Genmaicha Rice Vs. Sencha Rice

If you aren’t following Tea Curious on instagram, you need to! She encourages experimenting with your tea instead of just accepting what people say about tea. She often tests ways of brewing, tasting etc! She recently had a challenge to drink down your green tea collection and guess what, I really needed to participate.

I started out with having some of my old, but surprisingly still good matcha every morning until that was finished and then I turned to my cabinet where I have a few green teas. I’ll be honest, while I don’t dislike green teas they aren’t what I reach for first so they often fall by the wayside. I actually really enjoy cold brewing green tea and drinking it out of a fancy glass with my dinner :)

Since today was the last day, I decided to help drink down my stash by experimenting with cooking! I was set on cooking rice in tea because I love doing that :) I’ve done it a few times and you can find those recipes here:

Gyokuro Rice

Matcha Rice

Oolong Rice

Tamago Kake Gohan - gyokuro

Long Jing Quinoa

In this post, I will talk more about the teas as opposed to the cooking method, so if you’re interested in that make sure to check out the linked posts.

Let’s meet the teas: Genmaicha and Sencha.

Both of these teas are actually fairly fresh. The genmaicha is from ippodo tea that I was given to photograph for one of my birthday giveaways! The sencha is a gift that my cousin brought me from his recent trip to Japan. I’m almost 100% certain it is sencha after asking some friends who know Japanese and also comparing it to my other green teas.

Now, I broke several rules of here for the sake of the experiment. I’ve cooked with tea many times and there is a balance between bitterness and all the flavor cooking off. I decided to cold brew the tea with 3 tablespoons of tea to make sure I got a potent brew since I would be using the brew as the water for the rice. I know this sounds like a lot but I need it to be potent so that it isn’t all cooked off which can happen.

So, at first glance the Sencha (on the right) is way darker in color and looks like it will give more of that flavor into the rice. This is the first interesting part of the experiment because this also speaks to when brewing this tea. Both of these brews had the same amount of tea and water and cold crewed for about 10 hours. I didn’t open the leaves up with warm water first, I just filled with vessels with cold water. I cooked each 1/2 cup of rice with one cup of the brewed tea.

At this point, I also kind of knew which rice I would like better. But, let’s continue!

When I cooked the rice, I also put a little less than a tablespoon of the leaves into the dry rice. It may seem like overkill, but I wanted to see which tea would hold up best to the environment.

After cooking, there was a large difference in how green the two rices turned out. You may be able to guess based on the darkness of the brews above.

Since I used tea in the rice as well, the sencha was a little bit more potent in terms of turning the rice color.

So after taking a few bites of each, here is what I thought. Genmaicha was the winner! If we talk about the flavor of green tea, the sencha rice is definitely more overpowering but it is present for the genmaicha but in a more pleasing way.

The sencha was strong but also a bit bitter. I would still totally eat this whole bowl and pairing it with either an egg or veggies and meat will be delicious. But on it’s own, it was just a bit too bitter and it seemed like the leaves kind of fell flat in the cooking process. The one thing that this rice did hold over the genmaicha is that the leaves incorporated better into the rice and it was a bit easier to eat.

The genmaicha rice was my favorite for a few reasons. First, I thing the brew was an nice, even flavor that really shows up in the rice. I think the genmaicha is much better quality tea than the sencha. The genmaicha flavor shows up in the rice but it is also mellow enough to let you enjoy the flavor of the rice as well. I think this would pair well with something a bit heavier. The one downside to the genmaicha was that the larger leaves and rice made it a bit more difficult to eat incorporated as there were some chewier aspects to it.

Tea.L - Tea Infused Skincare

I love drinking tea but I also love to try all the various tea infused products out there! Sometimes those products are a yummy snack and one of my other favorites is testing out tea infused skincare. If you look at all my facemasks and lotions you will notice that most of them have tea somewhere on the packaging. I was really excited to discover Tea.L which is a tea infused skincare company. There are a few things that set them apart from most of the skincare I’ve tried right off the bat before even trying their product.

