After my August sorbet adventures I wanted to learn more about tea. I decided to start at the Tea Embassy. It’s my favorite kind of shop — small, specialized, and run by people fiercely devoted to their product. From the street the Embassy’s historical bungalow looks like a place ladies in hats might gather for an afternoon of vicious gossip and Earl Grey, but inside there’s dark wood and a wall full of silver canisters. (Tea, like wine and perfume, should be stored away from light, heat and humidity.) The Embassy’s excellent website — which includes an online shop — promised a “palate profile” to help me select my perfect tea from among the 200 they offer.

When I arrived, the natty young man behind the counter introduced himself as Tim. “We’re still working on a formal version of the profile,” he said, “but let me ask you a few questions.”

We talked for the next two-and-half hours. Some of the questions he asked me were about flavor, but many were about mood and context, or just the kind of person I was. Did I like to wake up gently, or with a jolt of energy? When my friends came to town, where did I take them out to dinner?

To pick the right tea, I had to think about what I wanted the tea to do and when I was going to drink it. That made sense to me — I pick the perfumes I’m going to wear much the same way — and it made me remember how bound up in ceremony and ritual tea is, even the simplest ritual of waiting for water to boil and leaves to steep.

As we talked, we sniffed. I skipped all the scented/flavored teas and stuck to representative green, black, oolong, and white tea. My goal was to learn about the variety of flavors in the leaf itself…

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