Educating the next generation of Tea Professionals

There are a lot of reasons to learn about tea and even more ways to go about it. When I first started studying tea, it was 1998, after my first trip to India. It was fascinating to watch my friend Satya’s grandmother make masala chai. Putting in the spices and tea and the whole thing boiling. I’ll never forget that first sip. Not ever, not ever. The tea she put in, I had never seen, I asked if it was some kind of mineral or vegetable. I didn’t know that this was the same stuff in the teabags I had stuffed in my kitchen cabinets back home. 

I started going to Chinatown, looking at the boxes and boxes of ‘teas’. Chrysanthemum, Osmanthus…these things sounded so exotic. The packaging foreign and dream-inducing. I got online to Yahoo groups and observed what people were talking about. Was it the tea? Was it the experience? Was it both? I was at the library and eventually landed up at the Tea Board of India, which had an office in New York at the time. I started visiting. What is Indian tea? I wanted to learn, there was nowhere else to go…but India. 

In 2002, I packed my stuff, put it in storage and set out to spend six months studying tea. Alone. With no real plan other than start north and head south. I was lucky to have had a few email addresses of someone who knew something about tea. I made phone calls. I showed up. Asked questions and was surprised to learn the more I asked the more people were excited to show me. 

I can go on about what I did with all of that information in the tea shop and tea room I opened, along with all the events and products over the years. But the main thing is that I want others to learn tea something in the way I had. With significantly less effort and OMG way less expense. Studying Indian tea was something I had to invent for myself and it’s been an incredible journey, though perhaps not the easiest path in the world. 

It makes sense to speed up that process for others. Tea needs us. It needs us to share; yes, tea is great for that solitary moment to ponder existence, but more and more, it’s a conduit to bring people together. Within that are a million business possibilities that are obscured from reach without a real understanding of tea. 

I’ve created a few different classes to meet you wherever you are. If you’re new to palate development, never mind the tea, or if you already know about tea from other countries but don’t know much about Indian tea, or whether you’re advancing or advanced in your beverage career, and want to add tea to your repertoire of knowledge. I’ve made it easy to jump in and start. 

In the palate development classes, it’s less about what the tea is and more learning to taste the subtle layers of flavor tea can have, which is a little harder to ‘hear’ than in products like wine, chocolate and whisky. The Professional Development classes are in-depth courses with homework and tests to set you up for a career in beverages.  The photo is my first two graduates of the Professional Course 101 series and I’d love to have you join the next round! Any questions you have about tea education, which includes actually going to tea gardens in India with me, please email amy@janamtea.com. I’d love to help you discover Indian tea and why I love it so much, I’ve dedicated my life to it.