At Far Leaves today I bought a couple tea modifiers, or so I like to think of them--flowers that aren't tea but can be brewed with tea to modify its effects/flavors. They're fine on their own, in fact really good, but I like the idea of using them to engineer the effect of a tea.

I got chrysanthemum blossoms and red rose buds. Chrysanthemum has an earthy, cooling, almost salt-and-buttery effect. It soothes the tea and rounds out the edges, while giving it a sort of heady calmness. And rose, well, is rose; as a tea, it's mellow but forward, soft but distinctly scented. And both flowers are highly edible once they've been steeped. Chrysanthemums are actually kind of spicy and roses are, well, roses.

It just occured to me that gently warming amaretto and steeping rosebuds in it would be... well... amazing.

I have to hurry to bellydancing.

7:32 p.m. 2004-03-04