Sacred Stone Baronial Birthday: Otsukimi

[akiyamakazuhiko]

Hallo, all.  My name is Akiyama Kazuhiko, and I hail from the Barony of Sacred Stone in the Kingdom of Atlantia (Central North Carolina on the southeastern part of the United States), and I wish to bid all here invitation to Sacred Stone's Baronial Birthday.  The theme will be a Heian moon-viewing, and all period Asian personae are particularly invited.  The theme of the event stretches through several periods to be more inclusive, but special preference will be given to the more peaceful entities.  I realize that a Baronial Birthday is a small event for significant travel, but nonetheless, the offer is made.

I have provided a scribbling of a web site for your perusal:  sites.google.com/site/sacredstonebb2016/home

Should it please, some of the events we wish to offer are a tea house offering the rare and highest fashion Chinese teas, waterside poetry composition and competition, music and song, and a series of pleasure competitions of refinement.

This is a goodly time away:  September 9-10, and the web site will be developing as more details and entertainments are made concrete.

Thank you for you kind viewing, and mayhaps we will become friends when we meet next autumn!

Regards,

Akiyama Kazuhiko

[solveig]

Noble Cousin!

Greetings from Solveig! Yes, I am the nit-picker in chief. Modern Chinese tea is pretty much a post-Heian beverage. The nature and method of preparation of tea evolved in China over time. Tea during the Heian period was likely to be something similar to 団茶 dancha which was prepared by boiling bricks of tea, salt, and other flavorings such as sugar. Regardless, tea entered Japan about the time of the Nara Period and appears to have long died out by the end of the Heian Period. You might consider serving amazake which is legally non-alcoholic. If you want to be early and really radical you might experiment with one possible interpretation of what was going on with the imperial dairies and serve yogurt drink. The Japanese also knew how to make ghee and there is speculation in Japan that they were using the milk produced by the imperial dairies to make something similar to parmesan cheese.

[akiyamakazuhiko]

I am delighted to have received a response from THE Solveig! And it's not a nitpick at all, but common knowledge!

While the event is posited as a Heian event, the specific period is expanded to include neighboring periods' art, aesthetic, and design in order to provide a welcoming environment. Though the state of teas in Heian Japan is... nill to blah... there is a local contingent excited for the inclusion of a beverage house that provides a social component for the event. This social space will include cakey teas as well as more modern preparations for the timid palate, or simply the all-tea aficionado.

You'll be pleased to know that as part of the feast, there are some incredible period deserts and beverages! I soon hope to have a fully approved menu to advertise!

I really do love the suggestion of amazake, and will add it to the all-important list! We'll see if we can source it appropriately.