Muskan Khanna has broken human, social, and financial capital barriers to start an organic Tea Studio.

Female entrepreneurs are women who run a business. Female entrepreneurship has increased and given rise to self-made females like Oprah Winfrey, Meg Whitman, Diane Hendricks, and Coco Chanel.

Muskan Khanna owns a boutique organic Tea Studio that is run entirely by women.  Muskan Khanna is a game-changer in the male-dominated tea business. She plays by different rules.  She talks about tea and corporate social responsibility. Muskan left the advertising business to create unique teas for the discerning, international palate.

Muskan, please tell my global audience a little about you?

I was born in Assam, the heart of tea. After that, we moved to Dubai when I was four and later to Colombo during my teens. I graduated from Birmingham in media studies. I worked in Mumbai and Delhi in advertising for two years and then joined my dad in the tea business. In conclusion, it has been a process and a journey to get to my calling being involved in the tea business.

Walk me through the tea club? 

Our specialty tea unit is called the Tea Studio.  A unique one of its kind, tea production facility where teas are not manufactured industrially, but creatively crafted.  Every one of the 12 teas we create in the Studio is one-of-a-kind, stand-alone tea.  Not grades, but individual.

I have heard of Darjeeling, Sri Lankan, and Assam tea. Tell me a little about tea from the Nilgiris?

Teas from the Nilgiris have a distinctive character and a uniqueness.  These are all high grown teas (our Studio is at an elevation of 6,300′ above MSL) which can be recognized by the Nilgiri logo which is assigned to teas from this district.

What is unique about these teas?

Each of the 12 teas manufactured in the Tea Studio is made up of a whole, unbroken leaf. In regular factories, be it orthodox or CTC the teas are graded into different lots. Here at the studio one tea leaf will make one particular type of tea, no grading and no sorting are required as we have 0% dust.

What are the different ways we can drink tea?

There are plenty of different ways to drink tea. Tea can be consumed as a hot or cold beverage. Tea can be brewed with milk and sugar, just milk, just sugar, some people put cane sugar while others make it with a mix of spices and herbs.

Can tea be used in cooking? 

Off course. For instance, green tea cakes and green tea flavored biscuits. My personal favorite is a green tea-infused roast chicken. It consists of a marinade of ginger, garlic, olive oil, thyme, and rosemary. The tea is in a foil and placed inside the whole chicken and cooked in the oven for about 40 minutes. As a result, once you cut the chicken, you get the aroma of tea and can taste it in the chicken itself.

What are some of the qualities required to be a tea sommelier?

One needs to be passionate and dedicated to the craft and love it.  A tea sommelier is like an artist, creating while working not with ‘dead’ or ‘lifeless’ material such as wood, paint, or clay, but with a living and alive part of a plant.  The Tea leaves.

What is the difference between organic and normal tea? 

Organic teas emanate from fields that are organically cultivated in which no chemicals, pesticides, or inorganic fertilizers are used.  Organic teas simply take one back to nature and to the way crops were cultivated before humans started degrading the soil.  The teas produced in the Studio are all deemed organic since the starting point of these teas is the natural organic raw material (the leaf).  In conclusion, purity.

How are your practices sustainable and how are you corporate and socially responsible?

We are the only factory in India that runs on 100% LPG, which means we use no coal or firewood like regular factories making us totally environmentally friendly. We are a 100% women-run organization, from the head of operations to the tea maker and the workers are all women. We have employed the women from the local villages around, helping the community and empowering women all the way through.

Tell me a little about the food here and your favorite dishes?

Indian food is usually quite spicy and full of flavor. My favorite dish of all time is Biryani. Biryani is a dish made of rice and meat, it is cooked for a couple of hours and is eaten with curd and pickle.

Tell me a good joke about tea?

What do you call a talkative drink?

Chai Tea.

Photo Credits: Ian Wagg Plush Design Studio THE 5TH Loverna Journey Alisa Anton Joanna Kosinska  Micheile Henderson Katrin Hauf Raychan

The post The Game Changer in the Tea Business appeared first on Four Columns of a Balanced Life.

Muskan Khanna is the embodiment of the 21^st century.  She is fearless, thinks outside the box, makes the rules, a game-changer who has broken the glass ceiling and aims for the sky. She gets it. To grow your footprint in a global environment, you have to have a unique value proposition, have a competitive advantage, be green, use sustainable farming methods, use corporate social responsibility and invest in the local community. She empowers women by only hiring them. Is it any wonder that her first interview is one of the most liked on my blog. She is not your quintessential sommelier. I give you Muskan Khanna.

Muskan, Four Columns welcomes you back. Your first interview was one of the most read and liked posts. As a result, let’s talk about tea again. Tell me about the health benefits of tea?

Wow! I did not expect that. There are quite a few health benefits, but in my mind, these are probably the top 5:

Tea contains antioxidants, which help keep us young, skin looking better, and even protects us from the damage of pollution.

Tea has less caffeine than coffee, almost up to 50% less! And we all know the negative effects of caffeine.

Tea helps boost the immune system.

