Not sure why, but the inside of my mouth is feeling a little sore. I hope I’m not getting sick. I felt a little achy yesterday, I was really dragging on my run today (of course it was ridiculously hot which could have something to do with it) and I know there’s something going around. The 4 year old was visited by the puke fairy Sunday night. Neither of my kids are big pukers, thankfully, so I’m hoping it was the stomach virus I’m told is on the loose around here. And I’m hoping I don’t get it.
This is my last TeaFrog sample from both sample orders and so something of a milestone. I just placed my order for those things from both sample sets that I liked enough to get more of and I didn’t put this on the list. But now I’m second guessing myself. Initially I didn’t think it was anything special, but then again I don’t think I’m tasting it properly because of my mouth issue. I will say that as I sit here typing, I’m finding the aftertaste from the second steep of this really wonderful. It’s sweet, almost sugary, with a very light, very subtle essence of slightly roasty vegetable that almost isn’t there.
I love the way this looks, too. The eyebrows are adorable. Like tiny green commas; almost like green caraway seeds. I can’t smell the dry tea because of the fruit smell-impregnated sample packet. But I’m having a lot of fun looking at it.
I’ve experimented with different times on this one. I started at 1:30, then went down to 1 for a resteep. Then with the rest of the sample I started at 2. All at 175 degrees.
Right now I’m drinking the 2 minute steep. The liquor is pale yellow, basically clear, with some visible solute but not nearly as much as I typically see in sencha, for example. It smells delicately and sweetly vegetal with a dab of butter and an interesting almost floral note.
At two minutes I’m getting a flavor that seems like it would be due to the pan fried nature of the leaves, or perhaps I’m just projecting. But it’s a lightly carmelized vegetal flavor with something dusky at the finish.
The deliciousness of this tea, I’m discovering, isn’t necessarily immediately apparent. I almost wrote it off because it didn’t have a strong initial flavor. I was thinking, oh no, one of those green teas that is indistinguishable from plain hot water. But as it turns out, the lack of seriously strong vegetal flavor initially (reminiscent of drinking the run off from your steamed vegetables at dinner) is part of the charm of this tea and there is a lot of flavor if you’re patient enough to linger over it.
Dammit. I wish I had stuck this in my order. Now I’ll have to wait until I have enough reorders to merit free shipping, and since I just ordered pretty much everything else I like of TeaFrog’s that is bound to take a while. Sigh.
Sorry about this missed order opportunity — I hate it when that happens :(