Hoohoo, friends of the blade!
This is a post for all tea lovers like me. I drink a lot of tea, all day every day. I mostly drink black tea, but I do enjoy a good oolong as well. And yes, I also like my herbal infusions. They’re not tea but I shall include some in this post as well, sorry not sorry. I’m also not a tea purist and actually like different flavours like caramel or fruits in my tea.
Anyways, if you’re searching for both tea and book recommendations, don’t look any further because I’ve got you! I’d be excited to know which teas you enjoy in the comments (I like talking about tea almost as much as I like to talk about books).
And yes, this book was inspired by reading A Tempest of Tea by Hafsah Faizal ☺️
BLACK TEA
Darjeeling First Flush
The Darjeeling is a classic. I especially like it as a first flush (the first tea leaves harvested) for its very mild, flowery and delicate taste. It also has a very appealing, yellow-brownish colour that looks just beautiful in a tea cup. For me, this is a tea for early mornings while everything is still quiet or for warmer afternoons in the summer.
Recommended Book: Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery
Anne, an eleven-year-old orphan, is sent by mistake to live with a lonely, middle-aged brother and sister on a Prince Edward Island farm and proceeds to make an indelible impression on everyone around her.
I think a Darjeeling and Anne of Green Gables go very well together because both are timeless classics you can whip out in any situation and you won’t be wrong. They are both well known and beloved and both remind me of warmth and love. Even though Anne is a whirlwind and a first flush darjeeling is anything but, they both are unique and radiate comfort for me.
Ostfriesentee / East Frisia Tea
This is a blend of many different black teas. Up to twenty different sorts of tea can be mixed into a blend which is usually very strong. It is consumed with sugar (Kluntje) and cream. The sugar is dropped into the cup first, then the tea is poured in and at the end, very carefully, cream is placed on top with a spoon. that way, you have a different taste with each sip.
I like this strong blend with milk or cream only since I don’t like sugar in my tea. I drink it when I wake up extremely tired and need to wake up quickly and during the winter months. I also like to let it steep for a while because I do enjoy the strong, bitter taste, only slightly tempered by the milk.
Recommended Book: Made of Stars by Jenna Voris
Shane and Ava are a team. He steals the aircraft, she charms their mark, and together they take what they need. Not even their distracting chemistry could get in the way. Until Shane was caught and left to rot on a prison moon. Now, freshly escaped from confinement and simmering with anger, he has his sights set on their biggest job yet.
Cyrus just graduated from the flight academy with a shiny new position lined up reporting to a well-respected general. On his very first assignment, he stops the outlaws in their tracks-or, he would have, if the annoyingly handsome Lark hadn’t fallen for Ava’s deception.
But when Shane uncovers a top-secret plot that would leave his home world at the mercy of Cyrus’s military leaders, he makes it his mission to thwart them at all costs. It isn’t long before Shane and Ava make interstellar headlines with each new heist. And thanks to a chance run-in with the rebels, Cyrus is caught between two versions of the truth. He must pick a side and fast. Because Shane and Ava will bring the planet to its knees…or die trying.
This is a very strong, brutal book with characters that are tired of this shit™. Thanks to the three different POVs this book has different flavours which all add their part to the story. The brutality of the world and the many action scenes are somewhat softened by the romance.
Lapsang Souchong
This is a smoked tea from China. Depending on what other tastes and smells you know, the smell might remind you of bacon or wood smoke, maybe even whiskey. For me it’s more on the wood smoke side, though it has a very unique taste. The smell and taste also depend a lot on where this tea comes from. It can be brewed once (2-3 minutes) or up to three times (more tea, for about half a minute). Though it can also be steeped longer since this tea doesn’t turn bitter. I use it a lot in our samowar!
Lapsang Souchong is the perfect camping tea. When it’s getting dark and colder and you sit in front of your tent, a smoky tea in your hands will make you feel instantly better. It’s also an amazing tea for the winter months or to blend it with other teas. I like it in combination with ceylon tea or with rooibos.
Recommended Book: Starry Eyes by Jenn Bennett
Ever since last year’s homecoming dance, best friends-turned-best enemies Zorie and Lennon have made an art of avoiding each other. It doesn’t hurt that their families are the modern day, Californian version of the Montagues and Capulets. But when a group camping trip goes south, Zorie and Lennon find themselves stranded in the wilderness. Alone. Together. What could go wrong? With no one but each other for company, Zorie and Lennon have no choice but to hash out their issues via witty jabs and insults as they try to make their way to safety. But fighting each other while also fighting off the forces of nature makes getting out of the woods in one piece less and less likely. And as the two travel deeper into Northern California’s rugged backcountry, secrets and hidden feelings surface. But can Zorie and Lennon’s rekindled connection survive out in the real world? Or was it just a result of the fresh forest air and the magic of the twinkling stars?
