GreenTeaSteve

A fairly standard rolled-leaf oolong: tasty and a good value. This is light and very crisp; it almost has a lemony ‘clean’ feel to it. The wet leaves have a slight buttery scent to them, but that doesn’t carry over into the liquid itself: both the smell and the taste are flowery.

This this doesn’t have the depth or tastiness of many higher-quality rolled-leaf oolongs, it’s good and the price is very fair. I got a lot of infusions from these leaves — sometimes 8 or 9 — but I like my tea light (and arguably weak) so others might prefer fewer.

After a few more drinkings: this tea is quite enjoyable and good, but I think it works better as an “occasionally” tea than as an everyday tea. Its interestingness and distinctness were great the first day, but after 4 or 5 days it’s starting to get a bit dull.

Overall, I’d liken this tea to a cross between Lapsang Souchong, Hojicha, and a dark oolong. The flavor is a little more Lapsang Souchong than Hojicha, with only a hint of oolong-ness, while the body and texture are more like a dark oolong than Hojicha, with only a hint of Lapsang-Souchong-ness. Also like a dark oolong, I’ve noticed that the leaves change from black to green when brewed. There’s a nice long, smoky aftertaste, with some astringency and just a hint of wood.

Although overbrewing doesn’t necessarily harm the tea, I definitely prefer it with a shorter brew time, at least for the first few infusions. I’ve been getting 6-7 infusions from the leaves (with a steep time of 2-4 minutes for the last few infusions).

I tried this tea for the first time today. As soon as I cut open the bag, the smokiness exploded out — this smells just like a Lapsang Souchong. The dry leaves are small, thin, wiry, and black; I had to check the producer’s website just to make sure this wasn’t actually a black tea. I gave the leaves a very quick rinse, and the smoky smell subsided, replaced by an almost malt-like scent.

I’ve never brewed this tea before, so I made three infusions with different brew times: 1, 1.5, and 2 minutes. The leaves were still going after the 3rd, so I imagine they could go longer. The liquid is a dark yellow color with lots of tiny leaf-hairs in it, and a relatively mild smoky scent.

Edit, after actually drinking the tea:
I like it: the taste is definitely smoky, but it’s mild — not overpowering. All three infusions were roughly the same flavor-wise, although the first seemed weaker than the others. It does have some characteristics of a light black tea, but it also has an oolong-ness to it. There’s almost a foresty/earthy taste hidden behind the smokiness, and a tiny hint of astringency.

Medium-bodied and smoky. While this didn’t blow me away, it was quite good and I’m looking forward to trying it again.

This was my last of this tea. I used slightly fewer leaves, with a longer brew time. Although today’s infusions came out a little less flavorful than previous ones, this is still quite good.

The “old cut grass”-ness is less prominent today; instead, there’s a hint of honey, particularly in the first few infusions. It also has a stronger aftertaste — a pleasant, mouth-drying astringency. I’d buy this again.

I used more leaves this time, to make this a little stronger, but it came out almost exactly the same — if anything, the first infusion seemed a bit weaker. I made five infusions.

The wet leaves have a strong, pleasant smell to them — very flowery, and stronger than I remember — and that smell makes its way into the tea’s flavor. This has a woody aftertaste which hangs around for a while. Very pleasant and enjoyable.

Edit: Later, I made three additional infusions using the same leaves (for a total of 8), using a longer brew time (3-4 minutes). There is certainly a hint of bitterness, but the tea is quite good overall — and much stronger. I suspect this can handle even more infusions, and that even the early infusions will be forgiving — next time, I’ll try some normal infusion times, instead of the shorter ones I started off with today.

This is my first time trying this tea; I like it. I rinsed the leaves once and used a rather short brewing time.

This tea first struck me as very “foresty” — bark, leaves, and earthiness — but there’s a strong flower scent and taste, and a bit of fruitiness (raisins?) too. I brewed it to a light orange color, but the flavor is still robust. There’s a bit of pleasant astringency, particularly on the aftertaste.

This is a solid tea with some complexity to it. While it might not be for everyone, it’s one I enjoy. I drank it by itself, but I think it might be even better paired with food or dark chocolate.

I got 4 infusions from these leaves. I think they could probably keep going for 1 or 2 more, but that was enough for me. =)

This was my last serving of this tea. This time, I made two 1-minute brewings and two 2.5-minute brewings, and it came out great — smooth with a nice, soft flavor. It’s rather nondescript and “average green tea”-like when brewed this way, at least to me, but it was enjoyable.