1. They actually tell you what teas they use in their products. So many products will just say green tea but Tea.L takes it a step further and lets you know that they use dragonwell. They also use yerba mate and rooibos! This stuck out to me as more genuine and that I would get more benefits from the tea in their skincare.

2. They tell you that their products are 99% natural. So many brands will say they are 100% natural when it just isn’t true. Again, Tea.L shows their transparency in their product. The 1% that isn’t “natural” is a safe product but they differentiate this which I appreciate !

Now, the actual products! If you’d like to watch an unboxing, you can check out my IG TV video here

Tea.L sent me a box showcasing their three products: an eye cream, face cream and body lotion. The eye cream combines green tea + yerba Mate. The face cream combines green tea + guayusa. The body lotion uses green tea + rooibos.

Right off the bat, I really enjoyed the dispensing method for these three products. The eye cream has an easy to dispense pump as opposed to having to stick my finger in a tube or squeeze a tube. The body and face lotion also have a pump mechanism as well which is really cool and I thought made it easy to not get too much out at once.

The other immediate thing I noticed was the smell. There is no artificial fragrance used in these items so they actually smell like tea which I really enjoy! The one with the strongest smell to me is the body lotion. The first time I put it on, my partner told me I smell like bubble tea, I agree with him that it was such a nice smell.

The face cream is nice and goes on well although I will admit I’ve used this one the least of the 3 as I have been testing out different skin care regiments. The smell of the face cream isn’t overpowering and I didn’t notice any reactions to my skin. The body lotion, which I’m almost out of is one I’ve used a lot. In the winter time, my skin definitely need some TEALC (hehe) and this lotion does the job. As mentioned above it has a nice smell and it goes on really well. I don’t have to rub it in a ton and I feel like it kept my skin moisturized for most of the day!

My favorite of the three products is definitely the eye cream. In the past few years as I’ve started my business, many nights with little sleep make eye care key! Their eye cream is a pretty thick consistency which to me make it absorb well into my skin and actually feel like it’s giving me some sort of coverage or layer of moisture! This is a thick cream so there is some rubbing in to do but I think that contributes to the feeling that I’m getting some coverage under my eyes without using any makeup. The skin under my eyes is a bit thinner so I appreciate this in an eye cream!

I’ve really enjoyed using these and look forward to purchasing more when I run out! I think it’s important to also share the people behind this great experience so I’ve asked the duo behind Tea.L some questions. Read their answers below to get a little more insight on them and their products!

Tell me a little bit about who is behind Tea.L

TEA.L was founded by husband and husband Zhao and Ron, who enjoy long walks at night and drink tea religiously. Ron used to work for a Canadian tea company called David’s Tea and Zhao came from a Chinese family with a 3-generation tea-drinking tradition. We don’t mind drinking from a tea bag when in a pinch but we always appreciated loose leaf tea in an infuser knowing their names and origin, and we want to maintain the authenticity throughout our self-care routine. The ideation process was driven by Zhao and Ron, but TEA.L was made reality thanks to a group of diverse individuals who brought in their unique perspectives: LGBT, millennial immigrants, ethnic minority, and women. And we hope that translates to our products where we stay simple by eliminating any assumptions about who should use our products, and we’d love to hear from you on how we are doing on that.

What was the inspiration to start a skincare line?

When we tried to incorporate tea in our skincare routine, we were very disappointed to find out that nothing on the market with tea claims approached tea with the authenticity a tea lover would expect. Everybody seems to be hiding behind ‘tea extracts’ and ‘fragrance’. We found ourselves asking, why can’t we treat tea in skincare as who they are when we drink them? That was really the genesis of TEA.L, if we can’t find one, let’s create our own! As we started our R&D process, we learned that each tea has its unique profile when it comes skincare benefits, just like their profile of color, texture, aroma and taste. Who knows rooibos and yerba mate each contains polyphenols not found in green tea? And this further reinforced our belief that all the tea lovers, regardless of where they are in their tea journey, they deserve to enjoy tea on their skin with the same authenticity in their drinks.

