planning to host fellow tea obsessives

This week I found out that a fellow tea obsessive that I met through twitter will be visiting Munich this summer. Actually a couple of tea obesessives. Should be quite the experience. Am already pondering where to take them for tea.

I go on and on about the meagre opportunities for decent tea drinking here in this city, but we do have tea shops/tearooms and I honestly can't wait to show these places off.

My visitors are already very familiar with the city of Munich, but in Southern Germany the people are much better known for their Kaffee und Kuchen (coffee and cake) than they are for their knowledge of tea and tea drinking. This is slowly changing. We have a budding tea culture.



There's the Tushita Teehaus, which I wrote about in a general sense of well-being, and then even closer is the Laifufu Teesalon, which I wrote about in Oolong Nirvana in the Next Street Over. (pictured on the left)






There's a very British place, which I'll talk about another time, where we could have cream tea, and if we're really ready to throw caution to the wind, there's always Afternoon Tea at Die Vierjahreszeiten (The Four Seasons).



So there's no reason for me to get overly excited just yet. Still have to wait several months for the opening ceremonies, but just going through our options for tea in Munich is making me thirsty.

cream tea and the tea mother

Cream tea

‘Who’ll be the tea mother?’

When I first started getting interested in tea, I met some friends who’d gone on and on about cream tea. I’ve since found out, and it’s worth describing. It’s important how this is done, so I plan on going into a bit of detail.

I can already hear several of you saying not so softly under your breath, ‘What’s the point, Lahikmajoe? Why can’t I just go back to enjoying my simple tea bag? You’ve ruined my tea drinking.’

Maybe when you hear about cream tea, you’ll feel differently. Maybe not. To be honest, when I finally had the opportunity to try it, cream tea turned out to be simply tea with scones, fresh strawberries (or simply strawberry jam) and Devon clotted cream. If you like those things, you’ll enjoy this. Supposedly, the origin of the cream is rather important. The fat content of the cream and the way it’s clotted has everything to do with why people rave about this.

Back to the story. My friends invited me over so that I could finally try it, and I gladly accepted. The first question they asked when I arrived was, ‘Now who’s going to play tea mother?’ I somehow controlled my first response, which was unflattering, and instead I simply asked, ‘What’s a tea mother?’

‘It’s whoever’s going to pour the tea,’ he responded. Oh, ok. I let one of them be tea mother. Each of them is more maternal than I’ll ever be.

So, if you get the opportunity, try cream tea. If you don’t like strawberry jam, scones, clotted cream or tea, then don’t bother.