Red Dragon Herbs and Teas

Rooibos is a shrub that comes from South Africa and very few people seem to agree on how to pronounce it.   Regardless of how you say it, it brews up a pleasant tasting herbal infusion with a ton of health benefits with a beautiful golden-red hue.   In this episode we talk about the […]

One of the most common questions we hear is “do you have a tea for weight loss?”.  The idea of being able to take something as enjoyable as a tea and watch the pounds melt away into oblivion is alluring, but the truth is that although tea and herbs have been shown to help with […]

We’re back after a long hiatus and today we’re defending the coffee industry.  Recently a group of coffee retailers in California had a lawsuit slapped against them saying that under Proposition 65, a 1986 law requiring businesses to label cancer-causing products.   Research shows that coffee kinda, sorta, maybe, theoretically, etc. could cause cancer – […]

Two weekends ago we went to Topeka for the Mother Earth News Fair.  I highly encourage anyone who is into homesteading, natural living or whatever other terms used for this genre to make a weekend of one of these fairs.  I talk a little about our experience there as a vendor, but mostly my relationship […]

Today we’re discussing Earl Grey tea and its mysterious origins.   We’re also briefly covering the facts we do know, which is it’s a very popular blend of (typically) black tea with bergamot oil.

Today we’re discussing how the planned closing of Teavana stores worldwide could potentially affect our business.  In short, it’s probably a bad thing for us in the long run because they created a lot of loose leaf tea drinkers.   I also discuss my thoughts on opening up a brick and mortar retail establishment in […]

Just like wine grapes, tea takes on flavors from the land and climates where it is grown.  One of the best examples of this is tea from Darjeeling, a tiny area situated in the foothills of the Himalayas that produces world famous tea.   Known as the “champagne of tea”, the cool mountain air produces […]

I stumbled across this article doing some research for another podcast I do (Cold War Cast) and thought it was worth sharing.  It’s George Orwell (author of Animal Farm, 1984 and a few others) describing his 11 “golden rules” to preparing tea.  I think it is kind of cool to be able to get into […]

  Since we’re not going to be selling tea this weekend at any farmers’ markets, we’ll take the week off from talking about it too…and discuss a few astronomical events.   Right now we’re in the middle of the Perseid meteor shower, which is a hallmark of one of my favorite times of the year. […]

We’ve had a a pretty eventful summer in the way of insects – ants in the kitchen and then all of us getting attacked by yellow jackets last weekend.   In this episode I discuss some of the ways people have used herbs to keep undesired insects away and also how to use herbs to […]