Lightly Alcoholic Tea Punch!!!

I wanted to thank everybody for your kind feedbacks on our tea punch!!! Great to know everybody loved it!!!

The recipe was inspired by the Punch story. In old times, sailors in the sea had nothing to do but mixed drinks with spices. Punch, which means 5, includes 5 elements-Bitter (TEA!), sour, sweet, weak and arrack. The original punch was alcohol based. I replaced alcohol with tea!

Our Lightly Alcoholic Tea punch was born!!!

Taste profile: very refershing, very well balanced tastes, has the aftertaste of bitter, sweet, and sour, with nice fruity aroma, beautiful presentation!! THE BEST! Absolutely delicious!!

To make the drink more healthy, I made a revision on the original Tea Punch recipe. Here's the reduced Sugar version:


Prepare time: 20 minutes, plus at least 3 hrs to chill
Yields: 20-24 servings (or approximately 96 oz)

Ingredients
6 oz Sugar (or adjust to taste)
2.5 cups of Apple Juice (unsweetened, from concentrate)
¼ cups of Lemon Juice (from concentrate)
2 cups of Grapefruit (from concentrate)
½ cups of Tequila
¼ cups of Vodka
4 Tea Beyond Grade A Blooming teas-assorted
6 cups of spring water
*Strawberry Gingerale ice cubes

Instructions:

1. Boil spring water and get the sugar dissolved in hot water: Right before the water reaches boiling point, add sugar in and stir until completely dissolved.

2. Steep the tea: drop 4 blooms and steep for about 15 minutes.

2. Mix Apple Juice, Lemon, Grape Fruit, Tequila and Vodka in a punch bowl

3. 15 minutes later, mix all liquid together. Let blooming teas stay in the mixture.

4. Cover with the plastic wrap and put it in refrige to chill for about at least 3 hours.

5. When serve, float on Strawberry ice cubs in the punch bowl and serve!!

*Strawberry ice cubs:

Ingredients: Ginger ale and whole strawberries (or strawberry pieces)

Fill the ice cube mold with ginger ale and add whole/sliced strawberries pieces to each cube. Freeze to use. Please allow roughly 1 day to process.

Tips for preparation:

1. Make sure to use very good branded ingredients to get the best results, such as apple juice, etc. Good quality ingredients always bring the high quality results!

2. Alternatives for sugar: you can use honey, if you prefer, or Stevia. Volume might be different. Add it gradually and taste it.

3. Avoid use water to make ice cubes-Water will dilute the drink. (see, I'm SMARTIE ^0*;))

4. Strawberry Gingerale ice cubes: use Strawberries that come with green leaves for ice cubes. It creates nicer presentation in the beverage, also looks very fresh!

4. Leave the blooming tea in the mixture: it creates nicer presentation, exhotic and continues to release the tea flavor.

Here's the original tea punch recipe if you have a sweet tooth:

http://teabeyond.blogspot.com/2009/12/exotic-blooming-tea-punch.html

Long Spout Teapot Tea Performance 长嘴壶茶艺

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9D-g74SINw

Long Spout Teapot Tea Performance (长嘴壶茶艺), one kind of Kung Fu (Gong Fu) Tea performance, is a popular tea performace in Sichuan (Sizchuan in most English, famous for its spicy food) and Zhe Jiang, China.

One story says in early 3 century, the Chinese emperor Ah Dou was afraid that someone could attack him while serving him a drink. His Strategiest, Zhu Ge Liang (诸葛亮）designed a special pot that has long curved spout made of cooper for him. This pot can be used to carry liquor but also be used as a weapon to protect him.

Another story says old tea houses are always crowded and there are not many waitresses. People do not want to wait. Long Spout tea pots allow waitress to pour tea from a distance thus can serve multiple people at one spot.

There are few styles: Erh Mei style (Sizchuan), Dragon 18 Style (Meng Ding, Sizchuan), Fu Rong (Sizchuan) and Tai Chi (Hangzhou, Zhejiang),etc...This short video was recorded in Hangzhou. He is actually a champion of Tea Performance in China.

Our Youtube channel:
http://www.youtube.com/user/Teabeyond

Happy tea, yes indeed!

We finally launched our Free Giveaway program in May 2010. Anybody that subscribes our email list will have the opportunity to win a FREE gift. We release the list of winners on the first day of each month.

Brian from NY is one of the winners of our FREE GIFT GIVEAWAY in May. After received his gift, he wrote:

I did win your contest, and received a collection of your beautiful teas. You have no idea how that made my day. It made me forget all the cares and worries of the day. If just receiving such a special treasure made me feel that way, I can't wait to make a pot. I can;t tell you how much that means to me. Thank you so very, very much!....Once again, Thank you so much. Take satisfaction in knowing you've made one person very happy.

Nothing is better than this!! Happy tea everyday, dear tea lovers!

Tea History-The Discovery of Tea

Chinese legend reads that the Emperor Shen Nong ("the god of farming") first discovered tea leaves when he observed that many of his people were dying of epidemic diseases and he decided to search for medicines. The legend says that Shen Nong (picture below)



has a transparent skin which enables him to test the toxicity of an herb by observing the change inside of his body.

He discovered tea one day while testing a cure. On this day, Shen Nong tried too many different kinds of toxic herbs and he lost consciousness. As he lay there, a few drops of dew from a tea tree dropped on his lips and revived him. Fascinated by this miracle, he ate the leaf, and though it was very bitter, he was able to see the leaves moving through and removing the toxins from his body.

It is recorded in the first Chinese medicine book named after Shen Nong, 神农本草经 (Classic of Chinese Herbs by Shen Nong), that Shen Nong tried 72 toxic herbs a day and that each time, tea detoxified his body. This is the first known record in Chinese history that shows tea being used as a medicine.





News of these medicinal qualities spread fast and tea varieties were developed for a host of different ailments, many of which are being proved true by modern science. For example, numerous recent studies have found that green tea has more anti-oxidants than any other drink. Anti-oxidants are shown to help reduce the presence of free radicals in our body. Free radicals randomly destroy healthy cells and reduce wholeness. It's no wonder that after more than 5000 years, green tea remains one of the most popular teas of the world! In honor of this rich history, Tea Beyond uses only the highest quality green tea as a base for all our beautiful blooming teas