Create Your Own Coffee Art

It's about time to get this party started again! So, I've decided to begin afresh with a brand new coffeehouse review of the Neutral Ground Coffeehouse in uptown New Orleans. Not too long back...ok, I'm lying, it was a while back...I made a post about coffee art. Today, I want to present you with a few online sources that will teach how to make your very own coffee art!

I Love Coffee Book

Wiki How To: Latte Art

Coffee Quote for the Day: "A leaf fluttered in through the window this morning, as if supported by the rays of the sun, a bird settled on the fire escape, joy in the task of coffee, joy accompanied me as I walked." -- Anais Nin, French writer

My how time flies....

So, it has been much too long since I've posted anything. But I've been investing in new endeavors =). I now have a new shop that I've created on Etsy for the purpose of selling my lovely hand-made items (mostly jewelry). I will have much more to post in the next few days, but for now...please check out the web-store:

Etoile Bleu

Tap is Spoiling My Tea!

As finals week draws nearer and nearer I'm finding less time to type. The change in seasons doesn't help either. Anyway, here is a long overdue post.

    In the last few weeks, I've been experimenting with using less sugar in my tea. I found it a very difficult thing to drink even my premium oolong tea (which is best w/out a sweetener) without sugar, so I stopped to ask myself why this was. The answer was simple...the tap water was ruining my tea. I know, about now you are shaking your head and wondering why it took me so long to figure out. Well, its because I have been suffocating it with my favorite condiment for as long as I can remember...and I'm wondering how many other people commit this travesty on a daily basis. How many Americans beside myself silently suffer themselves to drink tap water when sink filters are about $20 and a gallon of spring water is about $2. Anyway, I went out and got a gallon of spring water to make my tea with and the results were highly different. So, not so long after I triumphed in drinking delicious sugarless tea, I started to become suspicious of my bleached white sugar as well. My suspicions were confirmed. One of my college friends who works at Teavana told me that processed, white sugar not only ruins the pure taste of tea, but actually cancels out many of the health benefits. What is the alternative? Natural honey or rock sugar. Oh, and as a side not, according to the Heiss's book " The Tea Enthusiast's Handbook," boiling the same water over and over again actually negatively effects its taste. Interesting...

Let's Not Get Too Serious

Of course, there are lots of serious things a coffee or tea lover can talk about, but I just wanted this and the next couple of posts to be silly. So, just relax and share a few laughs with me.

you can buy this mug at Zazzle

lol these are priceless...

Ah, the French...French Press Coffee

I found this great little movie about making French press coffee =).

"Before the Taking of Toast and Tea"

 "Time for you and time for me, And time yet for a hundred indecisions, And for a hundred visions and revisions, Before the taking of a toast and tea" - T. S. Eliot 

So, it seems I have come full circle -- right back to T. S. Eliot. It seems I can't drink a cup of coffee or tea without thinking about his poem, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock". Go read it if you haven't yet =). Well, now since I've gotten on the subject of literature and tea/coffee, there are two writers who I truly believe lend themselves to tea and coffee respectively: Basho, a Japanese poet of the 17th century, and Rumi, a Turkish/Persian poet of the 13th century. Warning: once you start reading these poets you might fall in love. Here is a poem from each to get you hooked: 

A monk sips morning tea

it's quiet, 

the chrysanthemum's flowering. 

-- Basho 

I am your moon and your moonlight too

I am your flower garden and your water too

I have come all this way, eager for you

Without shoes or shawl

I want you to laugh

To kill all your worries

To love you

To nourish you. 

-- Rumi

If you can't tell from the poetry itself, Basho was inspired by somewhat Daoist beliefs, and Rumi is nothing less than a Sufi mystic...but you will need to look up those religions for yourself. Explaining Daoism and Sufism is a little beyond the scope of this blog; however, I do encourage you to learn more about them if you decide to read the poetry.

How do you say "tea"?

Ok, here is the continuation of my last post.This is how you say tea in various other languages:

Dutch  Thee
French Thé
German Tee
Portuguese Cha
Hindi and Swahili Chai (Yes -- that means when you say chai tea you are being a redundant fool =) )
Turkish  çay (pronounced chay)
Arabic Shay

I forgot to tell you last time, but the Arabic word for coffee is qahwa. I probably should have listed it in Arabic first since we kind of got the whole coffee drinking idea from the Middle-East. Oh, and I have definitely decided to start writing a New Orleans blog which I will attempt to start tonight.