Fave Friday

About a year ago, when I did my first detox with local nutritionist Claire Stone who I "met" on Twitter (if you're looking to detox I can highly recommend hers), I started drinking non-tea tea. I had a lot of it slowly aging in the cupboard and I started trying to drink it all up when I couldn't drink coffee anymore. That was when I discovered that green and white tea still has caffeine in it. But that was OK, because it made me experiment a bit more with other teas.

I don't drink tea in the British sense of the world; but I do drink tea in the way the rest of the world means it. The only tea I don't drink is black tea, with milk. Black tea in general doesn't make me feel great, even when I drink it...er...black. Confusing. If I'm coming to visit, please just offer me white, green or peppermint, one of which most people seem to have hanging around.

Anyway. (I seem to say that a lot). My favourite teas, at the moment, are made by Pukka. For a start they have beautiful boxes, which I find very appealing. Secondly, the bags are individually wrapped which makes them very portable, and the wrappers are quite sturdy. My favourite for most of last year was the vanilla chai. This winter, each time I put on a coat for its first wear of the season, I found a vanilla chai teabag in the pocket. This was good because it meant I had vanilla chai everywhere I went. It's naturally quite sweet and very aromatic.

I stuck to my favourite for a while but now I also regularly buy the three ginger and the three cinnamon (not available in many places but so, so good). They're very good for school and drunk with a stir of manuka honey when my voice is going. Sometimes when I take my cup down after lunch I get a little group of students following me with their noses up, like little Bisto children. This Christmas break I have also discovered, and love, the revitalise (love cardamom so much these days) and elderberry and echinacea (which has a lot of elderflower in it, not that it says that on the label).

So much tea, so little time.