Perhaps it has a wee bit to do with my British birth and ancestry, perhaps not,  but one of my favorite “vanilla” things in life has always been to enjoy a nice cup of tea. 

Not long ago I discovered Harney & Sons and I have become quite an enthusiastic fan. I initially picked up a can with 20 silken sachets of their Earl Grey Supreme  in a specialty market and it was like finding bliss in a cup.  This was truly the most delicious cup of tea I had ever tasted!

The can pointed me to their website and I proceeded to spend well over an hour perusing their wonderful on-line store, trying to decide how to narrow down my many interests to a reasonable size order.  In the end I decided that I deserved to grab samples of every variety of Earl Grey that they offered, a 50 count bag of the Supreme, the Dragon Pearl Jasmine AND the 8 slot linen chest! I placed the order right before I went to Chicago and was delighted to have them here when I returned. Never have I tasted such delightful and flavorful blends!

Hell, I even decided it was time to learn to make a “proper” cup of tea, meaning fully boiling the water and letting it steep a full 5 mins rather than getting it from the hot water “cooler” and dumping my cream and sugar in moments later. (“Daddy Myke” of my Leather Clan would be proud since he and Angel bought me a proper kettle for Christmas and Danni Boi got me a lovely large tea pot.) I even showed My Brett how to heat the teapot before pouring the water in to steep the tea.

This morning My sweet Brett let me sleep in late, even though I so inconsideratly woke him up in the middle of the night last night. 😉   And when I was ready to wake up at last, he had prepared and brought me up a pot of tea, complete with cream & sugar on the side, the cup and saucer, spoon and a raspberry turnover all on a lovely breakfast tray.  I love the way that man romances, pampers and cares for me. 🙂

As I sat in bed enjoying this treat I mused to him him much I would love it if we could visit Harney & Sons tea shop in Millerton some day.  He immediately popped onto the web and checked their address and discovered that it was not all that far away. Less than 2 hours later I was standing in this wonderfully elegant little tea shop.  He bought me a fabulous two cup thermal tea pot that keeps my second cup piping hot while I enjoy my first, as well as 2 more varieties of tea. Then we treated ourselves to a cup in their Zagat rated tasting room along with a scone plate with jam and clotted cream.

I was in my british glory and misted up thinking about how much I would have loved to have brought my dear mother there. It was an wonderfully perfect afternoon and I look forward to visiting again and again!  But in the meantime, if someone was looking for ideas of something to buy for me, a gift certificate from Harney’s would ALWAYS be welcome! 🙂