Guru of Tea

The Las Vegas Tea expo was smaller than last year but in some ways more focused on the business in hand…promoting tea! The executive program was attended by a small number of interested parties and the open educational forum by many more with the focused tastings being especially well attended. Jen Pettigrew’s (http://www.janepettigrew.com/) tasting on rare teas was especially well attended where teas like Rawandan black tea was received well..and you can guarantee not many of the participants would have tasted this fabulous tea! The guru attended the focused oolong tasting by Philip Parda of Zhong Guo Cha (https://secure.worldsourceintl.com) covered many interesting styles from a Fujian-style Tie Guan Yin to a Nepalese mountain oolong – tips included! On the floor of the expo the stands were exceptionally well put together supplier to the North American trade such as Sungarden tea (http://www.sungardentea.com) to small single estate companies such as Glenburn (http://www.glenburnteashop.co.uk/) showing first flush Darjeeling tea and Darjeeling white tea and Satemwa estate (http://www.satemwa.com/) focusing on to novel processed orthodox, oolong as well as more traditional CTC Malawian teas. Also present were a large contingent of companies from Taiwan who were showcasing Taiwanese (Also known by the historical name of Formosan) tea, tea processing and history. Many other tea producing regions were represented either by tea boards or companies – Kenya sadly being absent). Monday was another good show from the floor and the Guru gave his presentation on White tea - what is it and why is it so unique -to a small but interested audience. People must have stayed awake as the pop-quiz on white tea was answered overwhelmingly in a correct fashion. Well done to all who attended! After the presentation there were many questions (which showed people were listening!) and people stayed on after to discuss issues such as the difference between the terms ‘fermentation’, ‘oxidation’ and ‘aeration’ and to discuss tea growing in Hawaii. Both topics I will cover in future blogs and/or articles. Overall a very exciting & informative expo, roll on 2010!