I recently had the privilege of going to see my beautiful daughter Francesca in her class, Room 9, at Cockle Bay School in Auckland.

I had sent her in one day with a magazine article on tea to share with the class and she came home with a request from her classmates for the Bell Tea Guy to come in and talk to them about tea. Cockle Bay is a great school and Francesca is lucky in having a superb teacher in year 4, Kirsten Holmes (Miss Holmes to me!). Miss Holmes confessed that she was unable to answer the deluge of questions that she had been asked about tea and that I simply just had to come in and deal with them myself.

Another connection is that Bell's financial controller's daughter Georgia is in the same class. She made it very clear that her dad is the guy who gives me all the money for the travelling I do, and I guess she is right about that!

We had a fantastic time and I don't think I have been asked such searching questions by any group before. The kids were most interested in the travelling that I have done which was a good chance for me to reminisce about some of my experiences over the years. We had a go at slurping and spitting, so much a part of my life, and they got the hang of that very quickly, so my apologies to their parents if they were still practicing in the evening! It was also the only time I have ever asked a group how many of them wanted to become tea-tasters and more than half the room put their hands up! Miss Holmes is now leading a science project for the school and tea may well be part of that.

Keep up the good work Room 9 it was great to meet you all.

The Tailor of Tea

It was a privilege to be part of the Twinings sponsored Mother's Day Afternoon Tea for the benefit of the Nurture Foundation, and no better place to hold it than the revamped ballroom of the Heritage Hotel. For those who don't know, Nurture, through research, are committed to helping New Zealanders have families through the safe delivery of a healthy, full-term baby.

There were a couple of key auction prizes on offer and one was to win an afternoon home cooking/baking class at Allyson Gofton's house with the lady herself. I've known Allyson a little while and she is great, not only a total pro chef but lots of fun and very humble! She is also a committed ambassador for Nurture. We had a right laugh and I of course muscled my way in to make the tea to go with the food. All in a very good cause. The stars of the show though were the ladies who bid for and won the prize, plenty of stories and I was the only guy there!

The other charity prize from the afternoon was a commitment from me to create a bespoke tea blend for the winning bidder. It was very appropriate that Cindy Farquhar outbid all to secure the blend for her husband Geoff. Cindy is Professor of gynecology and obstetrics at the University of Auckland, and a trustee of Nurture. I went along to their lovely Auckland home to interview Geoff and find out more about him in order to create his own very personal and unique blend of tea. It’s just like the concept of a bespoke tailor and Geoff will join the ranks of previous recipients, Allyson Gofton herself, and the illustrious Earl Grey for whom the very first bespoke teas were created by Twinings in the early 1800s.

Watch this space and I'll let you know how this developed......