How did you choose the teas that make up your products?

We did the intuitive thing which is diving into our root as tea lovers. Ronald worked for a major Canadian tea brand for years when the loose-leaf tea movement just started to take hold in the US consumer market. Zhao came from a Chinese family with tea drinking habits that lasted for 3 generations (one of the things he packed with him when he moved to the US was a jar of his family’s favorite dragonwell). We have our favorite teas to drink but we knew from early on that we need to put in the hard work and expand our knowledge in understanding how these teas can benefit our skin.So,we spent 2 months digging into academic papers on dermatology and cosmeceuticals to learn everything there was about studies on tea’s effect on skin(with some help from friends in the skincare industry). And we lined up about 8 tea candidates including 3 green tea varietals (Gyokuro, Dragonwell and Sencha) based on our research. The next 6 months was endless trial and err on the other ingredients (oils, butters and extracts) and the infusion process. We had friends and families who volunteered to test our early prototypes, so we were very fortunate to have their feedback to improve on. The biggest challenge was to retain the scent of the tea while maximizing the effectiveness of the antioxidants. 8 months later, we finalized the teas and tisanes that are currently in our product: dragonwell, rooibos, guayusa and yerba mate

What do you think sets your products apart from other tea infused or based skin care products?

The fact that we are a tea-first skincare brand who uses organic loose-leaf tea and tisanes with minimal processing and maximum preservation in our products. And this is driven by our vision to bring tangible value to our customers’ self-care routine, whether they are looking for more ways to benefit from tea or introducing tea as a new element in promoting a youthful look. There’s so much hype and so many new trends out there in skincare, and we aspire to help our customers create authentic self-care rituals that actually work for themselves.

What do you see in the future for Tea.L?

We hope that TEA.L will lead another wave of tea awakening for its role in skincare, just like how loose- leaf tea did with drinking tea. We believe this can be achieved when we connect with the tea lover community through their skincare routines and refresh the definition of tea in people’s lives.

What is your everyday tea and what tea do you want to drink more of in 2020?

Zhao’s everyday is dragonwell from family influence, it is just perfect in every way for him. Ron’s go-to is gyokuro steeped at 95 degrees for 2-3 mins, that way he gets more of the sweet flavor and less of the stringency. We do share rooibos together after dinner to aid digestion and just relax. We both want to drink more Oolong in 2020, as it is actually often overlooked, especially from certain region like Taiwan. We love how it sits between the green side to black side, and that it is versatile. It can be steeped multiple times and we get varied flavor profiles from every steeping. Specifically, we loved this Ginseng Oolong tea from David’s Tea but unfortunately it was discontinued a few years back, they are these tightly winded Oolong tea coated with Ginseng powder, would like to find them again.

Besides skincare, what are your other favorite ways to engage in self care?

Our recent favorite is to improve our sleep hygiene for better quality sleep. Sleep hygiene are the 12 good practices to aid deeper sleep and make you feel energized after you wake up. Among these practices, we are making an effort to get up at the same time each day regardless of the day to keep the biologic block set or entrained, and get off our devices at least an hour before bedtime. So far it’s been working wonders. It is something anyone can try so we highly recommend them.

Matcha Waffles

I have a lot of matcha recipes planned for this summer! Mostly because summer is kind of go, go, go and matcha powder makes everything so easy!

I don’t generally eat a lot of starchy carbs except for rice but one of my all time favorite things is waffles!!! I remember back in high school, I requested that my birthday dinner be at eggspectations because they serve waffles all day and night - chocolate chip, of course.

Please note, This post and the photos within it contain affiliate links. If you purchase something through the link, I may receive a commission at no extra charge to you.

