((PKG)) TEAMAKER – JASON ELLIS ((PIA))
((Banner: A Special Leaf))
((Executive Producer: Marsha James))
((Camera: Kaveh Rezaei))
((Adapted by: Philip Alexiou))
((Map: Bastrop, Texas))
((Main characters: 1 male))
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
I have always liked being outdoors ever since I was a little
kid. I've always been like foraging, you know, just kind of goes
along with that and just like learning about what the plants are
and what you can eat.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
Reading this Native American ethnobotany book, I was just
looking up what tribes lived in this region and what plants they
used for what. So, I was looking for plants in Texas and found out
that Native Americans around here use yaupon, which is their
only access to caffeine. It’s the only caffeinated plant native to
North America.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
Yaupon is, it's a native shrub that grows all along the Gulf Coast
here in central Texas. We're about as northwest as it grows, but
then all along the Gulf Coast and then up the Atlantic coast to
Virginia. It's an evergreen, has little red berries in the wintertime
and, as I said, it's the only caffeinated plant native to the US. It's
very, very hardy. It's a relative of South American yerba mate,
which is a really popular caffeinated beverage from South
America.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
Native Americans used to roast it into a really dark tea and it has
kind of a roasted smoky flavor to it. You can treat it all different
ways to get all kinds of flavors. So, all the caffeinated teas in the
world, like, you know, green tea, white tea, black tea, oolong, pu
erh, like all those teas, they all come from the same plant. It's the
same species of plant and all those flavors all come from how it's
grown, where it's grown and how it's processed afterwards. So, I
found out you can pretty much do the same kind of thing with the
yaupon too.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
So, I just started trying to find out what yaupon was and at first I
thought, this must be awful if nobody's, you know, if it is a
caffeinated plant, everybody loves caffeine and if it's all over the
place here, it must taste awful, you know, if nobody is using
it. So, I went out and found some and started experimenting with
it and it's really, really delicious. It tastes a lot like tea.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
So, I said if it's a tasty caffeinated beverage, I thought, you know,
you could make money with it.
My name is Jason Ellis. I'm one of the co-founders and co-
owners of Lost Pines Yaupon Tea. This is all freshly harvested
yaupon. It’s going to sit here for about a week before we remove
it and then it will look a lot like this. This is completely
unroasted. It’s pretty dry and brittle already and then this is our
light roast, which tastes a lot like a green tea. It’s just roasted just
for a little while and then we have a darker roast, which we’ll leave
in the oven a little bit longer. We have a dark roast that has kind
of a roasty taste, really similar to a black tea and then the light
roast is going to be a lot closer to a green tea. Both of them have
a lot less tannins than a traditional tea so they don’t, it has a lot
smoother finish at the end and it smells really good too.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
Yeah, harvesting the yaupon is, it's a lot of work.
It’s the understory to the Lost Pines Forest here. So, it’s
native. It's meant to be here. If you have a pasture or a field and
you let it go fallow, you don't maintain it anymore, the first woody
plant to come back is yaupon and it just becomes a huge
thicket. It takes over the entire thing.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
One of the most fun things about making the yaupon is roasting
it. We roast it in the oven and you can actually make a light roast
and a dark roast and then as it's roasting, you can smell the flavor
change and you can almost cook by sense of smell.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
Yeah, I mean our company is very socially, environmentally
conscious. It's still becoming more popular. Like, people didn’t
even hear about it to just a few years ago for a lot of people. You
know, it’s all pesticide free. We're not labeled organic but it's wild
crafted, you know. It's beyond organic as far as I'm concerned.
((MUSIC))
((Banner: A Special Leaf))
((Executive Producer: Marsha James))
((Camera: Kaveh Rezaei))
((Adapted by: Philip Alexiou))
((Map: Bastrop, Texas))
((Main characters: 1 male))
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
I have always liked being outdoors ever since I was a little
kid. I've always been like foraging, you know, just kind of goes
along with that and just like learning about what the plants are
and what you can eat.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
Reading this Native American ethnobotany book, I was just
looking up what tribes lived in this region and what plants they
used for what. So, I was looking for plants in Texas and found out
that Native Americans around here use yaupon, which is their
only access to caffeine. It’s the only caffeinated plant native to
North America.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
Yaupon is, it's a native shrub that grows all along the Gulf Coast
here in central Texas. We're about as northwest as it grows, but
then all along the Gulf Coast and then up the Atlantic coast to
Virginia. It's an evergreen, has little red berries in the wintertime
and, as I said, it's the only caffeinated plant native to the US. It's
very, very hardy. It's a relative of South American yerba mate,
which is a really popular caffeinated beverage from South
America.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
Native Americans used to roast it into a really dark tea and it has
kind of a roasted smoky flavor to it. You can treat it all different
ways to get all kinds of flavors. So, all the caffeinated teas in the
world, like, you know, green tea, white tea, black tea, oolong, pu
erh, like all those teas, they all come from the same plant. It's the
same species of plant and all those flavors all come from how it's
grown, where it's grown and how it's processed afterwards. So, I
found out you can pretty much do the same kind of thing with the
yaupon too.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
So, I just started trying to find out what yaupon was and at first I
thought, this must be awful if nobody's, you know, if it is a
caffeinated plant, everybody loves caffeine and if it's all over the
place here, it must taste awful, you know, if nobody is using
it. So, I went out and found some and started experimenting with
it and it's really, really delicious. It tastes a lot like tea.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
So, I said if it's a tasty caffeinated beverage, I thought, you know,
you could make money with it.
My name is Jason Ellis. I'm one of the co-founders and co-
owners of Lost Pines Yaupon Tea. This is all freshly harvested
yaupon. It’s going to sit here for about a week before we remove
it and then it will look a lot like this. This is completely
unroasted. It’s pretty dry and brittle already and then this is our
light roast, which tastes a lot like a green tea. It’s just roasted just
for a little while and then we have a darker roast, which we’ll leave
in the oven a little bit longer. We have a dark roast that has kind
of a roasty taste, really similar to a black tea and then the light
roast is going to be a lot closer to a green tea. Both of them have
a lot less tannins than a traditional tea so they don’t, it has a lot
smoother finish at the end and it smells really good too.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
Yeah, harvesting the yaupon is, it's a lot of work.
It’s the understory to the Lost Pines Forest here. So, it’s
native. It's meant to be here. If you have a pasture or a field and
you let it go fallow, you don't maintain it anymore, the first woody
plant to come back is yaupon and it just becomes a huge
thicket. It takes over the entire thing.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
One of the most fun things about making the yaupon is roasting
it. We roast it in the oven and you can actually make a light roast
and a dark roast and then as it's roasting, you can smell the flavor
change and you can almost cook by sense of smell.
((MUSIC))
((Jason Ellis, Co-founder & Co-owner, Lost Pines Yaupon
Tea))
Yeah, I mean our company is very socially, environmentally
conscious. It's still becoming more popular. Like, people didn’t
even hear about it to just a few years ago for a lot of people. You
know, it’s all pesticide free. We're not labeled organic but it's wild
crafted, you know. It's beyond organic as far as I'm concerned.
((MUSIC))
