Well, I really love tea! In the mornings, I prefer black tea but I also like green tea and all kinds of herbal teas. The only condition for the black tea especially: it has to be REAL tea - not those small cheap tea bags with an almost indefinable powder which hardly tastes like anything - no loose tea where you actually still can see the leaves. To have some variety in the mornings, I usually have quite some assortment of flavoured black tea (vanilla, earl grey, amaretto, cherry, cranberry, caramel ....) so that I can choose a different one each day and will not get tired of one type.
Unfortunately, Norway is not really a "tea" country (although I start to wonder if it is good for any type of food at all) so among the few teas you get in the normal supermarked, you usually have the choice between 5 different bag teas. In the very good supermarkets, you get one loose tea but usually only one brand which is not that good. I recently was in a medium sized German supermarked and the tea section is now ~ 10-15 m long, 2 m high all densely packed with all kinds of tea (herabal, ecological, loose, bags).
Alternatively of course, you can go to a tea shop and they have a very good choice and very friendly people working there (like in almost every tea shop) but as most good things here in Norway they are REALLY expensive.
So, everytime I come back from Germany, I import loads of tea. Some of it I buy in the German supermarked and some I order at a quite good German online shop (they probably would deliver to Norway as well but then you never know if they put additional tax on it or if they keep the tea at the customs - a lot has happened here).
Of course it's not only the tea I have to take with me, so I usually have to go home with at least a half empty bag to fill it up once I return and still I have to do without many things which I really like but I have to make choices and one of them is the tea ;)
Unfortunately, Norway is not really a "tea" country (although I start to wonder if it is good for any type of food at all) so among the few teas you get in the normal supermarked, you usually have the choice between 5 different bag teas. In the very good supermarkets, you get one loose tea but usually only one brand which is not that good. I recently was in a medium sized German supermarked and the tea section is now ~ 10-15 m long, 2 m high all densely packed with all kinds of tea (herabal, ecological, loose, bags).
Alternatively of course, you can go to a tea shop and they have a very good choice and very friendly people working there (like in almost every tea shop) but as most good things here in Norway they are REALLY expensive.
So, everytime I come back from Germany, I import loads of tea. Some of it I buy in the German supermarked and some I order at a quite good German online shop (they probably would deliver to Norway as well but then you never know if they put additional tax on it or if they keep the tea at the customs - a lot has happened here).
Of course it's not only the tea I have to take with me, so I usually have to go home with at least a half empty bag to fill it up once I return and still I have to do without many things which I really like but I have to make choices and one of them is the tea ;)
I love tea, too. I should take more time to enjoy it.
ReplyDeleteMe too. Americans drink coffee. Preferably made by Starbucks. If they drink tea, they drink herbal tea from tea bags. For someone from Frisia, that is NOT acceptable.
ReplyDeleteAnd so, every time when we go back, like you, we stock up on loose tea, kluentje and all those other things we cannot buy here. And then, after three weeks of Germany, I have to admit, we are all happy to go back home. Germany might have loose tea, kluentje and gummi-bears without artificial food coloring but the US is home now.
Yes it seems to be a common habit that people tend to import things they grew up with or they realised are better in their home country (you seem to appreciate them even more once you don't have them anymore).
ReplyDeleteI've never been that attached to Germany as a country (of course my family is there and I do love and miss them) but Norway or at least Oslo has certainly not become my new home (for various reasons) and I am happy at the prospect of being allowed to leave soon(ish).
There's this place at Grensen: http://www.blackcatkaffeogtehus.no/
ReplyDeleteAnd then this one in Vibesgate: http://www.aperitif.no/?id=97379
but Norway is definitely not a place for Tea, I agree. It's really only fantastic for smoked Salmon :-)
Yes, thanks, I've been to black cat. It's very nice and they have a good choice but since I've been to Germany anyway over Christmas it was cheaper to get the tea from Germany.
ReplyDeleteLast time I left more than 400 NOK for 500 g Earl Grey, 250g Arctic and 100 g Kirsebaer - they are all very nice though.