RIGA - “We want Latvian people to understand that tea is more than hot water, we want them to understand the world of tea," said Ilze Konovalova of downtown Riga's newly opened Chado tea house. Konovalova is clearly passionate about tea. When anyone shows an interest, she will rifle through the massive selection, pointing out the different varieties and occasionally lifting a particularly aromatic tea out of the bunch for people to sniff. Her narratives about tea always come back to her personal favorite, oolong milk. Her eyes light up as she talks about how each time the unique tea is brewed, the flavor subtly changes. The Chado tea house, which is now in its third month of existence, is hoping to set up a tea culture similar to the wine culture that exists in France, she explained. One look at the interior will show just how far Chado goes to achieve that goal.

Leslie Harlib's Cuisine Scene: It's really become time for tea

UNTIL A YEAR ago, Jennifer Leigh Sauer, a Mill Valley-based photographer, wasn't much of a tea drinker and hadn't thought much about tea.

While on a shoot in San Francisco for one of her clients, she went into a Chinatown tea-tasting shop and it changed her life.

"Before that, I thought tea was like Earl Grey or English Breakfast, basically Twinings or Liptons," she says. "The shop was so amazing; it was colorful, textural, beautiful. I was wound up visually by what I was seeing. And I couldn't believe the impact tea had on the people drinking it. It was magical."

Being around tea culture was so inspiring, Sauer says, she decided to photograph tea salons around the Bay Area, thinking she'd write an article about the phenomenon. The photos and accompanying essays wound up as her first book - a beautiful full-color hardcover released this week by Earth Aware, a division of Palace Press in Terra Linda.