What this blog is about

Hi Fellow tea lovers!

Let me introduce myself. My name is Bena Andriani, I come from a long line of tea lovers and entrepreneurs.

I remember as a child watching my grandpa (Engkong as I called him) read the newspaper in his big armchair with a pot of Chinese green tea and one of those little Chinese tea cups. The aroma would fill up the room and the steam would fog up his reading glasses.

While my dad would always order Teh POCI whenever we went for a meal. This style of Indonesian Black tea’s secret lies in the sugar! A massive lump of rock sugar is placed in the teacup before pouring the hot tea over it, and as the tea cools down to drinkable temperature, the sugar would slowly dissolve making a distinctive noise that you have to experience it for yourself. This is repeated until there is no more tea to pour, each serve sweeter than the last.

All of my family are entrepreneurs in their own right, so growing up, all I ever wanted to do was to work for myself. On what? I didn’t know yet… just that has always been the dream.

I moved to Perth as a teenager, studied food science, had a ball, worked for a cosmetic research company for close to 5 years, and finally decided to pursue my passion in tea and beautiful design, which would have never happened without my designer husband (also a foodie and tea lover, how lucky!).

With that, Teassential was born.

FOLLOW MY TEA JOURNEY

I am writing this blog to channel my love of tea and food, slow living, mindfulness and living life without regret. To share with you my tea journey as I go deeper into it.

I’ll share my favourite tea related food and drink recipes, gourmet food and gifts ideas, tea and food pairing, the art of gift giving and unusual hampers, love of design goodies and homewares, my experience as a small business owner, occasional Pilates moves, and taking time sit back and enjoy the ride with a cuppa tea and good book. Last and probably most importantly, to entertain! I hope you enjoy what I write and do leave comments, share it, and share your own tea experience with us.

I’d like to dedicate my first few blog posts to our stockists who have believed in Teassential since the very beginning, and thank them for their continuous support. I love every single one of them and would recommend a visit to their shops, because each one is unique with its own character.