This is far too easy to overbrew. I somehow got this tea mixed up with a different one, and I brewed it like a normal tea (extra leaves, standard time and temperature for green tea) instead of doing short infusions. I’m reducing my rating by a few points. :-/

This still is not a bad tea — a lot of complexity shows through, especially when it’s brewed strong — but it becomes distractingly bitter very quickly. The taste is very mossy today, with some fruity overtones. The self-inflicted bitterness makes it difficult to enjoy, though.

Still delicious. I’m increasing my rating of this by a few points.

Today’s brewing was a bit stronger for me (but I like very light teas, so “strong” for me is likely “weak” to most people,) and it came out less grassy/composty and more nutty. Smooth and enjoyable.

I’ve been holding these for two years, and I used a weird brewing process today (3 of these in a 32 oz teapot, three infusions) so this review might not generalize well. I rinsed these twice before brewing.

Musky and soil-like, with some coffee overtones and a hint of dark chocolate. The aftertaste is mild, with more dirt and a faint hint of caramel. Noticeably bitter, but at the same time it does have some of the pu-erh sweetness. As it sits and cools (or maybe as I get used to it,) the bitterness is subsiding and the sweetness is becoming more pronounced.

I’ve been experimenting with different brew settings for some time; today’s experiment was good but not the best. Similar settings once yielded a wonderful dark chocolate flavor — one the best pu-erh experiences I’ve had — but I haven’t been able to repeat it.

This is a very unusual tea, but I like it. The brew is a nice orange color, with an aroma that’s sweet with a hint of smokiness. It’s medium-bodied with a very smooth texture and a fairly mild flavor: a sweet, roasted, almost malty taste. It’s almost similar to a weak pu-erh, particularly in its sweetness, but without any of the earthiness. It’s also quite similar to a fully-roasted all-twig kukicha, but with less of a bark-like flavor. It has a very long aftertaste.

This is an interesting tea, with a flavor I enjoy. It’s very difficult to categorize — it isn’t really grassy, nutty, flowery, salty, spicy, smoky, twiggy, mulchy, or any of the other adjectives that normally fit green, black, or pu-erh teas — but it’s definitely recognizable as tea. This is the kind of tea I push on people who say things like “I don’t like tea” or “all teas taste the same”.

A quick pre-rinse really helps the first infusion; I often do two pre-rinses. It does offer multiple infusions, but not very many: after two infusions the leaves often still have some flavor in them, but it takes a long time to extract that flavor. This tea is almost impossible to overbrew, though, so I’ll do one ‘leftover’ infusion at the end with an unbounded brew time. After 10 or 15 minutes, this ‘leftover’ infusion becomes strong and tasty without the bitterness such a long infusion would normally bring.

I didn’t include this in my numerical rating, but I do have one very negative comment: This tea comes in individual-serving foil packets, and those packets are horrible. They’re difficult to open, they contain too little leaf (for my 16 oz teapot), and they make the price outrageously expensive. While I do think this is a tea worth trying, the current price is simply not worth it.

This is a decent tea, but it’s not my favorite. Leaves are thin — not quite wiry or needle-like, but close. Aroma is nice: robust, rustic, and nutty. Flavor is very grassy, and very “traditional green tea”-ish. It’s noticeably astringent, but not unpleasantly so. This reminds me more of a darker green tea, or maybe an age-worthy oolong which hasn’t been aged. It certainly feels like a quality tea, but it’s not my personal style.

This is definitely a food tea; better with dinner or dark chocolate than by itself. I could see some people absolutely adoring this tea, but I don’t plan to order it again.

It took some experimentation to find brew settings that worked well. I had more success with a short brew time, and pre-rinsing the leaves twice seems to improve the texture. I usually got 3-5 infusions out of it, depending on brew time.

Light and airy, with some earthiness. The leaves are soft and velvety, with plenty of tiny hairs to make their way into the infusion. Aroma is rather weak. The flavor reminds me of cut grass that’s been left in a pile for a few days: herbal and grassy, but with some light mulchy, compost-like overtones. This is a flavor profile I enjoy, but it’s very light and mild so you might enjoy it even if old grass isn’t your thing. :-)

This isn’t a superstar Long Jing by any stretch, but it is good. A nice, very light everyday tea.

Improves over multiple infusions. I usually get 4-7 brewings, depending on how strong I make it.