I was browsing waffle recipes and saw this one that was simply blended and used oats. I based my recipe off of this one! I don’t have a large blender but a small ninja smoothie blender. What I did was split all the ingredients into two batches like shown above and placed my matcha powder in one of them so I get two waffles of each! Feel free to use matcha for all your waffles!

My batter felt a little thick even for waffles so I added a little bit more cashew milk (the milk I used) for each batch. I have one of those waffle irons that flips and has a timer. I put a range of time on my recipe because people like their waffles differently. I cooked mine for about 4 minutes and that made a softer waffle with a touch of crisp. If you like crispy, I would go for 5-6 minutes. Here is the waffle maker I have, we got it a few years ago at Christmas time :) p.s. Christmas is almost here. Yes, I’m linking my fav countdown for you!!!

The top waffle is the matcha one and at first you may not see the green due to the golden crust but just bust these babies open and you will reveal that beautiful green! I really like the way the matcha and oats compliment each other in this recipe. I chose not to use any additional sweetener, but note that because a banana is used, these aren’t totally savory. There is a hint of sweet.

If you don’t know which matcha to use, I suggest Midori by Matchaeologist. It is a great quality matcha for culinary purposes!

Top these waffles with whatever treats you like! I usually love to either have just butter or some butter and fruit on my waffles!

Do you have a favorite waffle topping?!

Long Jing Quinoa

Hey There! I’m finally back with another recipe and I thought that it was time to do something savory! I’ve done tea infused rice before so why not try quinoa!

I bought this red quinoa loose from safeway. They have a nice section where you can fill up a paper bag and the cost is by weight. I like how I can just recycle the bag afterwards, no plastic packaging! I want to start off by saying, I’m Persian so rice is like a love language to me but every once in a while I’ll have quinoa.

I had been making my way through some long jing that I got for my birthday and was towards the end of it so I decided to use that. I think this could go well an oolong, hojicha or something like genmaicha or gyokuro as well.

I didn’t have directions for this quinoa so I followed the general rule of doubling the amount of quinoa for how much water to use. Quinoa expands 3 times so 1 cup will make plenty !

The recipe is simply one cup quinoa to two cups water. Instead of using plain water I brewed two cups long jing and used that to cook the quinoa so that it would have a delicious green tea flavor!

Prepare your two cups of tea, I used this pot because it is so handy! Again, feel free to change up the tea to some of the suggestions mentioned above. Place the 1 cup quinoa and 2 cups tea in a pot. I added a bit of salt, pepper and liquid saffron as well.

With the lid off, bring the pot to a boil. Once boiling, cover and lower the heat and let the quinoa cook until the water has been absorbed (10-20 minutes). Once all the water is absorbed, turn off the pot and let the pot sit with the lid on for another 10 minutes then fluff the quinoa with a fork!

The result is a nicely flavored quinoa with a touch of green tea! The long jing gives the quinoa a bit of it’s roasted nutty flavor !

Voila!

Sencha Margarita

Spring is finally here and I’m excited to bring you a new recipe for a spring themed drink! I got to work with First Leaves tea and their Sencha tea! What better way to celebrate spring than with a green drink?

If you’re unfamiliar with Sencha, it is a Japanese green tea. First Leaves tea’s sencha comes from Fuji City in Shizuoka. You can choose loose leaf or for an easy, on the go solution, the tea sachets. Check them out here to get 15% off your purchase!

Although I made a recipe with this tea, I highly encourage you to brew the tea first to try if you’ve never had sencha! When it comes to brewing in this recipe, you can do either brew it hot and let it cool down or cold brew in advance.

If you want to cold brew, run warm water over 2 teaspoons of leaves just to wake them up a bit. Place the leaves in a container and fill with 2 cups of water and leave in the fridge for about 12 hours. Make sure to taste it after 12 hours to see if the flavor is strong enough, if not you can leave it a bit longer.

