Té Company was a delightful discovery my first week moving to New York City. The storefront is understated, easy to miss. But the gilded teapot logo caught the winter sun and my eye. It looks like an elegant, minimalist tea shop. Perhaps often expected to be European inspired, given the name. But names can be deceiving. Té Company is actually tea room and wholesale tea importer that specializes in Taiwanese teas. Té, in their words, is a romanization of the word tea in the Taiwanese or Hokkien dialect.

Té Company began as a restaurant supplier, bringing quality Taiwanese looseleaf tea to NYC’s dining scene before opening their own tearoom and DTC business in 2015. The space is intimate but inviting, creating a sanctuary for enjoying tea (and Taiwanese inspired tea provisions) in a conscious way. They source their tea straight from small Taiwanese farmers and are committed to using tea to represent Taiwanese heritage and explaining the craft of tea making, noting everything from the elevation to oxidation of each tea.

While some pop in just to purchase some tea for at home brewing, they also offer tea tastings and a small menu of Taiwanese food and desserts (including their elevated form of the pineapple cake, the pineapple linzer) to complement the flavors of the teas. It’s no wonder this humble room has garnered the love and respect of locals, a secret source for oolong that is preciously rare, even in a city as big as New York.