CharlotteZero

This tea is delicious. It is definitely less smokey than the one other lapsang souchong I’ve had. That other lapsang souchong (which was Harney & Sons) was very smokey and had a strong piney taste as well. I enjoyed that cup at the Indian Road Cafe in Inwood, NYC. Gosh, I miss home!

Anyway, I can’t wait to compare this one to the “subtle roast” zheng shan xiao zhong that came in the Verdant Tea January reserve club shipment. I think I may also dedicate one of my “too big” yixing teapots to this kind of tea, as it’s not very expensive and would be good for serving larger groups of people.

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What a strange tea. It doesn’t look like any other Sun Moon Lake tea I have seen. It is rolled like a standard Formosa oolong with two leaves and a bud. When the leaves are steeped, they unfurl to reveal three different colors- a lighter yellowish green, a deeper jade green, and a purple. Could this really be a black tea?

It definitely has some of characteristics of a black tea, but its aroma is intensely fruity. I really like this tea very much. I’ll add to this after my second cup.

EDIT: I had to downgrade this one because the finish was lacking…Just about entirely.

This is another sample that came with an online purchase. The first time I tried this tea I also did not taste apples/applesauce the company’s website speaks of, but this time, on the second steeping I did. It was not the juicy tart flavor of fresh apples, but the flavor of peeled and cooked apples. Interesting! It has strong floral vegetal notes, none that I found unpleasant or too strong. A very nice tea.

I would like to say first that Berylleb is an excellent eBay seller- both their products (in my case, teaware) and their customer service have been wonderful. I highly recommend that you check out their store on eBay.

That being said, I was not a big fan of this free sample they sent me with my most recent purchase. I do like milk oolongs, but this one left a too sweet taste in my mouth after I drank it, almost like an artificial sweetener would.

Oh well, I gifted it to another Steepsterer(?), and hopefully they will enjoy it.

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The first thing I smelled after brewing this tea was vanilla cake, but also a hint of pond. Typical of mini touchas, when it is brewed there are a lot of small fragments of leaves, so you have to be sure to use a strainer. It wasn’t very complex at all, and left me wishing that it had something more. It also left my throat quite dry. But overall, it gets relatively high marks for being very smooth and drinkable…and for smelling like cake.

Thank you Kasumi no Chajin for swapping this sample with me.

I only had about 2g of this tea of this tea to taste with, so I decided to brew it for a minute each time in a gaiwan with about 2oz of water. I really wanted to get a sense of the full flavor profile of this tea. I found it had an odd sweetness that I didn’t think complemented the floral notes, and the mid/back-palate flavor reminded me of overcooked green vegetables. Although this hasn’t been my favorite tea I’ve tried, it was a really interesting experience- my first summer harvest Tieguanyin.

Whether I make this in a gaiwan or in a teapot, for 10 seconds or for 5 minutes, I love this tea. One day I may write more descriptive tasting notes (maybe).

Oh, yeah…And the name totally makes me get Dr. Dre/Snoop Dogg “The Next Episode” in my head every time…Bonus.

This is a great comfort tea. It will always be a staple in my cupboard because I haven’t found anything that goes as well with Justin’s dark chocolate peanut butter cups or homemade dark chocolate covered macadamia nuts (what I’m munching on today). It is a dark-roasted oolong whose aroma reminds me of coffee, stone fruit, and nuts. Great for a relaxing Sunday.

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They keep this one under the table, so you either have to know about it, or they have to offer it to you. I totally fell for the gimmick of this and decided to buy an ounce. It did turn out to be a very nice tea. The florals were well balanced with other flavors and there was a nice buttery taste to it. I’m still a new tea drinker (at least when it comes to anything besides English and Irish black tea blends), and I haven’t had many other spring Tieguanyins. I’ll have to try this alongside a couple of others soon.

This is another delicious Wuyi tea from Red Blossom. I prepared this gongfu style using a porcelain gaiwan. I would love to do a side-by-side tasting against come of their other Wuyi cultivars to find out why people consider it to be so special, but I only had a small sample and decided to appreciate it on its own and not to try to analyze the experience.

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This was a nice tea to end my day with. Maybe I just don’t have a real taste for Tieguanyin that is this green. I find that the floral tastes are too overpowering for me to have this tea alone. I do, however, love this tea with a granny smith apple.

My adorable dachshund grabbed this sample off of my shelf the other day, and I took it as a sign that it was time to try it. I drank this from a tea bowl, as the company’s website says it was first served to them that way. The first aromas I noted were artichokes and green apples. I could also taste artichoke strongly. There are floral notes that I can’t put my finger on too. This tea is lightly creamy, and when all of the broth is gone, the leaves smell sweetly tart like citric acid. Very enjoyable!

I haven’t had the opportunity to taste many raw pu’erhs, but this one might be my favorite yet. It still tastes “green”, but it doesn’t have that sharp, bitter flavor that I normally associate with raw pu’erh.

This was a cake I purchased to experiment with aging pu’erh, and I am looking forward to seeing how it changes with age.

Drinking this tea this morning. I will edit and put more detailed tasting notes later (maybe).

What a wonderful way to start my morning. This is my current favorite mi lan xiang oolong. This tea has just the right amount of astringency, and tolerates multiple steepings without getting bitter. The best part of this tea is the finish which lingers on and on, sometimes for hours after.