The Tea Library

I've drank tea all of my life.  In my childhood, I drank black tea, brewed from tea bags.  In the summer I drank ice tea, unsweetened, as is the tradition where I grew up in New York City.

Now, I can no longer tolerate more than a tiny bit of caffeine, and I've switched to either herbal tea or decaf black tea.  I have always been sensitive to cinnamon and that leaves out some herbal and flavored black teas, but I find the herbal tea world is large.  The two herbals I really don't like are roobios (which, unfortunately, is in a lot of blends) and chamomile.  On the other hand, I like hibiscus and mint.

The one thing I regret about my tea habit is the fact that, except for a couple of gift shops that will sell you one herbal tea bag, I can't buy just one tea bag (or enough tea for one ball's worth of loose tea, which I also indulge in sometimes) to try out.  If I don't like the tea, or if my digestion doesn't, I'm stuck with a box of 19 or 23 tea bags.

I'm not a tea connoisseur.  I think I can tell if a tea is really bad (and I know that most tea connoisseurs don't use tea bags - I can understand why, but I tend to be lazy) but I'm willing to try different brands out.

Enter....The Tea Library.  

Yes, one of our local libraries has set up a Tea Library for this winter.  They need contributions of tea bags.  They must be individually wrapped, list ingredients on the wrapper (thank you!) and not be past their expiration date.

If you take tea, the limit is three tea bags.  You also have to sign a register (first name) if you are either taking or donating.

Today, I stopped into this library (I usually don't go to this one) and there was the tea library.  I didn't have any teas but I decided to try three of them.   I figured I couldn't go wrong with Earl Grey, and none of these have roobios or chamomile.
 

Now I'll have to find the time to donate some teas.

Would you take out a tea from a tea library?