New Teas!

New Teas!, a photo by Ayala Moriel on Flickr.

At long last, I've re-launched my entire tea collection at the inaugural Vancouver Tea Festival this past weekend - including the long-time favourites Immortelle l'Amour and Roses et Chocolat teas, which were both out of stock for longer than we could tolerate... It's been a long, painstaking process of sourcing, sampling and testing teas and various fragrant botanicals from different origins, comparing them, formulating, tasting and fine tuning my vision for each one of the teas, complete with the tea label design, French translation, and printing... The entire process took 4 years!

Each of the 4 teas in my collection was inspired by a distinctive perfume from Ayala Moriel Parfums' line of all-natural, artisanal fragrances that are handcrafted to perfection from the finest flower extracts in the world. The teas themselves are a blend of carefully selected perfumed teas (read: not-aromatized, but rather fragranced with the real whole fresh flowers such as jasmine, rose, etc.) and further perfumed with top-quality, freshly dried and organic or wild-harvested botanicals.

Charisma tea was Ayala's first tea blend, and the house blend she served only to guests at her West End perfume studio during the summer months, it was blended from fresh lemon verbena and spearmint leaves mixed with premium jasmine green tea. It is now available in its dry loose leaf tea form for your enjoyment year around! Charisma can be re-infused 4 times, and makes for an excellent chilled tea or add a splash of rum and a slice of lime to turn it into a tea mojito!
The tea was inspired by Charisma perfume: a fresh floriental fragrance based on the contrast between cool and warm notes: jasmine sambac, gardenia, tonk a bean, kewda, green tea, sandalwood, spearmint and bergamot.

Zangvil tea was created in 2011, to coincide with the Zangvil fragrance launch and our White Potion fragrant chocolate bar we collaborated on with CocoaNymph (you can read more about our amazing tea party we hosted to celebrate this triple accomplishment). Zangvil is all about ginger - a note that is comforting, warming and sexy. The perfume is a honeyed amber-and-ginger fragrance that is as cozy as a cashmere sweater; and the tea reflects that with delicate silver needle jasmine white tea, infused by rare botanical musk seeds, vanilla beans and of course - crystallized ginger. It can be infused up to 7 times to produce a clear, shimmery liquor that is a delight to all the senses!

Immortelle l'Amour tea is an elixir of love, and full of anti-oxidants yet caffeine free. This rooibos-based tea is perfumed with vanilla bean slices, organic orange peel and Ceylon cinnamon bark. Calendula petals add a stunning visual effect - like threads of sunshine within the beautiful red-maple hue of rooibos. Immortelle l'Amour perfume was inspired by a love story, and the Quebecoise tradition of making Tire sur le neighs (taffee on the snow). It has notes of immortelle, maple syrup, rooibos, cinnamon, orange and an overdose of vanilla. The tea is wonderfully sweet on its own, and can be re-steeped twice (which is very unusual for a rooibos tea!). It is particularly luxurious when served with pure maple syrup, and makes a wonderful accompaniment for a brunch of cinnamon waffles :-)

Roses et Chocolat tea is arguably the most luxurious and seductive of all 4 blends. It also was the most challenging one to blend and took Ayala 4 years to perfect: it required an expert patience and masterful blending of China black tea, rose petals, fine Darjeeling,  cacao nibs and exotic spices to create the perfect balance between the smooth, rich, floral and spicy elements. This tea is a message of romance and seduction in a cup. Enjoy this whenever you have a chocolate craving (but don't want the calories ;-) Or if that's not your concern - it may very well be served with a square of dark chocolate or Rahat Loukum (Turkish delight). Roses et Chocolat perfume, which inspired it was originally created for Valentine's Day 2005 as a limited edition. We could not keep it on the shelves long enough ever since. It is also available as a chocolate bar (72% cocoa with rose otto, saffron and chilli, which we've developed with CocoaNymph) and a scented candle made of organic soy wax (designed in collaboration with Gabriel's Aunt).  



Alicia at our booth at the Vancovuer Tea Festival (November 2nd, 2013).