Flower teas

In my Tea Cultures in Asia class, our teacher did a mic of pu-erh tea with a chrysanthemum pod. She used a glass teapot, which was perfect because we could see the flower pod open, which was beautiful. The flower gave a nice floral and sweet accent to the pu-erh tea.

There is a specific type of tea that is called flowering tea. They take tea, usually green, and blend in various types of flowers. They are created in a large tea ball. You put them in a glass teacup or teapot and watch them unfurl. Sometimes they are good tea as well.

It makes you wonder what the range is of what would make a pleasant infusion, and then also what the larger range is of what would be edible. Chamomile, chrysanthemum, and rose petal teas are common, but there would be lots of commercial floral tisane types. Blue pea or butterfly pea tisane has been getting some mention lately, but I don’t like it myself.

I drank a lot of tisanes long before I started a tea habit, going back to the 90s. I’ll mention a brand that was a favorite then, but looking back at this time there really should be more whole-herb and flower alternatives; these are sold as processed tea bags. One interesting aspect the product descriptions mention is the conventional (traditional) understanding of the health benefits of different types of flowers, herbs, roots, and barks. I really believe there probably is vast potential in those sorts of benefits, offset by this type of information only being hearsay, not really being reliable, and probably not possible to verify or pin down further through any amount of research.

http://www.alvita.com/herbal-teas.html

Jasmine is common.
chrysanthemum is another common.
I had this one without flower, but it smell with strong flower amora. Truly…
We call it"Flower field", because it just so smelled like flower and spring!
Check it if you want
https://teadaw.com/products/yellow-tea-flower-field

rose bud tea is very popular in China and can be found at almost any asian grocery store. Jasmine and chrysanthemum are also very common but many flowers can be brewed into tea. I have a cherry blossom green tea that was brought back from japan for me and I have sweet olive flowers being brewed into tea.

There are so many great options! Some of the most common (and beautiful) would be rose buds, chamomile, butterfly pea, chrysenthemum (as mentioned above, it is common with pu-erh, although not my personal favorite…).
Other popular ones would be jasmine and lavender. All of these flowers are easy to find in stores and online, and they truly make a great addition to many teas, or can be brewed on their own.

One of my favorite combinations is sakura (cherry blossom) sencha:
https://pathofcha.com/collections/japanese-teas/products/sakura-sencha

Also chamomile rose Silver Needle white tea is quite delightful!
https://pathofcha.com/collections/white-teas/products/chamomile-rose-silver-needle-white-tea

Osmanthus flowers are added to tea to make 桂花茶.

Cornflower (blue) and safflower (red-orange) petals are used for adding pops of color to dry tea leaf blends, but I’ve never noticed any particular flavor effect.

Hibiscus flower makes tart bright red infusion.