Scenting tea with fresh flower

Scenting tea with fresh flowers is my latest project.
I have written an article about how to do that. What do you think?
http://club.grandtea.com/make-your-own-scent-tea/

5 Replies
Ubacat said

This sounds like fun! Thanks for posting this. I have plenty of flowers in my garden. I always wanted to try something with my Japanese cherry blooms but sadly this year there’s hardly anything on the tree. It was a cold and dry spring. Will have to wait next year for that one.

I wonder which ones are acceptable for scenting tea and which are poisonous? My lily of the valley should be blooming soon and it has a wonderful scent but would it go with a tea and is it safe?

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Yeah! It is fun! I made 50 g cape Jasmine green tea as experiment and it smell amazing. Maybe like a special gift to a friend.
In China, We have a red lily dried as condiment for steaming chicken. But I am not sure it apply to all lily. You have to ask a herbalist.
When You have done it, Please share your experience with us.

I know these flowers are safe. Somebody maybe can extend the list of safe flowers.
Jasmine,
Cape Jasmine,
Rose,
Osmanthus,
Lavender,
magnolia,
Chrysanthemum,
Dandelion,

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Arby said

Lily of the valley is very toxic. Daffodils, all lilly species, and fox glove, iris, poppy, sweet pea Hyacinth, daphne, and rhododendron/azalea are too, unfortunately.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_poisonous_flowers

As for edible flowers, apparently carnation, English daises, apple/pear blossom, blueberry/blackberry/raspberry/strawberry blossom, and banana blossom are edible.

Ubacat said

Thanks for that info!

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I don’t think it’s going to help most people that would read this thread but lotus is used for flavoring teas in Vietnam. It grows at our house (I live in Bangkok) but in such limited quantity that I couldn’t really use the few flowers a year growing in large pots for that purpose. The comment about flowers being more aromatic at different times is familiar from other flowering plants around our house but I’m not sure if any are edible.

I mentioned this to a tea contact that makes teas in Vietnam, a vendor who’s business name would be familiar, since he was also experimenting with jasmine black tea last year, and who knows what else. His comment was that if you can make the tea to be infused during the processing of the tea itself, before it is fully dry, the results would be better, which makes me wonder if it wouldn’t work to simulate that. To some extent the moisture in the flowers already would though, the reason for the later drying step.

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