you sample and finish,… Continue reading, hoot!

2014 4th Annual Los Angeles International Tea Festival

As much as I miss living in Canada, living in the Los Angeles area has its perks with lots of festivals in town. I was stocked to go to this years Los Angeles International Tea Festival to say hi to fellow tea lovers I met last year and the World Tea Expo, attend the tea workshops and most importantly – drink all the samples! As with last year’s Los Angeles International Tea Festival, the festival was held at the Japanese American National Museum, August 16th and 17th. The location seemed tighter this year as there were a few more vendors this year, way… Continue reading, hoot!

You Are The One, My Little Black Yixing Teapot

You are the one, my black yixing teapot. I saw you at the shop and knew from the get go, you’ll be my black tea pot. You were the last one at the shop, and I held onto you, determined to take you home. The shop keep scribed my name on the label and you became mine! At home, you were taken in with open wings – the Tea Owls were happy to have you on board! To start our tea journey, we boiled you, as carefully as possible to start you as a blank slate. I know, little yixing black… Continue reading, hoot!

So much bubble wrap! Ebay Tea ware Fun

On occasion, I order tea and tea ware from Ebay. Ebay, especially from sellers based in China, have some killer deals and hard to find tea ware. However, when you get teaware shipped from China, you get some interesting packaging. Yunnan Sourcing has some legendary use of the bubble wrap, however this one takes the cake: This package is a tea set I took a risk on, bidding on a new seller. It looks the seller I got it from sold a few things and stopped, so no point of me linking them here. My package arrives with no box… Continue reading, hoot!