What could be more fitting for a book about frenemies camping in the wild than tea that smells like campfire and a warm hug? I think Starry Eyes and Lapsang go very well together because with both you think you know what to expect but then you also get a whole lot more. Starry Eyes is one of my all time favourite books and this tea is also one I enjoy again and again.
Orange Pekoe Gorreana
This is a special tea because it comes from the Azores. It’s the only tea from Europe and Chá Gorreana is the tea plantations & firm producing it. The orange pekoe has a beautiful mild aroma with a hint of caramel. It doesn’t turn bitter quickly, so it’s okay if you forget about it for a few minutes while steeping. It might be even good because the flavour gets stronger.
I enjoy this tea all year around but especially for afternoon teas.
Recommended Book: The Absinthe Underground by Jamie Pacton
For Sybil Clarion, the Belle Époque city of Severon is a wild, romantic dream, filled with cafés, cabarets, and glittering nightclubs. Eager to embrace the city’s freedom after running away from home, she’s traded high-society soirées for empty pockets and barren cabinets. At least she has Esme, the girl who offered Sybil a home, and maybe—if either of them dared—something more.
Ever since Esme Rimbaud brought Sybil back to her flat, the girls have been everything to each other—best friends, found family, and secret crushes. While Esme would rather spend the night tinkering with her clocks and snuggling her cats, Sybil craves excitement and needs money. She plans to get both by stealing the rare posters that crop up around town and selling them to collectors. With rent due, Esme agrees to accompany—and more importantly protect —Sybil, who means more to her than even a comfortable night in.
When they’re caught selling a poster by none other than its glamorous subject, Maeve, she doesn’t press charges. Rather, she invites Sybil and Esme to The Absinthe Underground, the exclusive club she co-owns, and reveals herself to be a Green Faerie, trapped in this world. She wants to hire thieves for a daring heist in Fae that would set her free, and is willing to pay enough that Sybil and Esme never have to worry about rent again. It’s too good of an offer to pass up, even if Maeve’s tragic story doesn’t quite add up, and even if Sybil’s personal ties to Fae could jeopardize everything she and Esme have so carefully built.
A tea for those who like friends to lovers and/or slowburn romances. The Absinthe Underground is a wonderfully whimsical friends to lovers romantasy in which the characters need quite some time to admit their feelings to each other and their love just gets stronger over the course of the book. Just like this tea does when it’s steeped for a while.
OTHER TEAS
Formosa Oolong
This is a semi-oxidized tea. It’s oxidation levels are somewhere between green and black tea. It can be brewed more than once, up to three times. It is often prepared using the gongfu method in which a lot of leaves are steeped in a smaller vessel. It has a very good, interesting smell and taste, a bit flowery, maybe even sourly but in a good way. It has good aftertaste that stays for quite a while.
I drink this tea all year long at all times of the day.
Recommended Book: The Seven Year Slip by Ashley Poston
Sometimes, the worst day of your life happens, and you have to figure out how to live after it.
So Clementine forms a plan to keep her heart safe: stay busy, work hard, find someone decent to love, and try to remember to chase the moon. The last one is silly and obviously metaphorical, but her aunt always told her that you needed at least one big dream to keep going. And for the last year, that plan has gone off without a hitch. Mostly. The love part is hard because she doesn’t want to get too close to anyone—she isn’t sure her heart can take it.
And then she finds a strange man standing in the kitchen of her late aunt’s apartment. A man with kind eyes and a Southern drawl and a taste for lemon pies. The kind of man that, before it all, she would’ve fallen head-over-heels for. And she might again.
Except, he exists in the past. Seven years ago, to be exact. And she, quite literally, lives seven years in his future.
Her aunt always said the apartment was a pinch in time, a place where moments blended together like watercolors. And Clementine knows that if she lets her heart fall, she’ll be doomed.
After all, love is never a matter of time—but a matter of timing.
The Seven Year Slip is a book I’d recommend to almost everyone who even has a slight interest in romance. I thought of it for Oolong because like the tea, its taste stays with you. Or the story does, in any case. It’s not a book you can easily put aside and never think of again. It’s deep, even not a light romance but it is definitely one that lingers, just like oolong smell and taste does.
Green Tea with Jasmine
I have to admit I’m not the biggest fan of green tea but flavoured with jasmine, I absolutely love it! It shouldn’t be steeped more than 2-3 minutes so it doesn’t turn too strong or bitter and the tea and jasmine can combine their flowery aromas. This is a refreshing mix which I love especially during the spring months but drink all year around.
