Clue No. 1
Ever since Geek Pride Day came and went, I have been feeling guilty for not doing it justice. I just couldn’t get it together to do anything prior to or on the actual day. I was too busy being on vacation. But Rabs and Ewa inspired me, and so I’m going to take the position that every day ought to be Geek Pride Day and therefore, this little homage isn’t late at all.
It’s a little mystery game. Here’s how it will work.
This is the first tasting note in a series of four. The names of the teas tasted, taken together, provide clues that are intended to lead to the answer. The correct answer is something likely to be known to geeks of a particular stripe and of a particular era, i.e., it’s a little dated, but then so am I.
There is no prize. It’s just for fun and bragging rights if you guess correctly. If no one guesses the answer after the fourth note, I’ll either try to come up with additional tea names for clues, or will at that point provide further hints. Feel free to guess at any time — you don’t need to wait for subsequent notes. To start you off, in addition to the name of this tea, I will tell you that the fact that this is structured as a mystery game is no accident.
Now, for the first tea (in case you’re actually here to find out what German Breakfast is like).
In the sample packet, it smells delicious — very aromatic black teas in this. It’s roasty and earthy and has a hint of sweetness. The leaves are small and I can see some tips in there.
The aroma of the tea is sweet and malty. It smells smooth. Very inviting. It’s a medium/dark black tea colored liquor. Reddish more than orange.
Yum. It’s billed as T&H’s strongest breakfast blend, but at 3 minutes of steeping it’s very tasty without any additives. I don’t feel I’m being slapped around. More like forcefully coaxed into wakefulness. It has an interesting mouthfeel similar to what I found in the Yunan from LeafSpa. It’s thick in a similar way, but not quite as thick as the Yunan.
There’s a bright, almost bubbly note to it from the darjeeling that gives it the illusion of being less full bodied than I think it is. I’m starting to think of the word “perky” when I taste darjeeling. But the taste is mellower and without the distinctive darjeeling flavor that can tend toward the sharp. This is rounder and softer. I wouldn’t call it sweet, but it tends that way, and tends even more that way in the aftertaste. A malty, grainy sweetness.
This will get into at least a semi-final breakfast blend round. I could see it going all the way.
