Sipdown Sunday Tea and Books!
This tea was one of the oldest teas in my collection as I bought it back in February when I ordered a Golden Moon Tea sampler. I learned along the way, though, that I’m not a huge fan of white teas, and hesitated to drink this.
Iced tea seemed like the best way to use up all of the leaf from the sampler in one go, so here we are.
The Tea
I used the whole of the sample on 2 L of cold water and let it steep overnight. I also added about 2.5 tsp of sugar to the pitcher. The resulting tea is not very melon-flavoured, as I can really taste the white base (I think it’s Shou Mei). However, I’m happy that I’ve finally dealt with this tea so that I have one less one in the cupboard to worry about.
The Book
This tea is supposed to taste like melon, and while I can sense the taste, it’s not very fresh and juicy, but more dark and dusty. I’m pretty sure that other people here have said that this tea tastes like muskmelon. So that’s the flavour I’m assuming to taste here.
When I think of muskmelon, a particular sci-fi story comes to mind: “Tiny Tango” by Judith Moffett.
This was a novella that got nominated for both the Hugo and the Nebula awards after it was published in the late 80s/early 90s. It’s about a botanist with HIV who chooses a life of academic mediocrity to hide her HIV-positive status, as she’s worried that the stress and high profile of a successful academic career would both ruin her health and run the risk of “outing” her to the world. She instead devotes her time to breeding a new variety of muskmelon.
However, as time goes by, other issues become far important to the world’s landscape: the arrival of extraterrestrials, climate change, and a vaccine to prevent HIV. The story shows her reaction to all these things in turn.
I’m not really explaining this story well, I realize. It’s a hard one to sum up, especially considering the public discourse around AIDS has changed a lot since the story was first written. But when I thought of this tea, and the flavour of muskmelon, this was the story that immediately jumped to mind.
For those who are interested in reading it themselves, it’s available on Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00IA66OAG/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00IA66OAG&linkCode=as2&tag=morein-20
