Tea’s chemistry is its elegance. Its caffeine wakes; its L-Theanine, an amino acid found only in tea and certain mushrooms, steadies. Together they create the paradox every drinker knows instinctively—clarity without edge, focus without rush.

Unlike coffee, which releases caffeine all at once, tea unfolds it slowly, stretched across the body’s rhythm by L-Theanine’s gentle modulation. This is why tea sustains rather than spikes. It sharpens thought while softening tension, creating the mind-state monks once sought: alert yet tranquil.

Each leaf also contains a wealth of polyphenols—natural antioxidants responsible for tea’s complexity of flavor and its quiet medicine. Modern research links these compounds to lower cholesterol, improved mood, reduced inflammation, and protection against oxidative stress. Ancient wisdom expressed it more simply: tea brings balance.

All tea begins in the fog and altitude of China, where Camellia sinensis first rooted itself along river valleys and mountain passes. From there, its seeds and stories spread—east to Japan and Taiwan, south to India and Sri Lanka, and eventually around the world. Each region wrote its own accent into the leaf.

China gave us the poetry of green tea; Japan the ceremony of matcha; India the thunder of Assam and the honey of Darjeeling; Taiwan the velvet smoke of oolong. In newer soils—Nepal, Kenya, Malawi, Argentina, Brazil, Hawaii—tea found new dialects, each shaped by altitude, humidity, and human ambition. Tea craves contrast: warm days, cool nights, and the tension between mist and sun. It thrives where there is change.

A blend is not a mixture but a composition—an arrangement of texture, rhythm, and mood. We begin with a base tea, then build around it like perfume: adding blossoms for lift, spices for warmth, grains for depth, fruits for light.

Flavoring tea is an ancient art. In imperial China, leaves were perfumed with jasmine, osmanthus, gardenia, or rose; oolongs carried the honeyed smoke of orange and plum blossoms. In Morocco, tea became a vessel for hospitality—brightened with mint, rosemary, and orange flower water. India’s chai, spiced with cardamom, clove, and ginger, spoke of hearth and heat.

At Petite Histoire, we follow that lineage. Each blend is composed using traditional botanical inclusions and, when appropriate, aromatic distillates that enhance without overwhelming. Flavor is treated as a finishing gesture, a final brushstroke on an already beautiful form. The result is tea that behaves like scent—structured, layered, and alive.

Strictly speaking, only the Camellia sinensis plant produces tea. Everything else—flowers, herbs, bark, seeds—is known as a tisane, from the Greek ptisanē, “barley water.” Yet language bends to desire, and the world now calls them all tea.

Herbal infusions predate agriculture itself. They soothed, cleansed, and connected people to the land.

Beyond tradition, plants like rooibos, yerba maté, and lemongrass carry their own rituals of energy and restoration. They remind us that the act of steeping is the same everywhere: water meets plant, scent meets air, and something changes.