Nathan Scheer > Nathan's Quotes

“True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future.”
― Seneca, Letters from a Stoic

“You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength." - Meditations”
― Marcus Arelius

“A primary rule of practice is meditation with no objects or anchors. Just concentrate on the breath.”
― Toshimi A. Kayaki, Green Tea Living: A Japan-Inspired Guide to Eco-friendly Habits, Health, and Happiness

“The fanciest grade of green tea in Japan goes by the name of gyokuro, meaning "jade dew." It consists of the newest leaves of a tea plantation's oldest tea bushes that bud in May and have been carefully protected from the sun under a double canopy of black nylon mesh. The leaves are then either steeped in boiled water or ground into a powder to make matcha (literally, "grind tea"), the thick tea served at a tea ceremony. (The powder used to make the thin tea served at a tea ceremony comes from grinding the older leaves of young tea plants, resulting in a more bitter-tasting tea.)
The middle grade of green tea is called sencha, or "brew tea," and is made from the unprotected young tea leaves that unfurl in May or June. The leaves are usually steeped in hot water to yield a fragrant grassy brew to enjoy on special occasions or in fancy restaurants.
For everyday tea, the Japanese buy bancha. Often containing tiny tea twigs, it consists of the large, coarse, unprotected leaves that remain on the tea bush until August. When these leaves are roasted, they become a popular tea called hojicha. When hojicha combines with popped roasted brown rice, a tea called genmaicha results.”
― Victoria Abbott Riccardi, Untangling My Chopsticks: A Culinary Sojourn in Kyoto

“Dinner that night is a feast of flavor. To celebrate the successful exorcism, Kagura has cooked several more dishes than the shrine's usual, simple fare- fragrant onigiri, balls of rice soaked in green tea, with umeboshi- salty and pickled plums- as filling. There is eggplant simmered in clear soup, green beans in sesame sause, and burdock in sweet-and-sour dressing. The mood is festive.”
― Rin Chupeco, The Girl from the Well

“You don't burn calories with Green Tea. You burn your guilt.”
― Nitya Prakash

“Tea first came to Japan in the sixth century by way of Japanese Buddhist monks, scholars, warriors, and merchants who traveled to China and brought back tea pressed into bricks. It was not until 1911, during the Song dynasty, that the Japanese Buddhist priest Eisai (also known as Yosai) carried home from China fine-quality tea seeds and the method for making matcha (powdered green tea). The tea seeds were cultivated on the grounds of several Kyoto temples and later in such areas as the Uji district just south of Kyoto.
Following the Chinese traditional method, Japanese Zen monks would steam, dry, then grind the tiny green tea leaves into a fine powder and whip it with a bamboo whisk in boiling water to create a thick medicinal drink to stimulate the senses during long periods of meditation.”
― Victoria Abbott Riccardi, Untangling My Chopsticks: A Culinary Sojourn in Kyoto

“ This dish... it's sweet-and-sour pork but with black vinegar. In fact, you could call it "Black Vinegar Pork." The glossy black of the vinegar was used to great effect in the plating, giving the dish a classy and luxuriant appearance. But the moment you put a bite in your mouth... fresh, vibrant green tea explodes in a sea of invigorating green. It is extravagantly delicious.
Chef Kuga's Sweet-and-Sour sauce includes not just black vinegar but also balsamic vinegar as well as Chef Mimasaka's smoked soy sauce! It destroys the traditional boundaries of sweet-and-sour pork, creating a dish that's rich, tangy and savory while erasing the pork's thick greasiness to push the taste of the green tea to the forefront!
He has completely succeeded in taking the green tea leaves and making them the centerpiece of his dish!
But the point most worthy of attention...
... is that this sublime taste experience wasn't created using solely Chinese-cooking techniques.
It shows an equally deft use of traditional French techniques!"
"What the... French?!
But isn't he supposed to be a purely Sichuan-Chinese chef?!"
"Yes, yes. I'm gonna explain, so quiet down and listen up, 'kay? See, there's another secret y'all don't know.
That sweet-and-sour sauce? I based it on Sauce au Vinaigre Balsamique. That's a balsamic vinegar sauce used in a whole lot of French recipes."
"Aha! Now I see. So that's where it came from!
French Vinaigre Balsamique sauce is a reduction of balsamic vinegar and Glacé de Viande!
It has a light tanginess and thick richness, which must have boosted the deliciousness of the sweet-and-sour pork into the stratosphere! ”
― Yuto Tsukuda, 食戟のソーマ 27 [Shokugeki no Souma 27]

“Green tea may just be the most powerful of all antioxidant sources. Green tea contains polyphenols that scavenge free radicals and protect against photo damage. A 1997 presentation of University of Kansas research at the American Chemical Society national meeting found that antioxidants in green tea called catechins (a phenol) are more than 100 times more effective at neutralizing free radicals than vitamin C, and 25 times more powerful than vitamin E.”
― Anthony Youn, The Age Fix: A Leading Plastic Surgeon Reveals How to Really Look 10 Years Younger

“Cool green foods became the natural choice in restaurants and teahouses. Matcha, the powdered green tea used for the tea ceremony, flavored ice cream, jewel-like gelatin cubes, and sweet whipped cream eaten in parfaits and layered with grapes, pineapple chunks, and chewy white mochi balls. There were Japanese-style snow cones, huge hills of shaved ice drizzled with green tea syrup, along with green tea-flavored mousse and tea-tainted sponge cake.
Matcha flavored savory items too, including green tea noodles served hot in dashi soup, as well as chilled and heaped on a bamboo draining mat with a cold dipping sauce of dashi, mirin, and soy. There was green tea-flavored wheat gluten and the traditional Kyoto-style dish of white rice topped with thin petals of sashimi that you "cooked" at the table by drenching it with brewed green tea from a tiny teapot.”
― Victoria Abbott Riccardi, Untangling My Chopsticks: A Culinary Sojourn in Kyoto