The way I brewed the tea for this recipe was with hot water and let the mixture cool before creating the drink. The tea pot that I used (pictured) can hold about 2 cups of water and it is suggested to use about 1 teaspoon per 8 oz so I placed 2 teaspoons of loose leaf sencha in my tea pot.

At this time, I also placed the honey that I used to sweeten the margarita in with the leaves. I normally wouldn’t sweeten tea this way but it’s nice for the margarita to have a little bit of sweetness to it!

Brew the your water to no more than 175 F. It is really helpful for teas like sencha to have a kettle that shows the temperature. If you don’t have one don’t panic! You can let the boiling water stand for a little bit, maybe 5-10 minutes and it should cool enough to use.

Pour your water into the tea pot with the leaves + honey and brew for 30-40 seconds. Give it a stir so that the honey dissolves and strain your tea!

Let the tea cool enough to use in your drink! You can refrigerate it to speed up the process or use ice in your drink to wait less time. I wanted to note that I used a matcha honey in this recipe because I had it and thought it might be fun but it is not a necessity!

Salt! Who doesn’t love a salt rim?? If you don’t, skip this part :) If you do, take a lime wedge and wet the rim of the glass and then dip the glass in a plate of salt. What salt to use? You don’t have to have that margarita salt that you see at the store. If you don’t have that, you can use most sea salts that aren’t fine grain and they’ll work well. I used maldon sea salt flakes I had for this drink!

In your salted (or non salted) glass, combine the juice of half a lime + 1.5 oz of your favorite tequila! I used Altos tequila. It is my go to because it’s priced well and tastes great in margaritas! I also love espolon tequila!

Please feel free to alter amounts of lime + tequila to your liking!

Finally, fill your glass up with the sencha + honey brew, mix, garnish with a lime and enjoy!

Roasted Eggplant with Genmaicha Sauce

Fall is here and I always crave squash and eggplant! I try my best to go to the local farmer’s market every weekend or every other weekend to support Maryland Farmers! I happened to pick up 3 nubia eggplants!

My original plan was to make khoresh bademjan which is an Iranian eggplant stew but when I got my Sipsby box and saw that there was genmaicha in it, an idea started brewing! Genmaicha is a Japanes green tea that also had puffed rice in it. This genmaicha is from Yannoko tea and is their organic variation which includes bancha as the green tea.

I love rice so the very first time I tried gemaicha I was in love! Genmaicha is definitely a tea that pairs well with savory food as it has the grassy green tea flavor as well as some roasted notes due to the rice. I decided to try a sauce using genmaicha to top the eggplants with!

In my recipe you’ll see that I said to let the eggplants “sweat".” When we prepare eggplants for the khoresh I mentioned above, you peel and slice the eggplants then salt them. After a little bit, you’ll see beads of liquid on them hence the “sweat"! This helps rid the eggplants of some of the bitterness. You are welcomed to fry the eggplants instead of baking but I love to bake them. With a little olive oil, S + P, they get browned and a bit crispy on the edges!

The baking time really depends on your preference and also how thick you sliced your eggplants. I wanted to give a little advice when slicing. Sometimes slicing thin can help things cook quicker, but with eggplant in the oven I’ve noticed that if they are sliced too thin you really lose most of the eggplant.

When doing this sauce I think it’s best to have all your ingredients prepared before you start so that you can focus on the sauce itself. When you brew the genmaicha tea, make sure to follow brewing instructions on the package. For reference, brewing temperature is 176F and steep for 30-60 seconds. You can do multiple infusions.

One other brewing note is about strength. In my other recipes I sometimes brew the tea on the longer side so that it is more potent in the dish since many times it is being cooked. Be cautious of applying that to genmaicha. I find genmaicha to be pretty delicate and you wouldn’t want the tea to be bitter and then transfer that taste to your meal!

