Carine Baudry is a professional nose from Paris, France, with years of experience in aroma creation that has given her a deep understanding of sensory evaluation. Currently working at the tea academy of the tea brand Nunshen, Carine has developed a tea evaluation system primarily based on olfactory perception of tea, utilizing sensory evaluation techniques and descriptive dialectics for teaching and training. The French non-profit organization Femmes de Culture has named Carine one of the 100 Women of Culture 2023. Traveling to the origins of the world’s magic fragrance products and cooperating with people from the famous French industries, such as red wine, perfume and food, Carine shared her personal understanding, how to introduce tea to the French in the right way.
Carine’s talent began in childhood, and she has been fascinated by smells since childhood. Her father was very encouraging and gave her the first book about spices, which she called “my wildest dream guide”. This pursuit of her dream drove her to start her career, with a master’s degree from the International Institute of Spices and Aromas of the renowned Versailles perfume school ISIPCA in Paris, France. Over the next 10 years of experience in aroma creation, Carine became a professional “nose” – perfumer, she has been engaged in perfume teaching for many years.
From 2018 to now, Carine has worked for the tea school of French tea brand Nunsheng. The tea school provides training courses for professionals and individuals, to help tea producers optimize their processes and improve their product value. Carine established the La Quint Essence training center, providing training, advice, and support on sensory expertise, emphasizing the role of senses in tea tasting, and teaching sensory vocabulary. Tea has a variety of aroma types, and Carine has created a new teaching method through continuous learning and research of tea, with olfactory methods as the training core, and developed tea sensory and descriptive dialectics. Her sensory teaching box, La Quint Essence du th é Tea essence Quintet, shows the role of senses in tea tasting and teaches sensory vocabulary. It contains 15 small bottles of fragrance types, which Carine explains are the basic fragrance types of tea. She has even distinguished 80 independent fragrance types in raw and ripe Pu’er tea.
Carine has had a dream since childhood to search for new flavors in distant places! Nowadays, she has fulfilled her childhood dream by constantly traveling long distances in search of flavors. Her greatest motivation for progress is to meet those who produce magical products, teach her understanding of smells and textures, and educate consumers to understand and respect these products. Carine mentioned that she often travels to Asian countries to explore and purchase unknown high-quality products. She believes that this is an excellent opportunity to meet new friends! Other cultures, different culinary arts, amazing plants and spices can all inspire her creativity. She traveled to tea gardens around the world, met with tea producers, learned about and purchased tea, so that when she returned to France, she could share with relevant personnel in France, such as producers, distributors, and consumers.
France is a famous country that produces red wine, perfume and food. The French like aroma very much. For example, the French like jasmine flowers scented green tea and blended strong flavour black tea. Chinese green tea is also famous. Carine collaborates with well-known figures in the French high-end food industry. She is the chairman of the tea competition judging panel at the French Agency for Valorization of Agricultural Products AVPA. She has many years of experience teaching top chefs and wine tasters, she is also an international expert in developing projects in many wine producing countries such as Thailand, Vietnam, and Laos. Both wine and tea are drinks, which are related to the service industry. Carine suggested that when introducing tea to the French, a better way is to use the method of wein sommelier or connoisseur to introduce wine, and describe and taste tea from the production area, manufacturers, taste, texture and other aspects, which is a familiar way of understanding for the French.
