Terri HarpLady

I’m a sucker for almost anything Verdant lists on their website.
Not that it’s a bad thing, mind you. With the exception of my bank balance, I’ve never been disappointed. :)

Some shengs are harsh, at least for the first couple of steeps. I tend to be very conservative on the amount of leaf I put in my Gaiwan, usually using 2 – 3 G, at least for the first time I try one, & I always keep those initial steepings really short. I keep notes in a tea journal, so that the next time I drink that tea I’ll be able to adjust things based on my previous experiences.

When I opened the package, I was delighted to see beautiful large flat pieces in the colors of a dry leaf pile. Whoever pried these off the cake did a beautiful job! The dry aroma was subtly sweet, fresh, & green. The wet leaf swelled to fill my Gaiwan, & it’s aroma was mineral rich. I was feeling daring, so I went with 5G in my 4 oz Gaiwan, one rinse, and 4 seconds (for those who aren’t familiar with my ’formula’s’, this translates into the following:
5G + 4oz (rinse) X 4 sec = A beautiful amber liquid with a sweet mild taste! Not a hint of harshness to be found!

I drank this all afternoon while I was teaching. The flavor continued on, mildly sweet & tongue numbing. Around the 6th steeping there was a little astringency, but this was gradually transformed into a citrus flavor that reminded me of aged tangerine peels, & sensation of allspice.

This is a pleasant sheng, with a nice sensation of chaqi as well!

Breakfast: A Hearty bowl of Stew, leftover from last night.
A breakfast like this requires a hearty tea, & this Assam fits the bill! It’s bold, with a bright sensation up the center of my tongue. Not as malty as some, but very substantial. I got this sample from Traveling Tea Box ‘A’. Thanks to everyone who participated!

Second Breakfast: Leftover baked sweet potatoes, which I cut up, peel & all, & sauteed in coconut oil with cinnamon & a pinch of salt until they were caramelized. Sometimes I add vanilla, ginger, & nutmeg.
Today I kept it simple.
For tea, I had another cup of this Assam, only I doubled the amount of tea & then spiked it with stevia & french vanilla coconut milk creamer.
This is like crack for me, LOL.

I have a sweet potato habit that knows no bounds. I eat at least one sweet potato almost every day. My son Drew shares my habit, & we bake whole trays of them. They are good hot, cold, or reheated. Leif & Tony think we’re crazy. Sweet potatoes are just SO AWESOME, I can’t stop myself. I grow them in my garden & my crop is always huge! Luckily they are also SO good for you. I don’t use butter, just a generous sprinkle of cinnamon. That’s all it takes. It’s dessert. Sweet potatoes taste the way winter squash is suppose to taste, & sweet potatoes make better pie than pumpkin could ever dream of. If you make the crust from pecans (gluten free), you have sweet potato pecan pie.
Oh sweet healthy decadence!!!

I used to have a soy french vanilla creamer habit. (along with quite a few other habits, but that was a long time ago…). Lately I’ve been thinking of Chai & other teas that are so nice with a little creamer once in awhile, & I remembered how much I enjoyed my Assam brewed extra bold this way. I like it straight up as well.
I think I’ll have another cup.

I ended my tea drinking (and harp teaching) day with this shu, which I’ve enjoyed a couple of times now. It reminds me of boston brown bread.

I love the taste of peaches! My adagio order came today, & this was in there. I’m not sure how I feel about it, so I won’t say much. It didn’t knock my socks off, but it wasn’t gross, & I have a pretty good supply of it, so I’m sure I’ll have more to say about it next time.

I’m not really a huge fan of flavored teas, but every now & then Little Terri talks me into something like this…

Here is another tea that I sipped all day while I was teaching. I wanted to do a comparison on this and the Yu Lu, but it never really happened. I just enjoyed both. The main feature of this tea is the German chocolate cake flavor, which lingers on & on!

I had students all day, from 10am – 8pm, with a one hour break at 12:30.
It’s a perfect day for the Gaiwan, as I’m just sitting around, listening to people of various ages & levels, while they play for me. I listen, I make suggestions regarding technique, interpretation, etc.

This is one of the teas I sipped. I don’t have a lot to say about it that I haven’t already said.

Yum!
How many times have I reviewed this? Who knows, who cares? It’s delicious. Sweet, tongue-tingling, mouth-watering, amazing!

First cup of the day!
First 2 cups of the day, actually!
I’ve reviewed this tea several times, so I just want to say it is a wonderful, balanced start to my day.
So smooth, so grounding, so tasty!

I’m the last person to have Traveling Tea Box ‘A’ before it goes back to Momo. It’s been an interesting project to be part of, & although most of the teas in the box didn’t interest me much (to be honest), there were a few tasty blacks that I kept (& Momo is really going to enjoy the box when it gets back to her later this week!).

