Tea Cart in Philadelphia!
I was very, very, very surprised to see this truck parked at the University I work for today:
It does look like a hot dog cart, but it serves loose leaf teas! It also roams (it’s usually near Drexel University but today it was near us because of the TEDxPhilly thing at the Kimmel Center.
How cool – they tweet where they are going to be on any given day:
Check out the menu!!
http://www.melange-tea.com/price-list/
It’s more extensive than some tea houses I’ve been to!
I didn’t get anything because I’m already drinking Yunnan Golden Bud from Samovar today (and let’s just say that in itself is a fully satiating tea experience!), but I thought it was a great concept!!! I hope I see it around again soon.
One thing that is really neat about Philadelphia is that we have these trucks that drive around with amazing food, and go to different spots. We’ve recently had a cupcake truck and a taco truck park near our University. I also had the best Cuban sandwich that I have ever eaten in my life from a truck that I only saw once, and never again!
Wow! Here in NYC we have more than our share of food trucks, but no wonderful tea trucks like this one. Melange has a most impressive selection, and very affordable prices — the thought of strolling up to their cart and getting a large cup of delightful Keemun for two bucks is making me very happy! This may call for a field trip to Philly in the near future.
Most amazing thing ever! …sad they don’t serve matcha… :(
Greetings everyone, thanks so much for the kind attention! Cofftea, we will be serving matcha someday, however, there are issues using the ‘chasen’ (bamboo whisk) which we are still trying to solve (no easy way to clean/sanitize them in accordance with food safety law); as soon as I can solve that puzzle we’ll be adding it to the menu!
Hello Melange Tea Cart! I hope you come back somewhere in Center City soon!! I’ll be looking at your twitter :)
I definitely see that as a problem… could you maybe just serve it w/ a spoon? My best friend served me matcha once in a coffee mug w/ a spoon so I could keep stirring it… I like to savor my matcha anyway so it’s nice to have something I can stir it w/ after it’s served… I applaude you for trying to make it authentic though! A wire wisk might be ok for the whisking prior to serving.
Hi all, and thanks for the interest – I’m glad I’m not the only one who’s dying for a real cup of tea in this city! As for reappearing in Center City, that’s a permitting issue with the city, but we are working on it and are trying to get every chance to bring our cart to various spots so more people can sample our offerings – unfortunately, Philadelphia isn’t exactly the easiest organization in the world to deal with so this is going to take some time.
Cofftea – I did experiment a little with matcha made with ‘western’ implements, but I believe the metal does interact with the tea in the slightest way and compromises the drink. Since matcha is all about purity, I’m pretty dead-set on only serving it if I can do it in the most precise manner possible, using the correct traditional implements (I have the same attitude towards yerba maté). It’s just very tough to ‘update’ such a process to work out of a hot dog cart, but that’s the crux of the Melange puzzle at every turn of the way. :)
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