This is part of the Adagio flavored white sampler. It sounded light and refreshing, and I’m hot and irritable, so I am giving it a try.
I’m using the Adagio-suggested time and temperature.
The dry leaf mixture smells like… um…er… something I haven’t smelled since college. (Yeah, that’s the ticket.) The leaves are big and dark with silver tips and there are chunky bits of what looks like citrus peel in among them.
The liquor is champagne colored. The aroma has a definite grapefruit note over a dewy, floral undercurrent.
I quite liked the Adagio grapefruit oolong so I was hopeful this would be a keeper as well. The jury’s still out, though. I’m not discounting it, but on this first tasting I’m not quite sure what to make of this. I’m wondering if perhaps my palate wasn’t clear enough to judge. I had the aftertaste of having chewed a fruity gum a couple of hours previously still on my tongue but I didn’t think it was strong enough to make a difference, but I forgot how shy white teas can be.
This one is quite shy. It has flavor, but the flavor is a mix of a sort of earthy white and some undefined other aspect that isn’t clearly grapefruit, though it isn’t clearly not. I recall the oolong version having a much more pronounced grapefruit flavor.
This fit the bill for a hot day, but I’m not sure it’s tremendously better than the plain Adagio white peony, which in turn wasn’t at the top of my list. I’m not averse to trying this one a few more times to see whether it grows on me, but if I had to pick now I wouldn’t run out and buy more.
