“Tea: a gift from heaven,
a spiritual beverage for humanity.”

–Henri Mariage

Orange and Spice® Hot Mulled Wine

Tea and gastronomy have long gone hand in hand. Not only is tea a lovely accompaniment to sweet and savory dishes, it is also used as a delightful ingredient in cocktails and culinary feasts – from the appetizer through to the dessert!

Bigelow Tea has a vault of tea recipes that we are happy to share with you, starting with one of our favorite appetizers:

Vietnamese Tea Rolls

INGREDIENTS:

½ pound mushrooms, diced
4 medium carrots, julienned
1 ¼ cups snow peas, stemmed, strings removed and very finely julienned
1 ¼ cup bean sprouts
4 green onions, cut into thin slivers
16 large basil leaves
16 rice paper wrappers
3 cups boiling water
10 Bigelow® Green Tea with Mint tea bags

Dipping Sauce
½ cup boiling water
6 Bigelow® Green Tea with Mint tea bags
½ cup fresh lime juice
3 tablespoons low sodium soy sauce
1 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon Asian Chili Sauce
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon fresh ginger
2 green onions, minced

Yield:                   Serves 8 (2 each)

Prep Time:         45 mins

Cook Time:         2 mins

Instructions:

Bring small saucepan of water to a boil, add mushrooms, carrots, snow peas and bean sprouts, blanch for 1 minute, and transfer to a paper towel.

Boil 3 cups (750mL) water, add 10 tea bags and let steep for 5 minutes. Remove tea bags. Pour tea into a low sided casserole. Cool.

To assemble rolls, soak sheets of rice paper in tea for 1 minute, carefully transfer to a paper towel, let sit 1-2 minutes or until pliable.

To assemble each roll, take a soaked wrapper, arrange 1/16th of the vegetables in a row on top of the wrapper, roll up rice paper, folding in flaps after first turn. Add one basil leaf, keep rolling. Continue until all the rolls are finished. The rolls will keep in the refrigerator for 6 hours, tightly covered. To serve cut in half on the diagonal and serve with dipping sauce.

To make sauce, pour boiling water over 6 tea bags, let steep five minutes, remove tea bags. Combine tea, lime juice, soy sauce, honey, garlic, ginger and green onions. Mix well and serve with wrappers. Serve cold.

To be sure to try out some of our other mouthwatering appetizers, like Bigelow Tea’s I Love Lemon℠ Asparagus Wrapped in Smoked Salmon.  So many gastronomical nibbles, so little time…