vlbrown-mzydt

I love tea.

I discovered tea when I was 10 or 12 years old and my grandmother gifted me a sampler set of Twining loose leaf teas: Earl Gray, Darjeeling, Pince of Wales, and English Breakfast – for my birthday.

Before that, I'd drunk plenty of Liptons.  We were a family that went through gallons of iced tea in the summer.

"Real" tea was not the same. Darjeeling wasn't like English Breakfast! Prince of Wales was like neither. Earl Gray was… different.

They smelled wonderful. They tasted wonderful.

I was hooked.

(Richard was older than 10 or 12 when he discovered "real tea". He was in his mid to late 20s when he was in a store with a friend (of east Indian parentage). Rich said, "Oh, I need tea". His friend looked at the boxes of Liptons and Red Rose and said the fateful words: "This… is not tea", then led Rich around the corner to an aisle where he said, "These will do." And Rich discovered Twinings.)

Mmmmmmmm.