Of course there are lots of foods that have healthy properties: blueberries, salmon, nuts… but one of my favorites is tea. Although I love the smell of coffee, I just don’t like the taste of it: coffee ice cream, chocolate covered coffee beans… So it’s nice to see tea having a little bit of the limelight lately.

I love all kinds of tea - hot tea, ice tea, green tea, rooibos (red) tea from South Africa. It’s great that there are now tea shops that specialize in tea such as Teavana, kind of like the Starbucks for coffee people, except for tea lovers.

It’s also fun to go to tea shops all around the world (Hong Kong, Sydney, and of course, London) to have afternoon tea, where tea along with little finger sandwiches, scones, and other dessert items delight the senses.

I’ve also enjoyed attending a tea ceremony in Tokyo where there are rules for serving and enjoying the tea.

Now I’ve discovered there are several magazines devoted to tea, such as Tea Time. So in planning my next trip to London I look forward to trying some of the places that offer afternoon tea besides one of my husbands favorites, Harrods, where we prefer to sit in the Terrace Bar rather than in the Georgian Restaurant, although both serve afternoon tea.

For those local to the San Francisco Bay Area, there are several delightful tea rooms such as Tea Time in Palo Alto, Lisa’s Tea Treasures in Menlo Park and Campbell, the Rotunda in Neiman-Marcus in San Francisco or the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco.

By now you must be parched, so indulge in some good for you tea. Enjoy!