January Shop Update Info

It’s 2023 ! I’m excited to start this year off with a shop update that will be super fun! For this month’s shop update I have 2 things to share!

Camellia Sinensis Tea Cups
For a long time I’ve been trying to find a way to get one of my designs on teaware. I love creating the gaiwan enamel pins but what if I could actually get one of those designs or a similar version printed on a gaiwan?! Well, so far I haven’t been able to find a way that was feasible for the size of my shop currently but I did come across a ceramics supplier who could do cups! I’m really excited to be releasing 50ml porcelain tea cups with my camellia sinensis design on them! These cups have a decal of my design high temperature fired on them. I hope you’ll enjoy using them!

Galentine’s Swap
I’ve mentioned a Galentine’s day swap earlier this fall and I’m doing a test run this year to see if it’s something I want to continue doing. In the past I’ve done Galentine’s day swaps and there was always the issue of someone not following through with sending something to their partner. After one year of way too many of non follow throughs I gave up doing the swap. Since then I’ve thought about it more and participated in a few others with other brands and I’m ready to try again!

Galentine’s day was a concept I first learned about from Parks and Rec where Leslie Knope deemed February 13th Galentine’s day, a day to celebrate the women in your life that you love like your girlfriends!

For this swap, you will be signing up to send a small package to a partner and also purchasing a gift box for yourself from my shop. The point of the gift box is to have something for yourself in the chance that your partner doesn’t follow through for some reason.

I have a limited about of spaces for the swap since I am testing it out. There will be 20 slots and you will get the box at a discount. The last 10 boxes will be available for purchase without participating in the swap but won’t have the discount.

If you sign up for the swap, you need to use your full name, correct address and email so that I can contact you and so can your partner. After you sign up, I will send out a short survey that you must complete. This will help your partner decide what to get you! Once I have all the surveys I will put people together in pairs and send you the information of your partner.

For the swap, try to really understand your partner based on their survey and get them something or a few smaller items that you think they’ll love. Don’t go overboard on spending but it would probably be good to spend between $10 and $20. It doesn’t have to be complicated, think of it as sending a fun package to a new friend! Package their gift in a fun way and write a card! You want this to be a fun surprise to open :)

If you’ve never shipped a package before, the easiest way is to pack it up, put the recipient name and address on the box by writing it or printing it on paper and taping it to the box and also your return address then take it to your local post office where they can help you ship it.

Remember that the heavier your package is, the more expensive it will be to ship!

The goal is to ship the package to your partner so that it will reach them in time before 2/13 or 2/14 !

The gift boxes I’ve created do have 2 teas in them but the other items are not necessarily related to tea. I tried to take some of the suggestions that people gave in a survey I sent out. There will also be 2 edible items but they are vegan, gluten free and use transparent and ethical trade.

Ya Shi Xiang Cakes - Now releasing in February!
Something fun that I’ve been working on with Rainy of Serene Tea is designing a cake wrapper! If you’re a fan of Duck Shit, I will have 200g Cakes of Duck Shit in my shop wrapped in a wrapper that I created! I will have 30 total. The first 10 will be available at a discounted price and then the other 20 will be available without the discount. I wanted to create something that had a duck as the main feature of the design but also some background landscape.

These are being postponed and releasing in the shop in February alongside Rainy from Serene Tea who has a few of my cakes and also more of the same tea cake with a different wrapper design that she created. Stay tuned!

Tea Infused Kringle Hearts

Hello!

Small Announcement: I’ve missed you all! I have to admit some sad circumstances have stopped my blogging for most of December and all of January. In December, my stepdad passed away suddenly and it affected me more than I could ever have imagined. I wanted to keep going everyday which I did to a certain point but creating recipes and blogging is such an involved process and I wasn’t up for it. I appreciate your patience during my little break and I’m back in time for the holiday of love!

I have mixed feeling about valentine’s day but I always try to be positive about it AND it’s an excuse to bake and cook things with hearts!

Have you ever tried Kringle?? I bought one from trader joe’s around the holidays and OMG SO GOOD! After I bought that one I couldn’t find them again :( I found out that you can order them online but they are a little pricey.

I was sure I could find a recipe on the internet, and I did! I used this recipe for these kringle hearts and will let you know the changes I made and how I added tea!

For those of you know kringle, you’re probably thinking that this isn’t the right shape! Well, you’re correct. I actually created the kringle then used a heart shaped cookie cutter to cut these out. It was messy but worth it for valentines day! The heart shape doesn’t change the taste in anyway :D

You can find the recipe I followed here !

If I am following a recipe and want to infuse tea into it, I will look for either a liquid portion to infuse or butter! In the past I have tried to use tea in place of the warm water for the yeast and for whatever reason they have always failed! This may have nothing to do with tea but to be safe I used the milk in this recipe.

The recipe calls for warm milk and so I heated the milk a bit and put 2 tablespoons of tea in the milk. I let it steep for until fragrant and when the milk was warm and not hot then I strained it and included it in the recipe.

Two notes about this, use more milk for the infusion that the recipe calls for and measure the final amount added to the recipe. You will lose some milk when you heat it and strain it. You can add less or more tea depending on how strong you want the tea flavor!

This recipe will not give you the thin kringle that you’re probably used to but it is still delicious. The filling is very sweet and is most of the flavor for this recipe. The topping which is a simple glaze makes this a great sweet treat!

A note about choosing a tea for this recipe. I would suggest choosing a black tea and if you are choosing a blended black to tea remember that the flavor you choose will be subtle in the bread part of this so make sure it is a blend you like!

For example, the tea I used in the blend was Amaretto Spice from The Jasmine Pearl Tea. This tea is a blend of black tea, cinnamon and amaretto flavoring. This combo was ideal because you have the extra cinnamon and almond flavor from the amaretto but nothing too overwhelming!

These turned out really delicious and although they aren’t exactly like the original Kringle they have that lovely flavor!

You can definitely create the shapes listed in the recipe but I will say that although the cookie cutter shape was a bit difficult to cut out since I did it after it was baked, it was nice to just give out heart shaped pieces!

I didn’t decide to do the hearts until after it was baked but I think you could probably cut them out before baking and have it turn out well too!

A tea and chocolate filled Valentine's day!

Baking up a storm. 

I decided to make a bunch of heart shaped treats for my family this valentine's day. I used silicone baking cups to make the mini heart shaped brownies. Marshalls provided an excellent decorating tool! I used all sorts of sprinkles and shapes. Check out what I made!

For breakfast I made my sweetheart some loving breakfast :) 

I went with a group of couples to Max Brenner's chocolate bar after dinner and had the most delicious treats! I tried a white chocolate chai tea which is essentially chai tea with white chocolate ganache. Although I'm not a huge fan of white chocolate this tea was so delicious. I highly suggest it!