Nature's Tea Company

The shop sits on La Pas Trail in Pike Township, out past the interstate loop northwest of downtown, which is a drive rather than a walk. What it buys you is the smallest pack size in the city: half an ounce, under four dollars for the plain blacks, and a catalogue the shop puts at more than eighty loose products. Single herbs and spices are sold the same way by weight, next to bottled iced tea in six- and twelve-packs, teaware and soaps.

It is also the only shop on our Indianapolis page that sells the room itself. The same catalogue that lists the teas lists a tasting event, an afternoon tea, a high tea party and the tea room by the hour, from one hour up to four. That tells you what kind of place it is: a counter built around people sitting down in it, not a warehouse with a pickup window. The shop credits two founders, a chemist and a trained herbalist, and says it has been brewing tea for family and friends for over thirty years.

For the catalogue's size, the leaf side is well balanced: an Assam and a pu-erh at the bottom of the price list, a Sencha, a Formosa Oolong and a White Peony a dollar above them, and matcha by the ounce. Buying one of each of those five costs less than a single tin at most specialist shops, which is the argument for the drive. Orders ship in two to ten business days, and the shop states that it does not take cancellations or refunds once an order is placed — worth knowing before you fill the basket.