Tea also helps soothe the digestive system – so it’s a good thing to have after a heavy meal.

And lastly, for you weight-conscious people out there, tea is calorie-free!

Congrats on being innovative, sustainable, being corporate socially responsible, and investing in women. You have just released some new brands like White, Oolong, Green, Black and Roasted Green. What are the similarities, differences, and uniqueness of these teas?

These teas are unique in their own way, the process of each type of tea is different, different machines using different temperatures all tell these teas apart from one another.

The similarity between ALL the teas produced here at the studio is the raw material – one leaf and a bud.

Muskan, I have been drinking tea all my life. I am your typical heat the water, dip an orange Tetley tea bag, brown sugar, milk, and cardamom kind of guy. Teach me some innovative ways to expand my horizons of tea and how does tea help us in our moods and different settings?

Gosh! What you’ve been drinking sounds very little like tea to me Jerry.

The best way to drink any tea be it white, green, oolong, or black is to brew it in hot water by itself – that’s how I drink it anyway.

Teas such as Nilgiri Platinum Needles and Nilgiri Baimudan contain the most amount of caffeine, so this is a good wake-up tea to have, whereas teas like our Nilgiri bamboo and Nilgiri Kukicha has the least amount of caffeine, so these are good bedtime tea recommendations.

Does the tea come in bags or separately and what is the difference?

Our teas are sold in 250gm loose leaf pouches. No tea bags for now.

Help me understand how tea is grown and the whole process from seeds to the time they are harvested?

There are two ways of growing a tea bush, you could either plant the seeds (a much longer process) or you could plant saplings, which have been taken from existing bushes.  Once planted the bushes take approx 5-6 years to grow and are ready for plucking on a regular basis.

The Camellia Sinensis plant is actually a full-grown tree, so one has to make sure it remains at table height so it easy to pluck. The bushes are also cropped in such a way that they are flat, which allows more buds to shoot up.

For teas like ours, which uses very high-quality leaf, the plucker has to go back to the bush every 7-9 days and pluck off the one leaf and a bud and then wait another 7-9 days for the buds to start shooting up again.

Once these are harvested, they’re brought into our factory in small bamboo baskets so as not to damage the leaf.

Talk to me about the caffeine content in tea and do you have decaffeinated tea?

As I mention before tea does contain caffeine but much less than coffee, and every tea has different levels of caffeine. For example, white and green tea contain 1/3 of the caffeine as compared to coffee, and oolong and black have less than ½ of the caffeine content as coffee.

It might also interest you to know caffeine is a natural component in Camellia Sinensis, so all teas will have caffeine.

The longer a tea is brewed for, the more caffeine it loses.

And caffeine from tea is thought to absorb in the body more slowly.

The post Muskan Khanna: Fearless in a Man’s World appeared first on Four Columns of a Balanced Life.

What is the meaning of life?

I have known Mayple Dorrington since I started my career at Scotia Bank. Mayple was Director, Communications and Change Management at Scotia Bank.  Mayple recently wrote a book called Finding: The Oasis in my Soul. It is a journal, an encouraging journey through the spectrum of real-life experiences of trials and triumphs. As you read her book, you can relate to it. You will see a reflection of your own experiences. The book asks some relevant questions about having an empty void within us, do we have doubts about our gifts, weaknesses,  our purpose, and our identity?

I am a big fan of gratitude, and this book challenges my thinking to transform my mind and to get a deeper conviction of love and purpose in my life. If you are struggling with insecurity, fear, uncertainty, or anxiety, get the book, become empowered, lead an authentic life, and transform yourself into what you are intended to be.  This is the first of a two-part interview.

Mayple, a true honor to have you talk to four columns. Tell my audience a little bit about you?

Jerry, firstly I want to thank you for the opportunity to participate in your blog. I’m deeply honored to be having this dialogue with you and your audience.

Born on the beautiful island of Jamaica I grew up in a happy, loving family cushioned in a viable business environment.   The business became a casualty following the aftermath of the 1970s economic downturn in my country and the outcome later triggered my family’s immigration to another beautiful country, Canada. With a business mindset, I later pursued that area of study and embarked on an amazing career in the financial industry that spanned 3 continents with direct access to over 27 countries.  Alongside my banking occupation of choice, I am an author and a motivational speaker.  My professional designations include an economist, chartered banker, high school teacher and a personal financial planner.

I am a devout Christian who anchored my beliefs, decisions, and hope in the power of the risen Jesus Christ.  With my teaching discipline, I constantly volunteer my skills for mentoring and coaching and by my mentees’ own admission, I have the knack to identify, develop and empower countless persons in reaching their personal goals.

Having said that, my passion is primarily centered around the relationships I forged working with people drawn from across the globe and living in the most multicultural city in the world. Through these experiences, I learned how to coexist with people, understand their behaviors, outlook, and preferences, and dispense greater tolerance, acceptance, and compassion in helping others. An area that keeps me growing is to intentionally embrace the power of mindfulness. This awareness constantly provokes and inspires me to challenge my mind, peel away layers of obscurity, to look deeper and wider for insights toward the path in finding truths.

