Frank's Recipes! Home Brews: Teas of the North

Frank's Recipes
Free Recipes Archive

Free Counter by Pliner.Net
dating, lasik, search, shopping
Visitors Since July 1, 1998

This location is no longer being supported or updated.
Please adjust your browser favorites to
http://www.franksrecipes.com

MENU

ť Cookbooks
ť Hints & Tips
ť Foodservice
ť Links
ť My Awards
ť My Guestbook
ť Recipe Archive
ť Software
ť Volume Cooking
ť Where Are You
ť About

Help support this site

Recipe Archives

Home Brews: Teas of the North

Juniper
Bearberry
Kinniknik
White birch
Strawberry
Cranberry
Labrador tea
Heather
Clover
Mint
Willow
Roses

Tea, both Asian and herbal, is a staple of every pantry and packsack, with both the Innuit and Dene throughout the north. When giant summer icebergs drift close to the Baffin coast, Innuit villagers dash out and chip off generous chunks to take home. Melted, this desalinated sea water is prized above all other waters for tea making. The first northern teas were made from the plants of tundra and forest, many of which had medicinal values.

As spring invades the boreal forest around Great Slave Lake, Dene women gather the tender new leaves of white birch, strawberry flowerbuds and young sprouting leaves, cranberries, heathers, Labrador tea, willow buds and pale pink wild roses among others for both fresh and dried tea mixtures.

Perhaps the most legendary of the north's valuable plants is Labrador tea, Ledum groenlandicum, also called Greenland tea and muskeg tea; or, by the Ojibway, Muskeegobug Anilibi, "swamp growing tea". It flourishes in cold, wet conditions, especially in muskeg and peat bogs. The leaves are best in early summer when the shrub is in flower but they can be gathered year round. Dry them outdoors in the shade or on a rock close to a wood fire. It makes a pale, slightly bitter refreshing brew. Hudson's Bay Company employees used it to stretch their supplies of imported tea giving it yet another name: Hudson's Bay tea. The leaves contain tannins, caffeine and vitamin C. The flowers make an even better infusion. It can be flavoured with a little mint.

You can make a subtle peppery wild rose tea from fresh or dried young leaves and flower petals or a highly aromatic citrusy tea from ripe bright red hips.

Wild strawberry leaf infusions make a delicate tea early in the spring and are very rich in vitamin C. Use two handfuls of leaves covered in boiling water. It is even richer if covered, cooled and drunk cold the next day.

Juniper sprigs, Kinniknik or bearberry [Arctostaphylos uva-ursi] leaves, thin paper-like outer bark of white birch, clover blossoms, mint leaves and spring willow buds and young leaves all make flavourful, vitamin packed beverages as well.

Teas:

basswood (Tilia spp)
blackberry and Raspberry Leaves
black walnut
chamomile
cinquefoil
clover (Trifolium pratense)
elderberry
gill-over-the-ground
gooseberry
mullein
nettles
New Jersey Tea (Ceanothus amreicanus)
persimmon
pineapple weed flower tops
plantain
red clover flowers
strawberry leaves
sumac (Rhus spp.)
sassafras
self-Heal
shepherd's Purse
sorrel
spice Bush
sweet Goldenrod (Solidago odora)
thistle
wild Rose
wintergreen (Gaultheria procumbens)
wood Sorrel
yarrow

Add to India teas:

calendula petals
dried rose petals
jasmine flowers
sassafras root

Subject: Iced Tea's

sun tea or ice cubes with:

anise
hyssop
blackberry juice
borage flowers
catnip
echinacea leaf
lemon balm
lemon thyme
lemon verbena
mint
oatstraw
peppermint leaves
raspberry juice
red clover
scented geraniums

coffee sub:

dandelion roots
chicory
goat's beard