“Ooh, but the most surprising dish of all was Mr. Tsukasa's four shades of Green Tea Puree! He pureed each type of tea leaf together with the vegetables, mushrooms or beans that best complemented it and then wove them together into a single, harmonious dish!"
He boiled the chickpeas. And for the asparagus and artichoke, he cleaned and sliced them before sautéing them in butter. Once all were gently heated through, he teamed them up with their specific tea leaf, placed them in a food processor and pureed them!
He seasoned the resulting puree with just a touch of salt, pepper and butter and then plated them in spinning-wheel arrangement, making an elegant dish of the gently shifting flavors of green tea!”
― Yuto Tsukuda, 食戟のソーマ 27 [Shokugeki no Souma 27]

“What would you like, black or green?"
"Green, please. It has an earthier taste."
"What is you name?"
"Leila. It means 'evening,' but I would rather have a morning name. I was at the other party, but I like your party better."
"I see. Cup or mug?"
"Cup, please. The best china. Gold-rimmed, no flowers. No cracks or chips. It's okay. I don't break things.”
― Grace Dane Mazur, The Garden Party: A Novel

“I lean against the counter, biting into the delicate macaron. It feels like I'm drinking a lightly sweetened, warm cup of green tea, sprinkled with a tiny contentment spell, one of Mom's specialties.”
― Julie Abe, The Charmed List

“What a pretty color...
A kind of goldish-green, with an emerald tint to it...
Mmm...!
A sweet, gentle, slightly bitter flavor with a soft aftertaste...
It's as if a breeze from a mountain stream has just blown through my body...
I probably wouldn't have understood this flavor if you had just given it to me the moment I arrived here after walking under the sun.
It's all because I drank that hot hōjicha first...
Now I get it! You made me walk under the scorching sun so that I'd understand the flavor of this tea...
This house... the mild breeze from the rice paddies... the sound of cicadas... the dragonflies...
What luxury..."
"This gyokuro is the last thing I've prepared for you today."
"Ōhara, I'm going to get angry if you give me anything else.
I've just had a taste of real Japan. The spirit of Japan.
As long as the Japanese do not lose this spirit, they'll be fine.
This is that essential ingredient all those expensive feasts were lacking.
So what more could I ask for?”
― Tetsu Kariya, Japanese Cuisine

“Hōjicha is a variety of tea created by roasting green tea leaves over a charcoal fire. It has less caffeine and a mellower, richer taste than regular green tea.”
― Tetsu Kariya, Japanese Cuisine

“Gyokuro is one of the highest quality (and most expensive) green teas in Japan. The major difference between the processes of growing gyokuro and regular green tea is that the gyokuro bushes are shaded with clod or reed screens for several weeks before harvesting, which gives the leaves a sweeter flavor and more intensely green color.”
― Tetsu Kariya, Japanese Cuisine

“You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me.”
― C.S. Lewis

“Take some more tea," the March Hare said to Alice, very earnestly.
"I've had nothing yet," Alice replied in an offended tone, "so I can't take more."
"You mean you can't take less," said the Hatter: "it's very easy to take more than nothing."
"Nobody asked your opinion," said Alice.”
― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

“My hour for tea is half-past five, and my buttered toast waits for nobody.”
― Wilkie Collins, The Woman in White

“A cup of tea would restore my normality."

[Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Screenplay]”
― Douglas Adams

“Honestly, if you're given the choice between Armageddon or tea, you don't say 'what kind of tea?”
― Neil Gaiman

“When tea becomes ritual, it takes its place at the heart of our ability to see greatness in small things. Where is beauty to be found? In great things that, like everything else, are doomed to die, or in small things that aspire to nothing, yet know how to set a jewel of infinity in a single moment?”
― Muriel Barbery, The Elegance of the Hedgehog

“If you are cold, tea will warm you;
if you are too heated, it will cool you;
If you are depressed, it will cheer you;
If you are excited, it will calm you.”
― William Ewart Gladstone

“As far as her mom was concerned, tea fixed everything. Have a cold? Have some tea. Broken bones? There's a tea for that too. Somewhere in her mother's pantry, Laurel suspected, was a box of tea that said, 'In case of Armageddon, steep three to five minutes'.”
― Aprilynne Pike, Illusions

“There is something in the nature of tea that leads us into a world of quiet contemplation of life.”
― Lin Yutang, The Importance of Living

“What kind of tea do you want?"
"There´s more than one kind of tea?...What do you have?"
"Let´s see... Blueberry, Raspberry, Ginseng, Sleepytime, Green Tea, Green Tea with Lemon, Green Tea with Lemon and Honey, Liver Disaster, Ginger with Honey, Ginger Without Honey, Vanilla Almond, White Truffle Coconut, Chamomile, Blueberry Chamomile, Decaf Vanilla Walnut, Constant Comment and Earl Grey."
-"I.. Uh...What are you having?... Did you make some of those up?”
― Bryan Lee O'Malley, Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life

“Thank God for tea! What would the world do without tea! How did it exist? I am glad I was not born before tea.”
― Sydney Smith, A Memoir of the Rev. Sydney Smith; 2 volume set

“But indeed I would rather have nothing but tea.”
― Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

“Tea is the magic key to the vault where my brain is kept.”
― Frances Hardinge

“Tea ... is a religion of the art of life.”
― Kakuzō Okakura, The Book of Tea