The genmaicha helps cook the spinacha bit more and once it’s reduced use as much boursin as you’d like to thicken it. I could definitely use more cheese but was trying to keep this a semi helathy recipe :D I did want to note that I used boursin because I had some, it’s creamy texture and the fact that it is already flavored with garlic and herb which I think went well with everything else. You could definitely experiment with other cheeses but be careful of using one that is too strong as it will likely overpower any notes of the genmaicha.

I thought this sauce turned out well and it paired well with the eggplant! The sauce definitely has an earthy taste which is thanks to the genmaicha!

A fancy but easy meal for a day when you have time to make yourself a nice meal or use at a party!

DIY Tea Scrubs

Tea Scrubs!

Valentine's day is coming up and handmade gifts are a great way to show someone you love, that you care! If you're stuck on what to make, check out these two types of tea infused scrubs that are easy to make, with simple ingredients !

I have two different versions of scrubs that vary in ingredients and with tea!

The first scrub combines salt and sugar and a rhubarb & ginger tea! Rhubarb and ginger are both great ingredients that can help skin. Rhubarb has antibacterial and anti fungal properties. Ginger is also said to help with evening skin tone and improving elasticity! 

I had this manuka honey and decided to use it instead of regular honey. You're welcome to use regular honey as well! Manuka honey has all sorts of benefits like treating acne and eczema! 

One of the most important parts of this recipe is to let the tea cool completely before mixing it in. If the tea is too hot, the sugar and salt will dissolve and lose the rough texture that helps with exfoliation! Feel free to put more tea than I used in the scrub but just know that the scrub might be a bit more water like as opposed to a scrub.

This seconds scrub uses only sugar and 2 types of tea! I received these teas from kailo tea. Kailo tea puts loose leaf and a capsule of vitamins in a tea sachet so you're taking in tea and vitamins at the same time!

The two teas used were Wake up and Zen out tea. The Wake up blend is green tea with vitamin B, C and D. The Zen out blend is herbal tea with vitamins C, D and magnesium! I brewed these two teas together so that they become mixed when I include them in the scrub. 

The rosehip and vitamin E oils give this scrub a lovely scent and added skin benefits!

Again, make sure to let the tea cool completely before mixing it into the sugar.  

Make sure that the scrub clumps a little bit, so that it will be effective!

Green Tea Cranberry Spritzer

Sparkling tea!

It's Christmas time and I have been so busy with the shop that I have been making recipes but not posting them! I recently got a bag of cranberries from my CSA and have been brainstorming about what to do with them. 

I'm a huge fan of cranberries in drinks so I started to look at what I had in the house. I try to make my recipes with simple ingredients so that you can make them with things you probably have already instead of going out to buy a bunch of items. 

I had cranberries, seltzer water and some clementines! The last thing I needed was to choose a type of tea. I wanted to chose something that embodies the christmas spirit. Lucky for me The Tea Spot generously sent me some of their lovely teas and one of them is a roasted green tea with peppermint! You can find it here  ! Peppermint is a classic christmas time flavor and with the addition of cranberries and citrus, it's perfect!

Once you brew the tea let it cool and then let it cool all the way by putting it in the refrigerator! Once the tea is cool you can use it in the drink! 

Seltzer always gives drinks a nice fizzy kick! If you are a cranberry lover I would suggest crushing up a few cranberries to add to the drink.

I filled my cup up about 1/2 way with tea and 1/2 with seltzer but feel free to change these porpotions to however you think the drink will taste best!

I mention in the recipe about adding some juice of the orange. I had a clementine on hand and squeezed half of one in each cup. You can add more or less based on your taste!

Orange + Cranberries + Green tea peppermint + Seltzer water = AMAZING!! If you want this boozy, I think this simple combo would taste delicious with a variety of drinks!

Green Tea Passion Fruit Cupcakes W/ Ginger Buttecream Icing

Spicy Frosting.