Recommended Book: Practice Makes Perfect by Sarah Adams
Annie Walker is on a quest to find her perfect match—someone who complements her happy, quiet life running the local flower shop in Rome, Kentucky. But finding her dream man may be harder than Annie imagined. Everyone knows everyone in her hometown, and the dating prospects are getting fewer by the day. After she overhears her latest date say she is “so unbelievably boring,” Annie starts to think the problem might be her. Is it too late to become flirtatious and fun like the leading ladies in her favorite romance movies? Maybe she only needs a little practice . . . and Annie has the perfect person in mind to be her tutor: Will Griffin.
Will—the sexy , tattooed, and absolutely gorgeous bodyguard—is temporarily back in Rome, providing security for Amelia Rose as excitement builds for her upcoming marriage to Noah Walker, Annie’s brother. He has one personal objective while on the job: stay away from Annie Walker and any other possible attachments to this sleepy town. But no sooner than he gets settled, Will finds himself tasked with helping Annie find the love of her life by becoming the next leading lady of Rome, Kentucky. Will wants no part in changing the sweet and lovely Annie. He knows for a fact that some stuffy, straitlaced guy won’t make her happy, but he doesn’t have the heart to say no.
Amid steamy practice dates and strictly “educational” tutoring lessons, Annie discovers there are more layers to Will’s usual stoic attitude. As the lines of their friendship become dangerously blurred, Annie reconsiders her dream guy. Maybe her love life doesn’t need to be perfect—it just needs to be real.
I enjoyed this sweet and steamy read so much. It also has flowers which is a nod to Jasmine for me. This book is a lovely warm hug that felt refreshing at the same time, much like green tea with jasmine.
HERBAL INFUSIONS
Fennel-Anise-Caraway
This is the best tea for stomach troubles. It tastes good and gently like caraway, strongly like fennel with a hint of anise. And it does wonders for an upset stomach. I always drink it for stomach flu, but also to help with period issues. And because I simply like the taste of it. It’s a helper, a warm hug and I drink it all year around.
Recommended Book: Twice Shy by Sarah Hogle
Maybell Parish has always been a dreamer and a hopeless romantic. But living in her own world has long been preferable to dealing with the disappointments of real life. So when Maybell inherits a charming house in the Smokies from her Great-Aunt Violet, she seizes the opportunity to make a fresh start.
Yet when she arrives, it seems her troubles have only just begun. Not only is the house falling apart around her, but she isn’t the only inheritor: she has to share everything with Wesley Koehler, the groundskeeper who’s as grouchy as he is gorgeous—and it turns out he has very different vision for the property’s future.
Convincing the taciturn Wesley to stop avoiding her and compromise is a task more formidable than the other dying wishes Great-Aunt Violet left behind. But when Maybell uncovers something unexpectedly sweet beneath Wesley’s scowls, and as the two slowly begin to let their guard down, they might learn that sometimes the smallest steps outside one’s comfort zone can lead to the greatest rewards.
Twice Shy is a book that makes me smile happily, that soothes my emotions, that feels like stepping into a warm and much needed hug. It’s one of those books where you can let yourself fall and get completely enveloped in the story. Like the tea, it makes me feel instantly better.
Mint
Mint infusion is always a good decision. It can be drunk hot or cold, with milk or sugar, mixed with juice or even with tea. A mix of black tea and mint is perfect for waking up since it has a very fresh minty taste but also the caffeine of black tea and a stronger, fuller flavour. This is definitely a drink for the whole year. Depending on the season, I like it hot in the winter and cold in the summer. There are so many mint varieties and I especially like peppermint which tastes sharp, and moroccan mint which is milder but generally cleaner and fresher. Actually, I could do a whole separate blog post on mint infusions.
Recommended Book: Fathomfolk by Eliza Chan
Welcome to Tiankawi – shining pearl of human civilization and a safe haven for those fleeing civil unrest. Or at least, that’s how it first appears.
But in the semi-flooded city, humans are, quite literally, on peering down from skyscrapers and aerial walkways on the fathomfolk — sirens, seawitches, kelpies and kappas—who live in the polluted waters below. And the fathomfolk are tired of it. When a water-dragon and a half siren join forces, the path to equality is filled with violence, secrets, and political intrigue. And they both must decide if the cost of change is worth it, or if Tiankawi should be left to drown.
I thought a lot about which book to pair with mint tea and finally decided on Fathomfolk because like mint tea is an allrounder, I think Fathomfolk is as well. It has many different facettes to the story, like political intrigue, social issues, romance, friendship, family and magic, as well as different mythologies interwoven in the story. I feel like the tea, this book has many faces and there’s something to like for everyone in it.
Now that’s it from my favourite teas and books I’d recommend for each sort. I like many more teas and these days I’m a bit addicted to a black tea with caramel and a smoky note from my local tea shop. I’m not sure but I think it might be a darjeeling blend.
Do you drink tea or do you prefer herbal or fruit infusions? Or do you even prefer coffee? Have you read any of these books? Which drink would you recommend for it?
Until next time,