This tea did catch my eye. Why?
1. I absolutely LOVE ginger
2. I’ve been wanting to drink something without caffeine in the evening, as I’m a terrible night owl & maybe I’ll go to bed a little earlier…probably not…but it’s worth a try, right?
3. It contains chicory, which I actually like the taste of!
4. It doesn’t contain rooibos, which I’m not a huge fan of.

Some of us remember the good old days when more herbal teas had chicory in them, & I know some still do, but it seems like these days almost everything that is caffeine free is made with rooibos & honeybush. They don’t taste bad, but they tend to somehow get out of the filter/bag/strainer (even when I combine 2 methods of filtration) & end up in my cup. Then a piece attached itself to my tonsil, all it takes is one little piece, and ackckckck!

I’m pleased to say that this tea is quite tasty, in my opinion. It’s roasty & bold from the chicory root, a little heavy on the cinnamon, I can taste the licorice root (which I also love) & it’s nicely spiced like a chai of sorts. Little Terri & I absolutely adore Chai, so thank you to whoever added this to the box!

Sipdown!
Actually, I didn’t drink the last cup, it was my son, Drew, but I told him I’d post it.

For those who don’t know, Gooey Butter Cake was invented in St. Louis in the 1930s when a local baker accidentally used the wrong butter (the gooey butter instead of the deep butter). Because it was around the depression, they sold it anyway, & people loved it so much that they started making it all of the time.

In St. Louis, you can get gooey butter cake almost anywhere, but it’s not something I’ve eaten, due to my intolerances to dairy, gluten, & sugar. The only other ingredient it contains is eggs!

So I can’t say for sure if this tea tastes like the real deal, but it was an interesting tea, with a nice lemony essence to it.

Today I played for tea at a nursing home that I’ve played at monthly for years (I’m not sure how long, but it’s been at least 12 years). Every month I play there. Residents come & go. My current favorite is a gentlemen who loves my arrangement of ‘Misty’. I play it for him every time, & he knows it’s for him. We always give each other the nod. He told one of the employees there that him & I “know each other. We have a special understanding.”

I always bring tea with me, as the tea they offer is plain & bland. Today I was in the mood for this one. I don’t drink St. Valentine often, but when I do, I make it strong & sweet. It’s awesome! Very heady with it’s rose aroma, very potent. It’s almost Valentine’s day!

I like to play a lot of latin jazz, which the residents seem to really enjoy, and as I was playing ‘How Insensitive’ today, I thought of 2 gals that are no longer in my audience. They used to sit at the nearest table, and once when I was playing that song, they sat there with dreamy expressions on their faces, lips parted, eyes half closed. One gal turned to the other.
“This music makes me feel SO sexy,” she said.
“Ohhhhhh yeah” her friend agreed, her voice smokey & sultry.

I love my job! I can help two 90 year old ladies re-live the sexiness of their youth, just by playing a song. How awesome is that?

The other bubble bath tea! Unsweetened, of course! This tea stands alone!

It’s bubble bath time! I wanted something sweet & exotic. I wanted Bergamot Rose Laoshan black. But I only have enough of that for one more time (on the verge of sobbing), & I want that last time to be extra special, so I’m saving it.

I confess: this chocolate chai initially disappointed me. It wasn’t what I was expecting. I followed the instructions, & it was ok…I’ve tried it steeped strong & blended with hot coconut milk, I tried it with almond milk. The problem all along was that I had a preconceived notion of what it would taste like.

As in all things, acceptance is the key. I steep 1 T in a mug for 3 minutes, add stevia, & enjoy.

This is a free sample that I got from Garret when I ordered some of his wonderful Puers! Thanks Garret! There’s been a discussion on the quality of customer service & the personal treatment we get from some of the tea companies, & Garret is definitely one of the people on the top of that list, in my mind. I’ve only ordered from him once (so far), but I can tell that he’s good people. One of the things I love about Steepster is all of the good people, sippers & sellers alike.

I’m not a huge oolong fan. I admit it. I was at one time, & a cup here or there is delightful, but then it seems to become redundant. I know that sounds crazy, but that’s the way I roll! I’ve avoided milk oolong, because apparently some companies actually spike it with milk (?), or so I’ve been told. Since I’m allergic, when in doubt, don’t drink the water (or the tea)!

Of course, this tea is pure tea. Dry, it smells wonderful! Like a sweet flan. I warmed the leaf in my preheated Gaiwan, & the aroma blossomed into flan with flambeed brown sugar & toasted coconut on top. There was also a bright fruity aroma that I just couldn’t pinpoint.

