Mike G wrote:The calendar of Ohio House beauty shots.

Mincy Bits was over the moon with this gift.

Mincy Bits contributed the Dark Lord trilogy, which I thought was a cool gift, too.

Regards,

I left early and hasty. Story for another time. I left a new Cannon SLR case with lenseses. Did anyone see!?


R

you where at are table when you left. but we did not see the case on table just camera. so i would say you must have put case down before you came to the table.

Ramon wrote:I left early and hasty. Story for another time. I left a new Cannon SLR case with lenseses. Did anyone see!?


R

Ramon, we've got it for you. Let's PM to figure out how to get it to you.

Add my thanks to C2 and Hammond, as well as the Cheng family, for the feast. This was a lot of (great) food, even for LTH. And I have to add special thanks to JimTheBeerGuy for trading sips of hard ciders (slightly different styles) with me, and to the Leek family. (In a strange coincidence, I got Leekman's Around the World cookbook and beautiful hand-made glass bowl, and Moetchandon received Leek's Ice Cream Maker and Ice Cream recipe book.)

Great food, great company (as always), and a great way to celebrate the season.

Just chiming in to say thank you, and that it was wonderful - food and company both. Wondering if I the only one to get a mouthful of duck egg shell?

lemoneater wrote:Just chiming in to say thank you, and that it was wonderful - food and company both. Wondering if I the only one to get a mouthful of duck egg shell?

Only the first bite.

David Hammond wrote:

lemoneater wrote:Just chiming in to say thank you, and that it was wonderful - food and company both. Wondering if I the only one to get a mouthful of duck egg shell?

Only the first bite.

Alistair nearly knocked my fork away from my mouth so that I didn't get any duck egg shell. He did. Man,were those duck eggs exactly as described, or what?

Hi,

I ate my first egg portion whole. I didn't make the same mistake twice. I must say the shell was salty and rather brittle. It was much easier to deal with than I would have expected.

Thereafter, I scooped my egg out of the shell.

Regards,

I want to know how they sliced them so perfectly with the shell still on!

Perhaps Homaro Cantu was in the back with a laser.

Mike G wrote:The calendar of Ohio House beauty shots.

Are more copies of this available? Or was it a one-off for the gift-exchange?

LTH friend Rod Markus, who provided delicious pu-erh for our holiday party, is fighting the good fight to put more tea on the tables of local restaurants.

I'm writing this from Kunming, Yunnan. Yesterday I went to a tea showroom here and tasted several kinds of tea including pu-ehr, which is local. Pu-ehr is a tea that can be cellared, like wine, with some blocks of pu-ehr hundreds of years old (after the Chinese revolution, when there was a tea shortage, the revolutionary forces broke into the tea storerooms of the imperial palace and distributed blocks of 200-year old pu-ehr). Pu-ehr is non-caffeinated and is very healthy for reducing cholesterol (see we were told).

I purchased a block of 10-year old pu-ehr (1999 vintage - although there are not vintages as scuh) and perhaps will bring some to an LTH event.

I had the opportunity to purchase a 33-year old block of pu-ehr, but the price was exorbitant (nearly $1000).

Gary,

When the time comes, I'd love to be among the tasters of your pu-ehr!

GAF wrote:Pu-ehr is non-caffeinated

That surprises me. My guess is that though it's low in caffeine it's unlikely that it has no caffeine -- this may seem like a fine distinction, but The Wife cannot tolerate caffeine in the evening, and she will stay awake even after drinking regular green tea, (she has to drink de-caffeinated tea, which has been soaked or otherwise processed to remove caffeine). Some Pu-erh is oxidized to be more like black tea, so I'd guess it has more caffeine than regular green tea though it may have less than other black teas.

Sounds like an exceptionally cool trip you're on GAF. Very envious.

Absolutely. Perhaps Rod can arrange a tasting of various teas - and I will be happy to share my pu-ehr - or simply at some other LTH event. Maybe our next Chinese meal. I

Or if your investments are not what they should be you can invest in a block of 33 year old tea in a lovely presentation block and hold it for future generations. I was told of the Chinese saying, "Grandparents pick the pu-ehr, and grandchildren drink it." BTW, the pu-ehr leaves are from the top of a tall tree in southern Yunnan, not bushes, and the locals train monkeys to pick the leaves (how, I don't know).

I was served a wonderful black tea with notes of rose petals and lychee. If I drank caffeine, this would be what I would drink. Also a very fragrant jasmine.

With regard to caffeine, I was told that pu-ehr has no caffeine, but Googling (here in China! - see the news) it appears that it has very low levels of caffeine. I was told that green tea does have some caffeine, so my (current) assumption is that pu-ehr has less.

I will have lots of pictures of street food and high-end restaurants in a few weeks.

GAF wrote:Absolutely. Perhaps Rod can arrange a tasting of various teas - and I will be happy to share my pu-ehr - or simply at some other LTH event. Maybe our next Chinese meal.

Excellent idea.

Enjoy Googling in China while you can!

I've been meaning to ask, are there any special instructions for the jasmine pearl tea samples we received? Steeping time, water temperature, etc?

Llama wrote:I've been meaning to ask, are there any special instructions for the jasmine pearl tea samples we received? Steeping time, water temperature, etc?

I experimented. I use a bigger than average cup and put in 6-7 pearls to water that's been boiled and then left to sit for about 3-4 minutes. When the color looks right, I drink it. You can use a timer and thermometer (I'm sure Rod does), but I go the easy and still very acceptable route.

David Hammond wrote:

Llama wrote:I've been meaning to ask, are there any special instructions for the jasmine pearl tea samples we received? Steeping time, water temperature, etc?

I experimented. I use a bigger than average cup and put in 6-7 pearls to water that's been boiled and then left to sit for about 3-4 minutes. When the color looks right, I drink it. You can use a timer and thermometer (I'm sure Rod does), but I go the easy and still very acceptable route.

We were also told by the gent who brought the tea that the pearls could be reused several times. I know this seems counter-intuitive, but I got a gift of tea from a Chinese friend, and we just kept adding water to the tea pot, and the tea just kept getting better through about four refills.

Cynthia wrote:

David Hammond wrote:

Llama wrote:I've been meaning to ask, are there any special instructions for the jasmine pearl tea samples we received? Steeping time, water temperature, etc?

I experimented. I use a bigger than average cup and put in 6-7 pearls to water that's been boiled and then left to sit for about 3-4 minutes. When the color looks right, I drink it. You can use a timer and thermometer (I'm sure Rod does), but I go the easy and still very acceptable route.

We were also told by the gent who brought the tea that the pearls could be reused several times. I know this seems counter-intuitive, but I got a gift of tea from a Chinese friend, and we just kept adding water to the tea pot, and the tea just kept getting better through about four refills.

Green tea can be re-infused a number of times. With the pearls, we did something like five infusions.

My understanding from the tea shops in Yunnan I've visited is that the number of times you can reinfuse tea is a function of the tea's quality. The higher the quality, the more times they can be reused. Five is very good quality.

Be sure to know how long you should steep the tea: steeping for too long leads to bitterness for some varieties. Likewise trying to use the same tea overnight.

Does that mean you can use one pearl per cup instead of many pearls over and over? I want to use it at work and have no good place to store used pearls.

Pie Lady wrote:Does that mean you can use one pearl per cup instead of many pearls over and over? I want to use it at work and have no good place to store used pearls.

You're going to need a few pearls per cup, so if you can't store them, just go with one infusion, or have a few cups in short order. Number of pearls is to some extent a matter of taste.