About These Recipes
Some of these recipes and tips are original while others have been created by major tea blenders, tea room chefs and tea sellers, and a few are from the plethora of new books on tea now on your bookseller's shelves.

Why Use Tea in Cooking
Tea is finally breaking out of its familar role as an accompaniment to afternoon tea fare and emerging as a provocative ingredient in every category on the menus of fine restaurants everywhere. More and more esteemed chefs around the country are bringing tea into the kitchen to create recipes using tea for entrées, desserts, or as a base for sophisticated new drinks, showing how infectious this "new" ingredient has become. Tea is an incredible flavor enhancer; it can be just the right addition to so many dishes from picnic favorites or classic desserts to traditional entrées. With compelling evidence that both green and black teas have antioxidant properties, there is now a greater impetus to enjoy teas in the cup, and on the plate. This is a health-giving ingredient with a long history and an even brighter future-right in the home kitchen.

How to Cook with Tea
The myriad tea selections can be quite overwhelming, and there is much more to cooking with it than meets the kettle. What’s great about tea is its multifunctional uses; you can substitute it for wood chips when using a smoker, include it in a marinade, create salad dressings, enhance stocks by steeping tea bags in them, stuff it into meat and so on.

The vices with tea are that it burns easily and can be very potent. But once you are acclimated to the different varietals, how they interacts with other ingredients and the various methods of preparation, tea can affix new flavors and textures to your dishes.

Some offer a heady, smoky flavor that pairs well with duck or earthy vegetables like mushrooms, while others provide a fantastic delicateness with mild fish such as tilapia or shellfish. The tricks of the trade are to know which teas to marry with what dishes, not to go overboard with the ingredient and to be creative.

The first step is to select an opposite tea to pair with your dish, as you would with any common herb and correspondingly when cooking with wine. Tea is analogous to wine when used as a culinary ingredient. It should add new flavor, but not overwhelm the dish. That’s why you wouldn’t want to pair a delicate food with a strong tea.

Tea can be surprisingly strong when used for cooking purposes, so be parsimonious when adding your new culinary wonder. Pay attention when brewing tea for use in cooking, If you over-brew you will end up with a very bitter dish, and if you overuse the tea it will turn acidy. A good rule of thumb is to not let tea bags steep directly in your dish for any longer than 10 minutes if it’s a light tea, four to five minutes if you are using something strong.

Click here for more tips on how to cook with tea.

Click on any of the links on the leftto try a delicious tea recipe. Enjoy.

 

 

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Green Tea Pepper Sauce