Did I drink the 10 second rinse? Well, hell yeah! It tasted like movie theater butter popcorn with a light Mango brightness. Nice!
The wet leaf smells of that buttery sugary flan, with pureed mango drizzle. I can’t believe how sugary sweet this tea smells, both wet & dry.

Over the next several steepings the movie theater popcorn gave way to floral greens, a thick throat feel, & a delightful tingle on the tip of my tongue. I have a lot of houseplant, on all 3 floors, so for the last hour or so, I’ve been alternating between watering plants & drinking cups of tea. I watered everything in the sun room (there are pink flowers!), then sat for a few cups & relaxed. Then it was the rest of the downstairs plants, a few more cups of tea, etc. During that time a coconut flavor has emerged, the butterness is back, but in the back of my throat, lingering. The tingliness & thickness has embodied more of my tongue. It’s all very nice.

Will I buy this tea? Probably not. The quality is wonderful, & it is tasty, & although I like the novelty of an excellent oolong here & there, I wouldn’t want to drink it every day.

It took awhile to get out of bed. I laid there with my ipad, half asleep, reading & commenting on Steepster reviews. Tuesday is officially my day off, at least from students (although I do have a gig later today). Of course, it’s not really a day off, as I have desk work to do, music to practice, etc, but it’s nice to sleep in a bit & laze around. Besides my bed is SO comfy, it felt good to just lay there for awhile. The only thing that would have made it better was a hot cup of tea. My room is on the 3rd floor, so by the time I made it down to the kitchen, there was no point going back to bed. I drank my tea in the sunroom.

My first cup of the day was this wonderful Keemun. The dry leaf is SO fragrant! The tea itself is so smooth & flavorful. My formula:
1 T + 12 oz (195 F) X 2 minutes = Yeah, baby!
The re-steep was for 3 minutes & it was every bit as delicious.

Sitting here in the sun, my houseplants have reminded me that I forgot to water them yesterday & they are also hungry. There is work to do, even on my day off.

Sometimes you just gotta have some sheng!

I spent a lot of time sipping tea today while my students came & went, but I didn’t write anything down, so this will be the first of my feeble attempts at commenting on teas that I drank hours ago.

I thoroughly enjoyed this puer! It doesn’t really taste like vanilla, but for some reason it reminded me of vanilla wafers. :)

Sunday Sample Sipdown #5

It’s been awhile since I drank this, & this is the last of the 5 tuochas that came in this sample. Although it isn’t as tasty as some of the Shu’s I have, it is still a nicely pleasant & grounding brew, with a creamy feeling of vanilla, and the mild sweetness & a little bit of graininess of an oatmeal cookie or muffin. It’s not malty, more of a cereal or quickbread kind of taste.

I’ve been drinking flavored teas sweetened with stevia, & this is a welcome change. This is the kind of tea I prefer overall, what I always come back to. Something bold, rich, & earthy.

Sunday Sample Sipdown #4 (? I think this is the 4th of the day).

This is another sample from Rachel. Thanks!
Tony & I are sitting around, watching episodes of the X files, waiting for the superbowl.

I have to admit, I’m not a real fan of this tea. It does have an interesting flavor, but it kind of burns my throat a little.

Sunday Saple Sipdown #2
This one is from Josie Jade. She was generous in sending 3 bags. The first time I had this, I used 1 bag. It was pleasant but mild. Today I used the other 2 bags together, steeped for 3 minutes. Plus stevia.

Not bad! Mildly smokey, with a trace of rose. Thanks Josie!

Sunday Sample Sipdown #1: This came from Rachel. Thanks!

I’ve been having a bit of a sweet tooth, so I put stevia in it. Not bad :)

Saturday Sample Sipdown #5

Thanks to Josie Jade for this one. It is pleasant, a change of pace, but not something I would stock.

Saturday Sample Sipdown #4 (I think I was on #4…)

This one is from Rachel! Thanks, Rachel!

The initial aroma of this while it was steeping led me to believe that it would be very bitter & that I wouldn’t like it.
Interestingly enough, it doesn’t really taste the way it smells. It’s smooth, pleasantly bold, slightly astringent, and there is a brightness to it as well. I feel that it’s lacking something, like a little depth, right in the middle of the flavor profile it’s a little ‘hollow’.
Having said that, it’s not bad!

Saturday Sipdown #3
Another gift from BoxerMama. Thanks!

I love cinnamon, especially on fried apples & baked sweet potatoes.
I drank this with Stevia, & it was pleasant, with the cinnamon way out in front. I’m not really getting the puer, & I’d like the black tea to be bolder, but otherwise, not bad. :)