I've been digging deep for inspiration lately following Huchi-Kuchi and all the Hearth Goddess deep into my imagination to conjure up some images of inspiration to keep my dream alive. Last night I remembered an inspiration from when I was still in college in Boston. Before Whittard's, before Alice's, before India, I read the Nora Roberts' three sisters trilogy and was inspired by the oldest sister, Mia. She lives on a small provincial island in New England with her two sisters nearby and they are witches.

Love and danger and magik unfold through the three romance novels (of which I think I will go buy today and reread). But the part that is most inspiring to me, is Mia's bookstore. Her bookstore is the heart of the little town. It's in an old victorian house by the sea with comfortable chairs and narrow bookshelves with ladders and creaking stairs and crystals in the windows. It's where everybody goes to be understood, given a cup of tea and a good book. It's the only source of magic and wildness and sexiness for the old fashioned folk living their island lives, kind of like the candy store and it's goddess in Chocolat. All these women do is promote enjoyment of life and everyone thinks they are evil temptresses until they realize how much they need a little enjoyment. I think tea can be one of those things.

It's not that I want to find a provincial place that has no magic, it's just that there seem to be A LOT of places that feel like that to me anyway. A lot of places. Most places. I usually feel a little out of the ordinary when it comes to enjoyment of life (I enjoy it a lot.) It's not that I think people don't feel magic themselves, quite the contrary, they just don't always have an outlet for it and I want to be like Mia and bring it to somewhere that needs one which is everywhere.

I want to be the scandalous woman in the neighborhood who kisses her Erik all the time and who has wild hair and wears beautiful dresses and glittery things and will make you a cup of tea to heal all your wounds and make you feel like you were just given a tiny present just for you. It's like I want to wrap the world in a starry blanket.

I am, afterall, a witch.

That's my Muse for the day, Mia and her magic bookstore on a tiny wild island.

FTGFOP

What does FTGFOP stand for? "Far too good for ordinary people." That's a joke. Get it?

Not too many people know what this means, and they probably just assume that if a tea has this on it's label then it must be good. Well that is true to a certain extent.

What it actually stands for is "Finest, Tippy, Golden, Flowery, Orange Pekoe." Sometimes you'll see an "S" at the front. That would be "Super!!!! fine, tippy, golden, flowery, orange pekoe," but that's just silly, and we're trying to be serious here.

It gets even more complicated, and I have included a huge list of terms that I snagged from Wikipedia at the bottom of this post. If one was to simply skim the list, and not absorb any of it, you would not be considered a bad tea drinker. It's sort of interesting from an academic point of view but, unless you're a tea buyer or something you don't really need to know much of it.

So then! What does the "Finest" mean exactly? Well, it means that the tea you're buying is good quality. It's still relative, and if you want to get really anal about it, you would inspect lot numbers on the tea shipments, but then again, that would be silly too. Tippy refers to the golden color of the new leaf buds (as opposed to the black of fully oxidized mature leaves). The more the color is golden or orange generally indicates that younger and more carefully picked leaves have been used to make that tea -- which is one important indicator of potential quality. Occasionally the number 1 can be added for a particularly fine grade of tea.

Grade terminology

• Choppy - When the tea contains a lot of varying sized leaves.
• Fannings - Small particles of tea leaves a grade higher than dust. Used almost exclusively in tea bags.
• Flowery - A large leaf, typically plucked in second of third flush, with an abundance of tips
• Golden Flowery - The tea contains very young tips or buds (which are usually golden in colour) that were picked early in the season.
• Tippy - The tea contains an abundance of tips.

Whole leaf grades

The grades for whole leaf orthodox black tea (in ascending order) are:

• OP - Orange Pekoe - Main grade in tea production. Can consist of long wiry leaf without tips.
• OP sup - Orange Pekoe Superior - Primarily from Indonesia, tea is much the same as above
• F OP - Flowery Orange Pekoe - High quality tea with a long leaf and few tips, considered second grade in Assam, Dooars and Bangladesh and first grade in China
• F OP1 - Flowery Orange Pekoe First Grade Leaves - As above but with only the highest quality leaves in the F.O.P classification
• GF OP1 - Golden Flowery Orange Pekoe First Grade Leaves- Higher proportion of tip than FOP Top grade in Milima and Marinyn regions; Uncommon in Assam and Darjeeling.
• TGF OP - Tippy Golden Flowery Orange Pekoe - Tea with the highest proportion of tip; Main grade in Darjeeling and Assam.
• TGF OP1 - Tippy Golden Flowery Orange Pekoe - As above, but with only the highest quality leave in the T.G.F.O.P classification
• FTGF OP - Finest Tippy Golden Flowery Orange Pekoe - Highest quality grade. Often hand processed and produced at only the best plantations. Roughly one quarter tips.

Broken leaf grades

• BT - Broken Tea - Usually a black, open, fleshy leaf, very bulky. Classification used in Sumatra, Sri Lanka, some parts of Southern India.
• BP - Broken Pekoe- Most common broken pekoe grade. From Indonesia. Ceylon, Southern India.
• BPS - Broken Pekoe Souchong - Term for broken pekoe in Assam and Darjeeling.
• FP - Flowery Pekoe - High quality pekoe. Usually coarser, fleshier broken leaf. from Ceylon and Southern India, also produced in some parts of Kenya.
• BOP - Broken Orange Pekoe - Main broken grade. Prevalent in Ceylon, Southern India, Java and China.
• F BOP - Flowery Broken Orange Pekoe - Coarser broken with some tips from Assam, Ceylon, Indonesia, China and Bangladesh. In South America coarser, black broken.
• F BOP F - Finest Broken Orange Pekoe Flowery - The finest broken orange pekoe. Higher proportion of tips. Mainly from Ceylon's "low districts".
• G BOP - Golden Broken Orange Pekoe - Second grade tea, uneven leaves and few tips.
• GF BOP1 - Golden Flowery Broken Orange Pekoe 1 - As above, but with only the highest quality leaves in the GFBOP classification.
• TGF BOP1 - Tippy Golden Flowery Broken Orange Pekoe 1 - High quality leaves with high proportion of tips. Finest broken First Grade Leaves in Darjeeling and some parts of Assam.

Fannings grades

• PF - Pekoe Fannings -
• OF - Orange Fannings - From Northern India and some parts of Africa and South America.
• FOF - Flowery Orange Fannings - Common in Assam, Dooars and Bangladesh. Some leaf sizes come close to the smaller broken grades.
• GFOF - Golden Flowery Orange Fannings- Finest grade in Darjeeling for teabag production.
• TGFOF - Tippy Golden Flowery Orange Fannings.
• BOPF - Broken Orange Pekoe Fannings - Main grade in Ceylon, Indonesia, Southern India, Kenya, Mozambique, Bangladesh and China. Black-leaf tea, few added ingredients, uniform particle size, no tips.

Dust grades

• D1 - Dust 1 - From Sri Lanka, Indonesia, China, Africa, South America and Southern India.
• PD - Pekoe Dust
• PD1 - Pekoe Dust 1 - Mainly produced in India.