Tea and a Game: June Review

So here we are with another edition of the review with my daughter of a tea, and a game. You may recall we started this series last month, with Wild Plum Tea and Batman Dice.

This month, we were traveling when we did the tea and a game, which added a layer of complexity to the whole thing. We had the game - we'd seen it at a game store and decided it looked like fun and had adorable art. What can I say? I'm a sucker for kittens.

But before I get into the review, a word from the daughter: she's decided that she'd like to change nom de blog, from Otaku Princess, to the Ginja Ninja. She's still the not-quite 17 yo redhead who has been amazing you all with her DC comics knowledge. And hey, it could be worse. I talked her out of the Space Whale! 

So when we arrived in NH, we had to shop for tea. This turned out to be more of a challenge than I had anticipated. The Ginja Ninja didn't want tea from the grocery store.

GN: We've had all the teas from the grocery store. Plus it has to be weird, that's the point of this thing. We're weird, it has to be weird tea.

Me: So we wound up finding some tea at a coffeeshop. The bag looked interesting.

GN: It was like, organic looking. Brown paper bag.

Me: It was loose tea, which led to some problems, but more about that later.

Armed with tea, and a game, we recruited my sister to play with us. The game is Tem-Purr-a, and the goal is to give your opponents indigestion by making them eat.

GN: It was basically reverse UNO, but with cats. There's a gangster cat, and a bunch of other cats, and some really appealing looking Japanese dishes that I really really want.

Me: So the point of the game is to feed yourself, and your opponents, but not get the indigestion cards. You start out with one in the first round, and the round ends when someone draws it. They exchange the card for a token, the card goes back into the deck with another indigestion card added - you can see where this is going. The more rounds, the more risk you have. When a player accumulates three indigestion tokens, they lose, and the person still holding the most food cards wins.

GN: That's why I said it was reverse UNO, because you're trying to get more cards, not less cards.

ME: My sister won, and we all had a blast playing. I'm looking forward to pulling this game out again. How about you?

GN: yes, definitely. It was fun, it was cute. It made me hungry.

ME: The tea, on the other hand.

Flowers! The smell of new-mown hay! Ok, at least the smell of hay.

GN: *goes off into giggles* Uh, ew. Ok, it smelled like hay, and tasted like hay, and there's nothing else to say. Kinda looked like hay, too!

ME: So it was Wildflower Tea, and it has clover blossoms, calendula flowers, chamomile, rosehips, hibiscus, and lavendar. I'm a sucker for edible flowers, so I thought this one might be fun. I've been wrong before, and I was wrong this time. Also, we wound up having to make our own teabags, because my sister doesn't do loose leaf tea and didn't have an infuser. But a twist-tie and a coffee filter will work in a pinch! There were no brewing instructions on the bag, so we erred on the side of putting what seemed like a lot in each bag.

GN: I was worried they were going to fall apart honestly, and then we were going to have little... not little, GIANT flowers floating around in our tea. So I got a mug from Eldest sister, and basically it's really sweet. Well, it's punny and sweet. On the inside, there's a knight (a figure) and on the outside of the mug it says Knight in Shining Armor. So the mug is his armor. But it's not really practical. It's hard to wash.

The Ginja Ninja made the teabags.

Me: I think we should get some Sweet Mint and mix it with the Wildflower Tea.

GN: it might help. It also helped when I got to the bottom of my mug and there was a lot of honey there.

ME: So if you find yourself in Laconia, NH, check out Wayfarer's Coffee Roasters, their in-house beverages are excellent. But give the bag of Wildflower Tea a pass. On the other hand, if you can field 3 or more players, Tem-Purr-A is a blast!

GN: oh, also, Eldest sister says the other tea there, the mint, was really good.

ME: we'll be back next month with another thrilling installment of a game and a tea!

GN: Hopefully iced tea!