How to grow tea at -35°F | INDIE ALASKA
PBS Indie Alaska
Alaska Magazine 2021
Fairbanks might seem an unlikely home for a professional tea guru, but Jenny Tse has no intention of leaving. She has spent most of her life in Fairbanks, and it’s where she started her artisanal tea company, Sipping Streams, in 2007.
GARDENING REPORT: FAIRBANKS TEA SHOP STARTS TEA FARM, OFFERS TIPS TO GROW YOUR OWN
FAIRBANKS, Alaska (KTVF) - The Fairbanks tea shop Sipping Streams Tea Company will be starting their own tea farm and is offering tips to help you grow your own.
According to Jenny Tse, Owner of the business, the farm is collaboration with the Chena Hot Springs. Tse explained, “At our tea farm for Sipping Streams Tea Company, it will actually be grown in collaboration with Chena Hot Springs. This will be grown outside in a greenhouse in the soil. The tea plant itself actually needs to be in the dirt. It can’t be hydroponically grown as people know Chena has, but it actually has to be grown in the dirt so the roots aren’t sitting in still water. It needs to be very well drained. A lot of pure light is what you would need, and it can withstand snow and winter, but not 30 below - and that’s why we’re doing this in collaboration with Chena Hot Springs, because their outdoor greenhouses are controlled by the geothermal heat also.”
FAIRBANKS CLASS TEACHES THE BASICS OF MAKING THE POPULAR FERMENTED DRINK KOMBUCHA
FAIRBANKS — A fizzy, fermented drink that has swept the nation in popularity in the past few years is gobbling up sales almost as fast as producers can make it.
The drink is kombucha, made by a simple fermentation process involving tea, yeast, sugar and basic science. It’s become so popular nationwide — retail sales reached close to $400 million in 2014 — that one Fairbanks business has started hosting classes teaching fans how to make kombucha at home.
Local tea company caffeinates Yukon Quest mushers, handlers and race personnel
Fairbanks, AK - Long distance mushers who drive sled dogs in the Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race don’t get a whole lot of sleep. But Race Director Marti Steury says the race has found a few sponsors who are willing to help keep them awake.
“Rumor has it that we are the best coffee and tea race in all of the mushing circuit which I wasn’t really aware that that was something to strive for,” laughed Steury.
FAIRBANKSAN STUDIES LEAVES, LIVES AFFECTED BY TEA
Tea has taken over Jenny Tse’s life.
Not only did Tse switch from drinking coffee to drinking tea, but she started her own tea business — Sipping Streams — selling teas and tea accessories, teaching a class about tea and staging tea events. In May she will be leading her first tea tour to Guangxi Province in China.
FRESH CUP TEA ALMANAC DECEMBER 2009
Owner steeps new Fairbanks tea shop in family's history
FAIRBANKS — Jenny Downer-Tse, owner of the new Sipping Streams Tea Company, loves to talk tea.
After traveling through Guangxi province in China, Downer-Tse has become a certified tea specialist and has opened a business with her husband to share her knowledge about the health benefits of tea.
FIRST ALASKA TEA FARM ALSO WORLD'S FIRST GEOTHERMALLY HEATED
The first tea farm in Alaska is getting started this week near Fairbanks. It will also be the only geothermally-heated tea farm in the world. Jenny Tse grew up in Fairbanks drinking coffee.
“I drink black coffee.”
Not what you would expect from a world-class tea connoisseur. Yes, here in rural Fairbanks is an international-award-winning tea expert, who is consulted by artisanal growers in Hawaii, India and China, who runs the leading tea manufacturing in Alaska. Now she will be starting the only tea farm in Alaska.
FAIRBANKS CLASS TEACHES THE BASICS OF MAKING THE POPULAR FERMENTED DRINK KOMBUCHA
FAIRBANKS — A fizzy, fermented drink that has swept the nation in popularity in the past few years is gobbling up sales almost as fast as producers can make it.
The drink is kombucha, made by a simple fermentation process involving tea, yeast, sugar and basic science. It’s become so popular nationwide — retail sales reached close to $400 million in 2014 — that one Fairbanks business has started hosting classes teaching fans how to make kombucha at home.
TEA 'SOMMELIER' BREWS THE BEST CUPPA IN THE WORLD
The right temperature, right amount of tea, and the correct steeping times were some of the methods used by this year's Tea Infusionist Champion, a title bestowed on the "sommelier" of teas.
There is a craft to brewing the perfect cup of tea, experts say, one that involves understanding the subtle alchemy that takes place when pouring hot water over delicate, fragrant tea leaves.