Westholme Tea Farm & Margit Nellemann Ceramics

Foglifter Coffee visits Westholme Tea Farm

This week, as things slowly begin to reopen after our isolated spring, I had the great pleasure to drop in to Westholme Tea Farm for visit with Margit and Victor. While the tearoom remains closed, the shop was as warm and inviting as ever and fully stocked with shelves of tea in painterly paper packaging.

With our flagship cafe opening this fall, it was high time to revisit introducing Westholme Tea to our Vancouver community. We are honoured to be working with Margit and Victor and cannot wait to have a thoughtfully-designed tea program that features a range of organic, looseleaf black and green teas and tisanes.

Margit’s hand-blended custom recipes begin with impeccably-sourced pure black teas, spices, and herbs from origins around the globe. From there, with input from her deeply knowledgeable team, things are tweaked and dialled up and drawn down until what’s in your cup is a meeting of old world tea-making tradition and a modern, clean, natural profile - each ingredient playing off the others, sharing the spotlight while delivering a firm foundation of expression of terroir and depth of flavour.

Malty Assam, sweet, kelpy Sencha, Calabrian bergamot, aromatic cardamom pods, beguiling vanilla, floral rose and hibiscus, nourishing mint and lemongrass and fennel and nettle. It’s extraordinary. The blends are diverse, artful, and free of artificial flavouring.

Simply put, this tea is very beautiful. You are going to love it.

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Photo gallery from a visit to the tearoom in September 2019 with one of my most favourite people.

Even a casual visit to the farm’s gallery space is a soul-enriching ceremony adorned with Margit’s whimsical ceramics and the finest sweet accompaniments to their teas. You feel transported and transformed until you float out the door, into the valley, and back to your normal life.

On this visit last fall, we were treated to a press pot of the glorious, farm-grown Heron’s Wake. Nine years in the making, this black tea was planted on the property in 2010. As Margit and Victor say,

“Ten years of Canadian winters, Cowichan summers, and West Coast rain have developed our Westholme tea garden. This is the very first Canadian estate-grown tea in the world – an authentic expression of the land, soil, and climate of our farm.”

Exquisite.

Amanda NicolettiComment