My mornings always start with a Hong Kong style milk tea, cha chaan teng. It is a ritual; it is a sense of comfort and familiarity, wherever my adventurous life takes me, this is my comfort blanket. It is an intense and strong tea, and I carry the ingredients with me to make it in hotels, or wherever I should find myself.

When I was studying in a culinary school in Italy it was very challenging, as Italy is not exactly known for its tea! Luckily my next destination was London, where good tea is part of the cultural tapestry. The British believe that there is not a single problem in this world that can’t be remedied with a good cup of tea. I set out in search of intensely flavored and high quality tea-leaves, and my quest was met with success. Another key ingredient lacking in both Italy and Paris was evaporated milk, so I substituted it for fresh milk. The tea is strong like an espresso, so and I use a lot of milk.

In Italy I introduced my own style of exotic milk tea concoction to my friends and they joined in my morning ritual, it became part of my treasured memories of that time.

When I returned to Macau I wanted to serve in Maquette the tea I made in Italy, I want to relive the experience and to share it with people here.

I didn’t want it to taste like the original cha chaan teng, I wanted to put my experience into this milk tea. I experimented a lot and visited very old tealeaf shops and found different kinds of milk, and along with my young team we tried out four to five cups of milk tea every day for a week to perfect our blend.

So much goes into brewing the perfect cup of tea, timing, temperature, serving cups, water….my parents and my team all helped in the refining process.

We did it, we created an exotic milk tea, based on the traditional Hong Kong milk tea, but with herbs in it to make it special. Our Exotic Milk Tea tastes like my happy memories of Italy, one I can now share with people in Macau.

And the herbs is the secret!

繪味之選——浅酌奶茶憶時光

我的早晨，總是從茶餐廳，伴隨著一杯港式奶茶而開始。它是一種習慣，一種十分舒服和熟悉的感覺，無論此刻我正在經歷何種充滿挑戰的生活，它總會伴我左右。這是一種擁有強烈衝擊力的濃郁茶品，我將其茶葉隨身帶在我到過的酒店里，當然它們也會隨時出現在我想要找回我自己的各種重要時刻。

當我在意大利的烹飪學校進行學習時，它是充滿挑戰的，畢竟意大利並沒有人們所熟知的代表性茶品。但幸運的是，我下一個目的地是倫敦，在那裡品質好的茶是其茶藝文化的重要組成部份，因為在英國人的眼中喝上一杯質量上乘的好茶比任何事情都重要得多，我想他們是熱衷於茶葉的。所以我在這樣的環境下開啟了在外尋覓具有強烈香味和高品質茶葉的旅程，當然我的探索之旅是取得了成功的。用新鮮的牛奶取代了植物淡奶，其關鍵因素是由於無論在意大利還是巴黎你都買不到植物淡奶，而且這種茶像極了特濃咖啡，因此我用了很多的牛奶。

在意大利的時候，我將這種招牌奶茶介紹給我的朋友，他們也因此加入到了我的早茶行列中。這部份記憶，對於我而言彌足珍貴。

當回到澳門后，我想要在Maquette裡面推出這種招牌奶茶，就像在意大利為朋友們製作奶茶一般，和來到Maquette的朋友一起分享它，為此我還給它起了一個新的名字 ── 繪味奶茶。

我並不希望這款繪味奶茶在人們嘗起來像原來舊的茶餐廳里的味道，我想把我自己的東西放到這杯奶茶里。因此我嘗試並且參觀了很多老的茶葉店，發現了不同種類的牛奶。每天，我和我年輕的團隊成員們都要嘗試四到五杯奶茶，以感受哪一杯奶茶才是最為合適的。
想要製作一杯完美的奶茶，它包括了精准的時間、合適的水溫、符合觀感的杯子以及用水來源等等，在這個過程里我的家人和同事都給予了很多幫助。

我們做到了！我們製作出了一款繪味奶茶，它基於傳統的港式奶茶，但又有所不同，因為我們放了一些香草在奶茶里，讓它與衆不同。我們的繪味奶茶喝起來，就像曾經我在意大利經歷的那段記憶一般，而現在我可以將它帶給澳門。

當然，在熬煮奶茶時所放的香草，是作為秘方保存在Maquette里。它，也將永遠一直在那兒。