World Tea Expo Day 1: Organoleptic Experience of Tea

Attentive audience, great questions, and of course the experience of oolong teas together with whiffs of their component aromas…hope our attendees enjoyed our skill-building workshop as much as we didi!

“We” are not just Donna Fellman of World Tea Academy—among other things, Donna gave us details about the manufacture of oolong and about what to look for in a good oolong, not to mention some secrets of cupping—but also Marzi Pecen, who spoke about the scents we experienced—not only does Marzi know tea but she has had extensive experience with perfumery in France—and Suzette Hammond, another major contributor to the conference, and Ana Kotar, who together with Suzette skillfully brewed the teas and handed out the aroma paddles.

One of the most fascinating aspects of the workshop for me was to experience how much the flavors of the teas were enhanced when we sniffed the aromas then tasted the teas. It was as if sniffing one of the tea’s component aromas, such as jasmine, “primed the pump”—the aroma came to the fore in the tea, but even more importantly, the tea tasted richer and more complex.

Much discussion, as a consequence, on how to pair teas with foods—clearly foods have aromas and flavors too, so if you pick the right combination, tea and food together can be more delicious than either component alone. But I can tell you, if you pick the wrong combination…oh my!  a waste! more often than not the tea tastes like so much hot water! 

Which is probably why so many people said that they preferred drinking their tea by itself, without food...

Here's Donnna—she is working like crazy here to make a whole slew of events as success!