Finding: The oasis in my soul. It is an intense name for a book. How did the book come about? What is the main message? Who is the audience? What is unique and different about the message?  

Jerry, there’s lots to unpack here… yes,  the name is indeed intense. You may notice I deliberately said “Finding” and not “Find” or “Found” because it’s a journey, not a destination. My book chronicles an inspiring journey through the lens of my real-life experiences of trials and triumphs and using what I have been through to come to a place of what I now know for sure.

Strangely the genesis of my book was drawn from my wanderlust nature.  Traveling to many countries, living amongst diverse nationalities, and conversing with numerous people from different walks of life, age, and outlook; hearing their stories, the many dreams realized, the hardships overcame, and bouncing back from mistakes, I realized how much we all have in common.

I wrote the book to expose our human commonality and to express how I cultivate the power to confront and stare down the debilitating state of uncertainty, worry, and fear.  How like myself, we can overcome our shortcomings and elevate our talents and self-worth to be the best.

During my speaking engagements, after sharing my story, which is often intertwined with slices from the lives of many others, seeing the visceral reaction of agreement from my diverse audience, I validated how we all want to feel valued, loved, and accepted. The main point is to have a positive self-image of not who I am, but who God intended me to be.  How I claim truth and confidence from the backdrop of biblical examples of trust, faith, and obedience.  Each chapter illustrates a meaningful life experience, which is brutally frank about what I learned, the impact of the practical application, and my spiritual transformation. Each reader will walk away with valuable nuggets to build their confidence and self-worth.

My core objective and the key message are to challenge the readers’ thinking and arouse a sense of gratitude, wonder, and introspection, allowing us to draw from an ever-renewing Oasis where we can replace worry, fear, and doubt with the joyful assurance of God’s promises and faithfulness.

The feedback has been overwhelmingly positive that this is exactly the response it evokes. I painted a graphic picture of my experiences, whether illness, a hero to zero career moves, friendship betrayal, family choices, to be transformed, to come to a place of rest, not a place of stop, but resting on the dependence and assurance of God’s love while seeking new adventures to spread my wings.  The overarching message may not be unique or different, but it’s worth reinforcing to keep us building self-awareness on how we can draw inspiration and hope from seemingly common encounters and events in our lives. It about seeing and acknowledging God’s love and handiwork in all aspects of our lives.

Explain to me what does women’s empowerment means to you?    

Empowerment is about acting on my own volition, having options, having the autonomy to make choices.  Really, Jerry, it’s to emancipate me from the sense of powerlessness, to become self-determined, being able to take charge of my life by owning my decisions, circumstances, hopes, and dreams, growing stronger, wiser, and more confident.

Having said that, for me, I do not believe women’s empowerment is independent of the influence of men. I strongly believe men and women were created with different, but complementary traits. When working in unity, we unleash the freedom to both look outward, naturally curious in opening ourselves to the universe, feeling supported to take risks, and to reimagine possibilities based on the imagery of how to think, rather than the limitation of what to think.

I have countless examples of gender neutrality during brainstorming, problem-solving, and trouble-shooting that delivered the optimum results, mainly because women are allowed the latitude, civility, and respect to explore and articulate their thoughts without judgment or fear. This type of liberation allows me to embrace and benefit from a diversity of thoughts; to see ideas from various points of view, despite differences reaching common ground, by filtering everything through what is pleasing to God. Why, because like all good things, true and authentic empowerment comes from honoring the will of God.

I am a big fan of being authentic and leading a transparent life. Help me understand what you mean by living an authentic life?    

Yes, Jerry, authentic and transparent are two buzz words presently tossed around a lot! Irrespective of the scholarly definition, at the core, this is about living one’s truth, what we know for sure, which can be shaped by our many experiences.

For me, it is when my values and beliefs are compatible with the integrity of my doctrine, actions, and words. It’s about self-awareness, knowing myself at a deep level, accepting my multi-faceted traits, my strengths, and imperfections; having the desire to continuously grow as I reconcile my good, bad and ugly qualities, which are common to all of us. I find that oftentimes, with increasing societal pressure, we lean into what the world prescribed as a success.  Whether to gain wealth, fame, alter our appearance or job aspiration, we can compromise who we are created to be which often leads to self-loathing, and unhappiness.

To justify my point, let’s take a look at the billions in revenue generated from cosmetic industries, fake content, scamming, Ponzi schemes, and the like. You see, in our humanness, our hearts are deceitful, full of pride, and can easily trap us in a state of denial and falseness to elevate ourselves. I am not immune to this pretense, but growing in spiritual maturity and wisdom, I try to be deliberate in not allowing this malignant state to frighten or paralyze me, but to be powered by my dependence on the spirit God graciously places within us.  As I summon the courage to live from a place of acceptance, growth, humility, and inner peace, only then, I can be the best expression of myself, which will be evident to impact others as I attract, influence, and sustain meaningful relationships.

The post Mayple Dorrington: Finding the Meaning of Life appeared first on Four Columns of a Balanced Life.