Product Description
Whether it's a delicate green tea from China or a bracing Assam black, a seemingly mild-mannered cup of tea represents a turbulent history of intrigue and conquest, tradition and revolution, East and West. In this sweeping tour through the history, culture, and lore of this 2,000-year-old beverage, veteran tea professionals Mary Lou Heiss and Robert J. Heiss provide an in-depth resource for tea lovers, covering all aspects of production and consumption--from the terroir in which a tea bush is cultivated to the time-honored rituals of brewing and drinking. At once passionate and carefully researched, this weighty tome will infuse readers with a deep appreciation for the illustrious, invigorating, and elusive leaf.

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 4.5 based on 20 reviews)

I just keep picking it back up! by Trish Ladham (Canada)

5 Stars
November 06, 2009
I LOVE this book! The beautiful pictures and history is fantastic. It is packed full of great information about lots of teas around the world. Complete with information on brewing and harvesting. I think anyone would find this a great book they can leave out for guests to browse while enjoying a cup of their favorite tea. I just keep picking it back up and always find something new to read or another picture to enjoy. Great book! I love the high quality paper, and glossy pages, the text is laid out in an easy to read fashion, pick it up for a quick 5 minute read or sit back and enjoy for the evening.

The Comprehensive Authority by Jason Witt (South Saint Paul, MN, USA)

5 Stars
October 29, 2009
This is the ultimate reference book for tea. There are other rather complete books on tea out there, but nothing like this. It's unmatched by any other tea book. Tea experts and afficionados tend to consider this book the thorough guide through the tea world that it is. Mary Lou Heiss is one of those experts and has shared her wealth of information with the rest in one volume. An indispensable and definitive resource.

Detailed Intro to Topic by People who Clearly Love their Craft by Christopher Tricarick

4 Stars
September 14, 2009
With the beautiful pictures of a coffee-table book, this volume combines the detailed information of a serious history. Since I am going to fill the rest of this review with a complaint, I need to state at the outset that for someone who knows nothing more about tea than how to drink it, as I did before I read it, it is an excellent introduction to the topic. The authors clearly love their subject and there is absolutely nothing wrong with their use of their personal experiences to inform their account. The basics--what kind of plant the tea tree actually is, how it grows, and what happens to the leaf from when it is picked to when it creates the beverage in your cup; why oolongs and senchas and pu-erhs and darjeelings are all as different from one another as they are; what the tea customs and brewing methods are in in the various tea drinking countries--all this is covered in decent fullness. I appreciate, too, that countries like Korea and Vietnam, whose tea customs and products are usually overlooked in discussions of that beverage, are not ignored. Yet sometimes the precision and profusion of information on many topics seems, where others are concerned, to mask the same quality that plagues most books of this sort--vagueness and generality. For example, the description of gyokuro and matcha tells us that the bushes are shaded during the last few weeks of their growth; this reduced chlorophyll and, hence, astringency. Later on we are told something similar about Fujian white tea. Yet dried gyokuro leaves are very dark green and the liquor is a clear emerald. Dried white tea leaves are indeed white and the liquor is a pale brown. What accounts for this huge difference? We are not told. Characteristically, however, we are given two long paragraphs describing the curtains which Japanese tea farmers use to shade those bushes whose leaves are destined for matcha or gyokuro. They are called kanareisha, and are divided into tana and jikagise. We then get a very detailed description of the two and of the way they are raised above the tea plants. All of this is interesting and I do not for one minute begrudge its presence in this book. After all, someone who is not interested in the topic can easily skip the paragraphs, and for the rest of us, they give the feeling--which is this book's strong point--that we ourselves are touring tea plantations and seeing everything the authors see. My complaint, then, is that in contrast to the wealth of detailed information on this sort of peripheral point, the book becomes shockingly casual and cursory on other topics of genuine importance to people who are actually drinking the tea. Everyone who is serious about tea will sooner or later become interested in the water question. What water is best for tea? After emphasising that tap water is not ideal and stating in general terms that the quality of the water is important with, of course, the obligatory quote from Lu Yu, the authors write: ""So this is our rule of thumb: if we won't drink a particular water, we won't brew tea in it. conversely, not all great drinking waters are good tea-brewing waters. We love Evian for drinking, but we wouldn't brew tea with it, as it is too soft. Most tea brews best in moderate to soft water. A few teas (such as tippy Yunnan blacks or full-bodied oolongs) brew well in moderate to slightly hard water with a bit of mineral content. For dependable results when we taste tea professionally, we suse water from one of the natural springs in Maine; it consistently has the qualities that we prefer in our tea-brewing water. Toese springs are relatively nearby our teashop, so the water is fresh. This water is similar to the tap water that our local clientele accesses, but we also regularly taste tea with local tap water, to stay in touch with its flavor." There follows the recommendation that the reader experiment with different waters to determine which one he likes best. Now, even assuming that the information here is accurate, it is far too general to be helpful. Which waters are hard, and which soft, and what is the precise hardness factor recommended for tea? The authors, having raised the question, do not answer it. However, a little bit of research reveals that Evian is the hardest of the popular mineral waters, harder than Volvic or Fiji and far harder than Voss or most of the others. To say that Evian is too soft makes no sense, and indeed most of the tea authorities I know say precisely the opposite--Evian is too hard. I suspect this is simply a mis-print and that the authors intended to say "too hard" here too, but who knows? The whole topic is covered far too superficially to be of any help. And they don't even address the question of PH balance. Google "tea water" and you will find that the internet contains a world of contradictory advice, vagueness, and statements of dubious accuracy. The authors of this book were the ideal candidates to clear up the mystery. Again, I do not begrudge the wealth of detail on things like the jikagise curtains the Japanese gyokuro farmers use to shade their plants--but it contrasts strangely with the limited information on something like the water that each one of us puts in our tea. But if this book leaves one wanting more, that is only because all of the information of which it is a repository has given the reader the knowledge of how much more there is to know.

