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1/27/14 3am insomnia banishing cuppa. 2tsp/12oz/212F/15 minutes. After a long and pleasant day with plenty of tea and only one spot of unpleasantness, sleep eludes me. So I’ll spend some time with the 100 Poems of Rikyu, sipping this tea, and hoping that sleep will arrive soon.

1/26/14 Tasted at a tea event. White teas are very light and aromatic, so having the aroma cup with this tea was a real treat. The first serving had very floral almost rose like scent, and a very light simple taste. The second serving was still floral, but with an additional toastiness to it, and was much richer in the cup. Our host actually brewed this tea four times, using a very tiny yixing teapot, and combined the 1st and 2nd infusions for the first serving, and 3rd and 4th for the second. I thought it was an intelligent way to heighten the flavor of a very subtle tea.

1/26/14 Tasted at a tea event. A classic jasmine scented white tea. A tasty tea, head knockingly floral in the first serving, and showing a nice hint of citrus-like astringency in the second. I didn’t care for it much personally, though it was a nice tea. I think I’d like it more brewed western style, so the intense jasmine was toned down and balanced a little better.

1/26/14 Tasted at a tea event. This is a nice basic tieguanyin, and was a pleasant bump up the intensity ladder. The first serving was very floral, with a ton of the clover/honey notes oolong teas are known for, as well as a note of toasted coconut. The second serving was much smoother and more mellow, with a pleasant creaminess to it.

1/26/14 Tasted at a tea event. A very interesting tea, both in terms of tasting and in history. It is made from a tea plant which is a hybrid of the native Taiwanese C. sinenses v. sinensis and the Indian C. sinensis v. assamica , which was imported to the island early last century to help establish a black tea industry. It was a very nice tea to drink, full of the malty peppery chocolaty notes that Assam teas have, all wrapped up with a vegetal bell peppery kind of greenness that was quite interesting. Unlike the previous more traditional Chinese teas, this black tea didn’t come through the second serving as strongly, and our host told us that is is pretty normal. Apparently the highly oxidized black teas infuse much more readily and thus don’t support multiple infusions as well.

1/26/14 Western tea before driving in the snow to a Chinese tea class. 3g/6oz/190F/3min. First impressions. Floral bitterness. Good mouth feel, present but not heavy. A pleasant drink for a hurried moment, and a good primer for spending an afternoon with similiar teas.

01/25/14 Gongfu in the afternoon. 4g in my small gaiwan. Peaches. In the dry leaf and in the brew aroma, and on the tongue, peaches. If a perfectly ripe peach were carved out of marble and somehow edible it would have this taste. I am loving this tea and it’s progress – I’ve lost track of the steeps at this point, but I’ve been drinking it steadily for about an hour now, and it is fantastic. Light in the mouth, and this peachy stony yumminess that just keeps going on and on.

This is my collection of English and Chinese tea wares. The two large white china pots are my basic brew set – I brew in the middle pot and pour off the tea into the second pot to serve. 24oz brews, 12g of tea per brew.

In front are my new toys – the gaiwan which just arrived today, and two yixing style pots I picked up in the past month. The one is for pu-erhs, and the water chestnut is for oolongs.

1/25/14 Tea with dasHusband on a snowy day. 5g in 6oz yixing. Gongfu brewing. I’m pausing after the sixth steep to note this. I may do some more infusions or not – I just want lunch now instead of more tea at the moment. The leaves could definitely support it – still very crisp bodied and not fully unfurled. I’m fighting with the pot a bit on that count – it is a 6oz, but it’s tall and pours slowly, so I think in the future I may use less tea in it and a scanter pour of water.

Very nice progression, but drinking tea with dH is a little distracting, so I haven’t got good tasting notes today. I was really struck by the sweetness of the first infusions. Also really interesting was noting how the boiledness of the water affected the taste — we noticed a flatness creeping into the 5th infusion, and I added fresh cold water to the pot for the next boil, and the 6th infusion was much perkier. Having my little electric boiler at the table with us is awesome for this brewing style.

1/25/14 Morning pot to fend of a chilly busy day. 3g/6oz/212F/5min. Fantastic aroma of roses both from the dry leaf and only slightly subdued in the brew. Drinking this first thing in the morning is giving it short shrift. Slightly sweetened with sugar, the rose flavors are present, but faded. More ‘old sachet’ then ‘blooming in June’. This would be largely the fault of the age of the tea – this was packed for me in ‘10. It’s been stored well sealed in my dark cool cupboard. The age detectable, but in a pleasant way. A summer afternoon in the attic above the rose garden kind of way.