I had a bunch of these pique tea packets left and they were so fun to work with, I decided to try another recipe! Last time I made this cocktail with them. I knew this tea would be great in a cupcake, all I had to decide what kind of frosting to create with it!

I know what ginger is a fun flavor with green tea and I thought, ginger buttercream? Why not?! I'm not blogging to be boring, I want to be adventurous!

All you have to do is mix the pique tea crystals with the milk in the recipe. I encourage you to use whatever amount you think is best but I honestly like to have a strong flavor so I used 4 packets in the 1 1/4 cup of milk! Do this step first before starting the recipe and place your tea infused milk into the fridge until it's time to add it to the batter. You don't need to heat your milk, but you can if you'd like!

I tried  a little experiment using mini cup cake papers but honestly I wouldn't do it again. Use full cupcake liners, you'll make less than is what is shown here but they will have a better shape.  

This tea has fragrance has such a wonderful and it's apparent in both the batter and when they're baked!

You may have seen the "spicy frosting" heading at the start of this post. I won't lie to you, with 2 tablespoons, this frosting had a KICK. If you want the ginger flavor with less of the kick I would mix everything together and gradually add in ginger to your taste. 

But let me tell you something about this spicy frosting...IT IS AMAZING. I thought it would be a bit strange but I really liked the spiciness contrasted by the sweet cupcake and the flavor of green tea! 

Yes, cupcakes were harmed ...I mean eaten...in this process!

Another note about the actual cupcake. These are THICK. If you want them to be a little less thick you can add a tiny bit more milk, try a few additional teaspoons. I actually loved how thick they are because they are a perfect for pairing with tea! I wanted to add this note though because not everyone likes cupcakes to be this way. 

As always, I suggest that you enjoy these cupcakes with tea :) 

You can check out Pique Tea here and see all their teas! These last a while because there are a bunch of packets in one box and I think theyre great for on the go tea without sacrificing the flavor! 

Berber Tea Noodles

Minty Noodles.

When I was younger I used to eat noodles all the time! Not just mac 'n' cheese but my mom would make this "green sauce" which wasn't really sauce just butter and basil which was SO GOOD. Nowadays I try to eat as healthy as I can, avoiding an excess of grains and noodles, with the exception of rice. I can't live without my rice!

After doing some research I kept finding "green tea" noodles but these were mostly pre-packaged noodles that were made with green tea. I decided that I wanted to infuse my noodles and although I couldn't find an exact method, I kept it really simple. 

I think that to make this recipe a success, you should use whatever noodle type you want. I used these flat korean noodles that I had in my shelves and they were great but I think this would work with any noodle and here's why. All you do is dump the tea into the water with the noodles and they will cook in the tea! The Berber blend from Tay Tea has Moroccan mint so it gives the noodles this fun minty flavor!

I love every part of tea and when I make recipes I often leave some of the leaves in it for fun because they don't bother me. If you cook the noodles in the tea you will have noodles with pieces of tea leaves on them, I really like this but if you don't you can do it a different way. If you want tea leaf free noodles, I would brew the tea first, strain it then cook the noodles in them! 

Now on to toppings and sauce. This would be delicious with a number of different sauces and I encourage you to pick your own. I like to use whatever ingredients I have so I whipped up a little stir fry of garlic, onions, salt and garlic chili paste! 

Mix your noodles and enjoy! The minty flavor is very refreshing! I Wanted to share really quickly a book that my friend Lu-Ann over at The Cup Of Life wrote, it's filled with inspiration and I often like to read it when I'm enjoying tea! You should also check her out because she recently had me on her monthly "at the tea table" ! 

So there you have it, another fun and simple way to incorporate tea into your day! I want to encourage you to give Sips by a shot, not just because I partner with them but I think that their monthly boxes are seriously a great way to discover new teas if you're into that! Also, this weekend 100% of their sales will be donated to Hurricane Harvey Relief!