A very good look at Tea, especially in Asia by Rebecca Huston (On the Banks of the Hudson)

4 Stars
March 24, 2009
Given how much I enjoy drinking tea, it's rather a given that over the years I've amassed a collection of books dealing with and about tea. Whenever I see a new book about tea, I know that eventually, it's going to be read by me. And this creates a quandary when I do -- given that there's a rather finite amount of information on the topic, eventually it all starts to sound the same, and it now takes a lot to really engage my interest. Such was the problem when I picked up The Story of Tea: A Cultural History and Drinking Guide by Mary Lou Heiss and Robert J. Heiss. Tracing the origin of tea in ancient China when a leaf from the plant fell into a cup of hot water that the Emperor was drinking from (or so myth would have it), this lavish book takes the reader on a journey from how the tea is cultivated, processed, drunk and ritualized around the world, and focusing mostly on customs in China, Japan, and mostly Asian countries. The first two chapters, A Brief History of Tea and The Life of a Tea Bush were only mildly interesting to be as they covered topics that nearly every book on tea has included. But the sidebars were interesting, and the photographs wonderfully evocative and at times sensual. It's in the third chapter, Manufacture where the story starts to get interesting. One topic I found very interesting was the history of how tea was classified in Ming China, separating the tea into six categories, depending on the age of the leaves and buds when picked, how the tea was fermented or not, and even how it was distributed. That still has remained the system today, with a few modifications. While black and green teas are known to most tea drinkers in the West, only now are the subtleties of white, yellow, oolongs and pu-erhs beginning to be known. The authors take the reader step by step on how teas are picked, graded, sorted, prepared and shipped, all of which determine how it is going to taste by the time it reaches your cup. After the first one hundred pages, the story began to catch my full attention. Titled Journeying Along the Tea Trail, takes the reader along on an excursion around the world to all of the various places ? China, Japan, India, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Africa and even South Carolina ? where tea is grown. It?s this vital aspect that determines how good ? or bad ? a tea will eventually be. Just like wine, each locale imparts a specific characteristic to the tea?s colour, taste, and aroma, and the terminology can also get just as confusing as when a group of wine fanatics get together to discuss a particular vintage. As the tea drinking public becomes better informed and acquainted with tea, I predict that the terminology and jargon will get just as complicated. An Encyclopedia of Tea is a brief section, unfortunately. I can understand why this section is kept small ? to have a visual guide to all of the varieties available would be far too large to ever publish. Instead, there are about thirty or so different teas that are given a description, along with a picture of the leaves and a brewed cup of tea. Much more interesting is a brief look at what are known as ?presentation? teas, where teas and blooms are tied and dried together so that when they are brewed ? preferably in a clear teapot or cup ? they transform into fantastical shapes. Brewing the Perfect Cup is just that. How to select your tea, the pot, how to find a good tea merchant, and all sorts of data on how to get that optimum brew. It?s a very short chapter, and frankly, all information that I had read somewhere else before. Much more intriguing is the next chapter, Tea Culture Around the World. Again, most of the information is focused on China and Japan, but what really works here is on the gong fu tasting ceremony, and the cha-no-yu ceremony in Japan. What sort of equipment is used, where such a ceremony will take place, foods that are eaten, and so on. I found it very interesting to read about, and two Asian cultures that tend to be overlooked got a little bit of space for themselves ? Tibet and Korea. Sadly, Western tea customs were pretty much overlooked here, which is a pity. Health Benefits of Tea, and the following chapter Ethics in the Tea Trade are bound to upset some readers. While there are certainly benefits to drinking tea ? I do it for sheer enjoyment ? you do have to be careful in sifting out the hyperbole from the reality. So too with the ethics. Tea workers have been exploited for centuries, and sadly, it still goes on. Awareness helps, and more merchants are opting to work with planters and vendors who can guarantee that their workers are being paid a working wage and given decent conditions. What is considered ethical is also a subject for debate as well, and honestly, one I intend to stay out of. The final chapter, Cooking with Tea is pretty interesting. While I haven?t tried any of the recipes yet, I know it will only be a matter of time before I do. There isn?t very many to choose from here, but they range the gamut from appetizers to desserts and sweets. The book winds up with a list of buyers resources, a glossary of expressions, a bibliography and index. Overall, I did like this book. The photographs are beautiful and compelling, at times the text is interesting to read, and I really did like the look at more obscure tea traditions in Korea, Tibet and Morocco. But some of the chapters left me cold. Despite the problems that I had with some sections, this still gets a four star rating from me. Recommended.

a comprehensive book for tea lover by Kang Guo (New York)

5 Stars
March 20, 2009
As a tea lover, I picked up this book and trying to understand more about tea. I was amazed on the tremendous amount of materials that were covered in this book. It covers a wide variety of area from tea's history and culture to tea's category and taste. It is a very comprehensive book that was written based from writers experience as a tea enthusiast and merchant. I love mini tea stories within the book. I strongly recommend tea lover to read this book.

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