Tea Grown in Europe Association
Taste what European soil has to offer
This year, we all travelled to UK and more specifically to Wales to visit Peterston tea estate. We were 25 members to gather in the tea garden of Lucy Georges, the owner. It was a time of exchanges, tea making and tea expertise sharing.
Then we crossed the country to scotland to visit 3 amazing gardens.
Our annual tea tour was on the stunning island of São Miguel, Azores. It’s been an inspiring week of collaboration, sharing knowledge, exchanging ideas, and reconnecting with the craft that brings tea growers across Europe together.
A heartfelt thank you to our host, Clara from the Agriculture Department, for guiding us through the tea fields and creating such an engaging environment for learning and partnership. Days like this remind us of the power of collaboration in growing not just tea, but the community and expertise around it.
The Tea Grown in Europe association is a place made for tea growers – most of them starting – to share practical experiences and discuss technical topics about tea cropping and tea making, from garden to cup.
Our first technical seminar was purposely held on mid-october at the Terrasses de l’Arrieulat, 2023 president Lucas Ben-Moura’s tea garden, nested in the heart of Pyrénées mountains, France.
The roundtable confronted the topics of cultivars’ adaptation, planting methods, field management, and tea making practices, relying on individual cases brought by participants Thomas Bernardi (Les Landes Vivantes) and Jakez Hubert (L’Aventure Oolong) coming from Brittany, Lydia Gautier, based in Limousin, Mylène Alphabégoïthy (Mendikotea), Gilles Lacape (SCEA Handi Baita), local guest Mikel Esclamadon (Ilgora Herriko tea), and Étienne Monin, in the surrounding Pyrénées area, the Zacherra family (Compania del Lago) coming especially from Italy, and the online participation of Beatriz Piñeiro Lago (El Pazo Quinteiro da Cruz) from Spain.
More was to come with the tea tasting session, under Lydia Gautier’s guidance, staging teas from all kind, with additional samples graciously provided by the Agrarian Development Services of São Miguel in the Azores, Tscha-Nara Teagarden in Germany, Filleule des Fées, and the Horticultural Vocational High School of Hennebont, in France.
We intend, that this first technical seminar will be followed by many others, to the benefit of EuT members, in tackling the various issues in tea cropping and making, while acknowledging the many progresses made by European tea growers, on their path to premium teas.
Many thanks to Lucas and his mother Sybille for their warm welcome, and the Argelès-Gazost townhall, for providing us with a comfortable meeting room.
For more information, please contact us at: president@tea-grown-in-europe.eu.
A summer serie’s portrait, published by the French newspaper Le Monde, sheds light on the white tea garden grown by our member Clara Estrela Rego on São Miguel Island, Azores, on behalf of the São Miguel Agrarian Development Service of the Regional Government of the Azores.
It draws on the two centuries old history of tea growing in Azores Islands, and on the favourable conditions brought by the Southern oceanic location. It moreover pays tribute to the passionate and delicate work of Clara, year after year, portrayed as “her Majesty of white teas”. We, in EuT, couldn’t put it better!
A scientific team, gathered around Professor Elisabetta Damiani, from the Università Politecnica delle Marche, based in Ancona, Italy, has recently conducted two studies, to assess and compare the healthy content of European teas, originated from six different tea gardens grown by EuT members.
The two studies were conducted between 2021 and 2022, and focused on the health-promoting properties of the teas investigated, in terms of essential and potentially toxic elements, on one hand, and antioxydant capacities and polyphenol contents, on the other hand. Results are published, respectively in the academic journal Molecules, 2023, 28, 3802, and in Antioxydants, 2023, 12, 1306 (both papers freely available).
More insight from tea growers about the studies can be found in the review by Roopak Goswami in World Tea News.
Further collaborative research with EuT tea growers is still on track. You may contact Tobias Denzler, from the Casa del Tè, for further questions.
The updated EuT Leaflet 2023 Edition presents 19 tea growers and tea makers from locations all around Europe, adding 9 tea gardens from the precedent 2021 edition!
Please get in touch with us if you would like to plan a visit with tea producers in your area, and taste what European teas have to offer. We look forward to meeting you.
Many thanks to Monica Griesbaum (Windy Hollow Farm), and Alex Ahearn (Flowers + Tea) for their diligent work, in preparing this new edition.
The Tea Grown in Europe Association is happy to join the 4th Global May Tea Part, on the 23rd May 2023!
The Tea Grown in Europe Association joins the 3rd Global May Tea Party
The Casa del Tè, home of EuT’s president Tobias Denzler, is nominated for the Prix Montagne 2022, sponsored by the Swiss Moutain Aid.
Vote to support Tobias’ tea garden, located on the Monte Verità, in Ticino, a place steeped in history.