NATURE GRANGE TEA GARDEN
There is a garden steeped in nature, at the 27.5-kilometer milestone on the traffic-heavy Alishan Highway, where rainbow-colored hot air balloons welcome guests and flowers sway in the wind. The venue promotes the essence of tea, while implementing the education of vanilla farming at the same time. You may wish to make a stop here before heading off to Alishan, to have a drink of the simplest purity, and experience the extraordinary within the ordinary.
Introduction
Zhuang Yurui, the owner of “Nature Grange Tea Garden”, has a burning passion for nature, which is reflected in her freestyle technique of field management. No fertilization or pesticides are used, “planting what can be planted”, eliminating herbs that are unsuitable, leaving only the lushest fragrant-leaved marigolds as their signature herb. The layout of the field is also unabashed in its casualness. A few hall tents form a world of their own, a sight that can be taken in through one glance.
Enjoy the harmony between human and environment with a cup of tea make by professional tea artisans. Enjoy the tea ceremony, pick some fragrant herbs, taste the madeleine, and you will have transversed the journey from farm to the dining table.
“Natural Grange Tea Garden” is the only place in Alishan where tea and vanilla are intertwined. The owner, Zhuang Yurui, has 40 years of experience in growing tea. In 2012, she felt the impact of imported tea and decided to create her own brand. She bid farewell to Alishan and went to work in Taipei. She used environmentally friendly kraft paper boxes, and developed tea sets such as bamboo pots and square round pots. Through repeated exploration of the market, unique business opportunities were discovered.
To promote tea culture, she went back to manage the tea garden at the foot of Alishan Mountain in 2020. By accident she discovered that tea and vanilla proved a perfect combination, with the result exceeding the sum of the parts. She returned to the role of a farmer, planted eight kinds of herbs in her garden and left it to fate to decide which were to be preserved and which were to eliminate. Ultimately, the marigold which grows the lushest, the mint which is an ideal complement to plating and flavor enhancement, and the rare marjoram in Taiwan won out and became the signature crops of the tea garden.
Features of Agricultural Tourism
Herbs
Zhuang Yurui says that bay leaf marigolds are resistant to heat and dryness. They not only emit fragrance to repel mosquitoes, but also create a sea of flowers. With a sight to behold and a hardy constitution, it can be distilled and extracted to be processed into distillate, essential oil, and can also be made into handmade soap and tea bags.
Zhuang Yurui feels that the tea plant dyeing is another perfect combination of tea and vanilla use. A simple DIY handicraft experience suited for parents and children. A few steps is all it takes to present a sense of gradient layering, making each unit a unique piece.
