Cheonji Dew Tea, reviewed

It’s been too long since I reviewed a tea, but since I’ve been traveling to Seoul, South Korea this week, I’ve had a chance to try a few new ones. This one is Cheonji Dew Tea, which I bought from a shop in Insadong, although I did see it at several other stores. The name of the tea itself, according to the woman at the shop, was Iseul Cha, or Dew Green Tea. The tea is a green tea that comes from one particular mountain area. The tea doesn’t look like leaves. It actually resembles small, soft branches or sheets of bark, each piece of which can be used for several pots.

The “ah-ha!” moment here comes when you first taste the tea. It is very, very sweet – almost like someone has stirred a lot of honey into your tea without changing the consistency of it at all. And all that sweetness is completely natural! It is absolutely delicious and the tea is also caffeine free.

The woman at the shop told me that it’s very popular with children, especially children who don’t normally care much for plain tea.

Coffee & Tea Glass Filter Straws

Coffee & Tea Glass Filter Straws are inventive devices that make it easy to brew a single cup of tea or coffee at a time – no special equipment required. To brew, pour hot or boiling water into a large cup with fresh coffee grounds or your favorite tea leaves. Once the mixture steeps, sip up the hot liquid through the straw. Each has a special filter on the end to strain out the leaves/grounds on the way to your mouth.

The Tea Straw has a glass strainer attached to a hand crafted glass straw, while the Coffee Straw has a mini French Press filter attached to a hand crafted glass straw. The French press filter is great for coffee, but it works well for tea, too. The tea strainer might be a little large for coffee grounds, however. Each one comes with a carrying tube to protect the straws on your way back and forth to the office (or any other destination where you might need to grab a cuppa).

Starbucks revamps pastry menu

You might have noticed a change in the pastry case at your local Starbucks over the past few weeks. In an effort to cut costs while increasing overall quality, Starbucks has completely changed the way that they do their pastries. Previously, Starbucks used a variety of regional bakeries to stock their stores. This meant that you could find different types of pastries in different areas, according to what was popular there, and that the ingredients that went into the items varied widely.

Starting today, Starbucks is using fewer bakeries, each of which will produce and ship more items. This consolidation also allowed Starbucks to tinker with its recipes and refocus on slightly healthier options with all natural ingredients. They cut out corn syrup from their Marshmallow Dream Bars, eliminated the artificial flavorings from berry muffins and real egg whites are making an appearance in a heart-healthy breakfast sandwich. Starbucks says that its new options have “15 percent fewer calories, 5 percent less fat and 8 percent less saturated fat” than previous items.

Time Out Chicago has done a taste test of the newest items on the menu, if you want to see how they stack up. Not all of these items may be available in your region, but some are nationwide.

Home Coffee Dispenser

The best coffee is generally made from recently roasted beans that have been ground just before being brewed. This maximizes the amount of oil in the coffee beans and gives the finished coffee the richest flavor. But we can’t always have our coffee this way. Sometimes a batch of beans sits around on the counter for a while before we get around to drinking it. Sometimes, we end up buying preground because there was a new flavor/brand available or we don’t have a bean grinder at our disposal. Whatever the reason, it is still possible to preserve the freshness of the beans by keeping them in an airtight container. The Home Coffee Dispenser is an airtight container that should keep beans – especially preground coffee that is prone to drying out – much fresher than other containers. Once the chamber is filled up,  you can dispense coffee a tablespoon at a time into your coffee maker (or even your espresso machine) without opening up the whole thing and exposing all the beans to more air. It holds up to half a pound of coffee.

The Dispenser is especially useful for an occasional coffee drinker, who likes to keep some coffee around but doesn’t make it much, since it not only keeps things fresh, but it makes it much easier to measure it out when you finally get around to using it.

Coffee Top Caddy

This Coffee Top Caddy is a brilliant idea, and I’m sure that anyone who has ever picked up coffee for a friend/family member/coworker/boss will agree. It is hard enough to mix in enough cream and sugar to your own coffee, trying to figure out exactly how much milk and sugar someone else takes in theirs adds pressure to any coffee run.

Designer Josh Harris made a few modifications to the basic design of a plastic coffee cup lid that allows it to securely hold packets of sugar and tubs of creamer easily. So, you can pick up your coffee and various condiments and mix it all together back in the office – and so can anyone else whose drink was on the coffee run. Your hands are kept free to hold the drinks and you don’t need to fuss over hot drinks at a busy condiment bar.