The Tao Tea Leaf 2011 Tea Tour took place during April 14 to April 30. The participants involved were: Tao Wu, founder of Tao Tea Leaf and leader of the tea tour; Bill Kamula, chef instructor at George Brown College responsible for teaching the Tea Sommelier course; Matthew Wocks, a Toronto based photographer (http://flimnit.com); and Tim Johns, chief software designer at Icewire Technologies and webmaster of Tao Tea Leaf.

On April 14, we all arrived and met up in Shanghai, where we had a delightful dinner followed by a memorable walk along Nanjing Road and The Bund.

Many people curious about owning Yixing teapots, one of the many traditional types of teapots available at our store, may be wondering how best to clean them. Since they are made of Yixing clay (also known as purple/zisha clay), they require a special cleaning process.

To make things easier for you, Tao Tea Leaf has provided the essential steps, as well as a couple of optional ones which you may feel free to skip.