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A Pot of Heart-to-Heart Tea In an era when take-away tea shops are sprouting everywhere, most people gravitate toward drinks that are fast and easy to carry out, forgetting one simple truth: a good cup of tea needs time to unfurl. Fan Yi-jen of Man Guan Tea Estate knows this well, which is why she opened her shop on Wenhua Road in 2014—to brew the tea she makes with her own hands for her customers. Yi-jen says that drinking tea is, above all, a face-to-face exchange. Through the complete ritual of brewing, she lets guests discover the aroma, body, and personality of each tea in her collection: the natural fruit notes of her honey-flavored oolong, for instance, carry a whisper of delicate honey, while the rich liquor of the Qingxin oolong glides over the tongue like a cool, sweet spring. Because climate changes from season to season, the same tea shifts its character; these stories can be told only over several pots and plenty of time, so one table of guests often needs more than an hour. Yet Yi-jen delights in the process. “Every minute I spend with my customers,” she says, “has become the greatest reward of running this shop.” Man Guan Tea Estate forgoes fancy packaging and insists that every step—from planting, harvesting, roasting, and packing to final sale—be done in-house without outside help. In 2017 alone, 457 items were submitted to SGS for food-safety testing; leaf quality is Yi-jen’s non-negotiable. A Korean who had worked in Taiwan for ten years once visited with his secretary. After each pot, he would turn and instruct the secretary: this one for his morning cup, that one after lunch, another for the evening. The teas on Man Guan’s menu supplied all the fragrant moments his day required. His approach matched Yi-jen’s own ideal of “everyday tea”: carefully cultivated Ali Mountain leaves waiting for the day we walk through the door and invite them to fill the quiet corners of our lives. Recommended teas: Honey Aromatic Red Oolong, Charcoal-Aged Vintage Tea (private reserve)