After dinner tea time

Once a week or so, instead of an after dinner wine, Tetsu and I will enjoy an after dinner drink of tea with sweet bean paste sweets.  (Of course bought at the corner sweet shop where I do crosswalk duty).  This week we had Sakura mochi and Monaka with Sakura tea.

The Sakura mochi I showed being made the other day.  They were still minus their salty sakura leaves at that point.  Yes, the leaves are marinated in brine and then wrapped around the pink mochi balls.  Most people eat the leaf as is, though I have run into people who prefer to enjoy the slight salty taste left after unwrapping the leaf.

Monaka is a soft, somewhat crispy wafer made of mochi with sweet bean paste inside.  Depending on the shop or area made, they can be round or flower shaped etc. This one is shaped as a traditional thatched roofed farm house.

And the Sakura tea was a gift from Tetsu.  Though we usually drink loose leaf tea made in a tea pot, this box was filled with tea bags.  Some of the nicer tea companies will make their tea bags of organza.  The tea and sweets were delicious!

Which brings me back to the first picture of the little flower at the top of my post.  This was made by Mrs. Furui.  I think she's trying to make a corsage or something...  And what did she make it out of?  The organza from left-over tea bags.  Already pre-dyed by the tea!  Ha!  Talk about not being wasteful!

Well, I'm not planning to make any corsages and I'm not planning to pass on my left over tea-bags to Mrs. Furui.  She can drink her own quantities of tea.  (I'm usually a coffee drinker anyway.)