Ten Ren's Tea Square One

Ten Ren's Tea was founded in 1953 in southern Taiwan and describes itself as a chain of more than 2,000 stores, with a tea museum opened in 2006. Its Ontario stores are in Markham, Richmond Hill, Thornhill, Toronto and Mississauga, where the shop is on the first level of Square One Shopping Centre, 100 City Centre Drive, unit 1-201. Like the rest of the chain it serves tea drinks to dine in or take out as well as selling leaf; the online shop ships, and dine-in and take-out orders run through a separate ordering app.

The online catalogue is eighteen products, all sealed loose-leaf packs and pyramid bags, with no black tea at all. The oolongs are the reason to come: Tung Ting at CA$ 20 the 227 g, an osmanthus oolong and a high-mountain Jin Xuan at CA$ 20 and CA$ 48 the 150 g, Alishan at CA$ 48 the 150 g, an An-Shi Ti Kuan Yin at CA$ 108 the 227 g and a Wuyi Da Hong Pao at CA$ 108 the 113 g. The greens are Chinese, Bi Luo Chun at CA$ 20 the 150 g and a West Lake Dragonwell at CA$ 39 the 227 g, with a plainer premium green at CA$ 20.

The sizes are the net weights printed in each product's description, and the packs are sealed, so this is a shop for a tea you already know you like rather than for tasting through a list; the counter at the Food District in the same mall is the place to buy 25 g first. The chain publishes no hours for this store, so check with the mall or phone ahead.