Confessions of a Tea-Drunkard Drama Queen

Hello hello!

We all have embarrassing things we've all done when it comes to tea. Or on the flip-side to this, we all do unconventional things when it comes to tea -- the thing's that others would look at and wonder if there's something wrong with us.

Last week on social media, I asked in my 'instagram story' to get their tea sins off their chest! With the permission of everyone who agreed to share, today we'll be going over some of the zaniest and wackiest tea confessions that you guys submitted. And also, we'll be touching base on one large hidden underlying issue that should be touched on.

Also, as promised on social media, I'll later confess some of my biggest tea sins as well. But before I do, we'll also be hearing some of the confessions by other tea bloggers/vendors within the tea community!

First, let's start the tea confessions that you guys submitted!

Anonymous Confessions from Tea Drinkers:

Before we start, I want to state that I got written permission to post these confessions from the tea drinkers who submitted them. Anyhow! Out of the dozens of responses that you guys submitted, three of you confessed to drinking the rinse of your tea. For those of you who are familiar with a rinse, it's where tea leaves is essentially 'washed off' to rid the tea of any dust/dirt that it might have accumulated.

Despite that only three of you confessed to drinking your rise, a large number of you also admitted to loving and enjoying boba tea! While several of you admitted to loving boba, three of you confessed to enjoying tea bags as well, along with other flavored teas. One tea drinker anonymously confessed, "I like Lipton. Reminds me of my grandmother."

Some confessions revolved around the process of making tea. One tea drinker anonymously admitted, "I brewed Gyokuro in an automatic tea kettle - more than once." Meanwhile, another tea drinker confessed, "I like to [drink] every tea gong fu style, even herbal blends." Another tea drinker admitted that they don't warm-up their tea-ware before a gong-fu session, while a different tea drinker confessed, "I [leave] my leaves out in my gaiwan for so long (days) that at times I find mold on them."

Other confessions ranged from adding oat milk to ceremonial-grade matcha, while some else admitted to regularly overstuffing a 40mg teapot with 4 grams of tea. One of you also admitted to leaving tea leaves out overnight and continuing a session the next day, while someone else admitted to never measuring their tea for their session.

However, the one confession that wins the award of 'confessions of all confessions' is when an anonymous tea drinker horrifically stated, "I accidentally garbage-disposaled one of my tea pets."

Oomph.

Confessions from Tea Bloggers/Vendors:

Many people who work in the tea industry (bloggers, vendors, etc.) are not so perfect either. After agreeing to speak openly, a few tea bloggers/entities shared some of their tea sins!

Lu Ann of 'The Tea Cup Of Life' shared that she'll sometimes pick teabags over loose leaf tea, as well as purposely overstepping some of her teas. On a similar spectrum, Nazanin of 'Tea Thoughts' confessed that unless it's a green tea, she'll boil it. And just like a similar confession from an anonymous tea drinker from before, Don of Mei Leaf confessed that he’s also had to turn tea pots into ornaments after forgotten tea leaves from a previous session start to mold — accidentally ruining the tea-ware. However, in a surprising confession from Micah, who's also known as 'The Weekend Sessions', he openly admitted that people in his personal life don't even know he has a tea blog!

On the sweet and wholesome side of confessing, Geoffrey of 'Steep Stories' confessed that, despite being a purist when it comes to tea, he'll drink chamomile tea every night before bed. On another wholesome note, Jann of 'Tea With Jann' was open to confessing that she'll sometimes take a whiff of empty tea jars to get a good smell of the teas she once enjoyed. Jann, I must say, this is a fantastic idea and now I'll be following in your footsteps!

(Hey not all confessions have to be bad!)

My Own Tea Sins/Confessions:

Now, I agreed to share some of my tea confessions with you all as well. Since I have too many things to confess to (such as enjoying tea bags or adding espresso to tea-latès), I figured I'd be a lot more specific in three of my biggest sings/confessions.

#3

I once blended a shou puer and white tea together, and then drank it.

#2

After reviewing Cha-Gao (Black Magic from Bitterelaf Teas to be exact), I once ate a piece of it like a tic-tac. It fried my tongue and I couldn't properly taste anything for almost two weeks... A month later, I got curious and tried it again but a much smaller piece. It fried my tongue again, and just like before, couldn't properly taste anything. Except this time it was only for a week...

(You can read that review, and my expierence rating cha-gao here!)

#1

More Recently, I stored a high-oxidized oolong in an empty mustard jar. Despite running the jar through the dishwasher twice, there was still an odor of mustard in the lid that I had missed. A month later when I opened the jar to make that oolong, it smelled exactly like mustard. I brewed it, and the tea completely absorbed the mustard note and lost most of its natural tasting notes.

In an attempted to repurpose the tea, I brewed the tea concentrated and added it to a glass of ice and dairy creamer, along with boba. In a failed attempt to make a delicious treat, I had instead made a mustard-scented boba milk tea.

Despite the fuck-up, something still felt off. While going full-throttle at trying to make this tea work, I bought mustard seeds and made the rest of my oolong, with mustard seeds, to try to make a better version of Mustard-Scented Oolong Milk Tea. I finally came up with a concoction that had a bliss-point of all of the notes.

However, it was only halfway through drinking this perfect monstrosity that I realized how insane I was being for trying to 'win' at this recipe while starting to feel sick. While being unable to settle in my stomach, I threw up in my work's parking lot forty minutes later.

Conclusion:

After reading the responses from everyone, an indirect problem arose from all of the admissions -- Too many tea drinkers felt ashamed for drinking what they truly enjoyed. A large number of tea drinkers felt ashamed to drink bagged tea, fruity tea, and even scented teas! Personally, this made me sad.

So what should you take away from all of this? Well first, none of us are perfect and we all enjoy a variety of things. There are no real 'set' rules in the world of tea for what is good or bad, and shouldn't matter as long as you are the one who enjoys it. Drinking a tea bag doesn't make you less of a tea drinker. Instead, judging and shaming someone for drinking a bagged tea is what will make you less of a tea drinker.

I encourage all of you to openly enjoy what you enjoy. I also encourage you to celebrate other tea friends for what they like and try to be supportive all around. Don't let others make you feel ashamed for liking what you like (except, if you enjoy mustard-infused oolong milk tea).

Let your freak-flag infuse! And enjoy whatever you damn well please ;-)

--The Oolong Drunk

"Blissfully Tea Drunk"