TalkingWithTami.com:Hello Bruce, Im so glad you took the time out of your busy schedule to chat with me! Tell your lovely wife Shelley I said hello and thanks so much for my newest book called,”My Mother loved TEA” by David C.Bigelow.I am a huge tea person,can you tell us how you got into the whole tea business?
I began drinking hot tea on my trips to the Middle East and Europe in the 70s. It was a ritual that Shelley and I then incorporated into our daily routine. We purchased a antebellum house here in Kentucky in 1990 and opened a small tearoom when American’s were not drinking hot tea. The tearoom became internationally known and grew to 5,000 square-feet of dining, retail and art. Our passion became our vocation.
TalkingWithTami.com: There are millions of teas out there lol, how can someone know they have good tea? Whats some of your favorites as well?
I drink a single-estate Tippy Assam every morning for breakfast and a Darjeeling First Flush in the afternoon. I tend to drink single estate and unblended unflavored teas with no additions. If we have guests for dinner, I like to drink oolongs using the gongfu method. It’s a great conversation starter!
TalkingWithTami.com: You have several books on the market, tell us some of them and why you decided to write about the tea experience?
There were few tea books available in 1990 when we started our tea business. Our books are pretty much consumer-driven. We began writing tea recipe books because people were always asking Shelley for recipes. I wrote five tea travel books because people constantly asked me where to have tea when they went to Europe or cities across America. I wrote the New Tea Companion with London’s Jane Pettigrew because our fast-growing tea industry needs tea education books. That book is now used by Twinings and many leading American tea companies for staff training.
TalkingWithTami.com: I have introduced my kids to tea and we have plenty of tea parties around my house lol. Can you tell us why its important to teach our youth about tea?
Tea can be a vehicle for teaching social skills, conversation, and history. The ritual of tea helps focus young minds in a delicious way. That’s why our book with Dorothea Johnson, Children’s Tea & Etiquette, has been such a success.
TalkingWithTami.com: I know that you have traveled alot, can you tell me where there are some amazing tea rooms?
I recently did interviews with CNN and MSN because they had similar questions. America is fortunate to have so many styles of tearooms to choose from. Although the English style has been dominate for a couple of decades, the growing trend is toward Asian and contemporary stylings. San Francisco is a hotbed of tea activity because of the large Asian culture in the Bay Area. New York City has over 100 locations to enjoy tea (see Tea in the City: New York.) The southeastern United States probably has the highest number of tea establishments per capita. It seems that every little town has some sort of tearoom these days. My first criteria for a great tearoom is that they pay attention to the tea. American tea drinkers are more sophisticated than they were ten years ago. They won’t come back, if the tea is not well-made.
