Eating Tea

I suppose a blog on vegan food and tea should have at least one post on combining the two. That is, about, more or less, about eating tea.

First of all, as some know, you can easily use tea, as a liquid, in cooking by simply...

* Replacing any water in a recipe with tea(especially in baking).

* Using it as a baste(ex. I tend to use a slightly oversteeped black tea to baste tofurkey).

Yet, this is merely the beginning in use. Since it's typically considered wasteful to toss the leaves and not everyone has a compost heap/garden they can feed with them, here are a few things I've been known to do...

* Eat them as is. Japanese teas, especially good quality ones, tend to taste pretty fantastic on their own or with just a dash of soy sauce. When feeling lazy, I've been known to take a spoon or chopsticks and eat them straight out of the pot.

* Make tea leaf pancakes. (1 c. flour, 1 c. water, all the leaves from one session mixed together then cooked over med. heat in a frying pan with veg. or canola oil. Use a spoon or fork to spread out the batter so the pancake ends up rather thin. Flip a few times until brown on both sides, makes about 3, cut into fourths or bite-sized pieces. Serve with dipping sauce of your choice-as always, I like chopped garlic + Korean soy sauce).

* Combine them with other tasty things to use as a filling for onigiri, buns, or jiao zi.

* Dry or just set aside the leaves to use as topping for ochazuke.

* Toss them in a stir-fry/fried rice. Greens and oolongs especially.

In short, you can throw them into almost any dish, so definitely play around to see where they add the most to your meal.

Though wait! There's more! Most people who think of cooking with tea tend to think of matcha, with good reason, there are grades of matcha marked only suitable for such(typically cheaper and sold in larger portions than drinking matcha). So, a few suggestions...

* Blend a teaspoon or so with fruit, tofu, soy milk and yogurts for smoothies.

* A few dashes in any baked good adds a green tint and underlying tea taste to the final product.

* Same goes for making sweets, such as green tea mochi.

* Sprinkling it over meals bound for the oven can add an interesting flavor.

As always, the key is to experiment.