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I have lots of ironing and house straightening to do today, spent yesterday morning with son getting his wisdom tooth out, and really wanted today to be extra relaxing and special even with so much holiday clean up to do. I knew I wanted a green or white tea so I could make the big tetsubin full and keep it over a warmer and keep refilling all day. I don’t have time sit and coddle a oolong, which I love to do. Maybe later…

As I pawed through my tea box, I discovered a sample I had not opened yet. Gads, how could this be?

This is a great fit for what I wanted today. It is a very subtle tea and I must say I think Tabby’s description was spot on. After the sip, there is a taste like fine frost. Anyone here remember freezers that got a layer of fine ice crystals? And everyone told the kids we were going to die of food poisoning or something if we kept eating it? It is also a taste I get from ice when I get severely anemic, but that is the only time I taste it, and crave ice. I bought an ice shaver years ago because I got so addicted to the taste of ice before we found out what the problem was. Take iron, and alas, ice is just ice.

Well, here is something that is warm and ever so slightly nutty on the way down, and afterwards fills your head with the freshness of frost melting off of the most pristine spring grass you could imagine.

Thank you, Teavivre and Angel Chen for the opportunity to try this!

I am drinking this again, partly because I just couldn’t stop thinking about it and partly because I am enjoying using my new tea set so much! This is the strongest white tea I have ever tasted, much more like a wulong and with some of the mineral qualities I find in puer sometimes. Here is the tea set:
http://purepuer.com/puer_tea/do/product/taiwan%20ceramic/Oval%20Bone%20White%20Tea%20Set

I just resteeped the leaves from two a.m. to go with my lunch of Asian ginger green beans and ramen noodle soup with veggies. This is so very good. It still has good presence and I am going to resteep again. I must, MUST keep this tea on hand.

By the by, the little dingo we are fostering has been a treasure and has been very sweet to friends, neighbors, children…but apparently our ceiling fan is evil and must be run off. Lunch was accentuated by her running in the den, barking ferociously, spinning and fleeing the room, and running back again…live to fight another day, I guess.

My neighbor surprised with a tin of this for Christmas. Wow! I have never seen tea quite like this! There are lots of stems, as is common in tea from Taiwan, but the leaves look like they could have been raked from your yard just minutes ago! Dry fall leaves, not soft newly fallen ones.

The steeped tea has a stronger aroma than the dry leaves. One feels like saying, “This can’t possibly be white tea!”. Since I have never had it before, I looked at several companies offerings of it. They all looked like this one, and it was noted that it is the strongest, most flavorful white tea. There is nothing subtle about this cup. It is delicious and arresting. There is a strong, lovely mineral quality, all smoothness and no astringency. This white tea shares many characteristics with some of the really fabulous oolongs.

What a delightful surprise! I will definitely be keeping this type of tea on hand.

Last year, my hubby gave me the bamboo tea tray from this company for Christmas. This year, I received two of their tea sets to use with it.

I must say this set is more beautiful in person than in the pictures, and I loved it in the pictures! The finish is so smooth, the color a bone white, and the lines and contours are captivating. Furthermore, it is perfect for making my oolong and white teas. Since it is ceramic I can use it with more than one kind of tea, while my Yixing set will be reserved for oolong. I absolutely love it, and can not say enough about their great customer service and how much time they took helping my hubby choose pieces of teaware and puer tea, acting as if it was their greatest privilege and joy to do so. They are truly tea lovers.

I hope this works! Here is a link to the set, which is showing as sold out right now.
http://purepuer.com/puer_tea/do/product/taiwan%20ceramic/Oval%20Bone%20White%20Tea%20Set

My oldest daughter bought me this tea for Christmas, along with Charlotte Au Chocolat. There were three samples in the box as well. I am not sure if they were ordered or are compliments of Dammann Freres. The bottom line…this tea was worth waiting for. It is smooth and delicious, refined and artfully blended.

The dry leaves are beautiful with the blue flower petals and poppies. The aroma is so nice. This is magnificent tea. It must be for me to break down and make a cup at two in the morning…

Hooray! Sampling lots of Christmas tea today. When I opened the pouch the first thing I noticed was that the dry leaves smell sweet and mildly fruity. It is earthy but not fishy at all. I have never smelled a quite like this before, but I have also never had anything with osmanthus.

The steeped tea is also mild and earthy and there is a nice mineral taste. This is very good, it is reminding a lot more of the puer from Teavivre and not at all of the puer from Southern Season. My oldest daughter, who just started drinking green tea for its benefits even though she doesn’t care for tea, likes this pretty well and is on her second cup. O.O. She hates black tea.

I have made s second steep. I will post how well it held up when we finish this pot. Delicious! Many thanks to my wonderful hubby who ordered this for me!

Now that we are afraid to go to our Chinese buffet because they started using MSG and gave hubby a horrible migraine, I decided to try to make some of our favorite things at home. Tonight I made Chinese green beans with ginger and garlic, and faux lomein. Don’t ask. Okay, it was Ramen noodles but I made my own sauce and added lots of water chestnuts because I LOVE them.

I wanted a good, authentic green tea for after my meal, and as I went through my box of samples from Teavivre I found this! Ad I am so glad I did!

The dry leaves were soft and fluffy like Zhen Qu Super China Black, an excellent tea. I didn’t read the directions and steeped for three minutes since I was not brewing gong fu style. It is very good.
Even exceeding the recommended limit as much as I did, this was smooth and there was no bitterness.

I am astounded at K S’ description of Cheerios on the front of the sip. Absolutely! Nail on the head! And so forth. :) A lovely grain flavor at the beginning, and instead of picking up floral, I am getting light buttery taste. Another great tea from Teavivre. Thank you, Angel and Teavivre!

This was the final tea for tea party yesterday. I can’t wait to open the new tin and see how the newer harvest compares to this one!

Jacqueline requested pics of the dingo and pups. I hope I did this right!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24998856@N06/6555735065/in/photostream/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24998856@N06/6555735753/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24998856@N06/6555736171/in/photostream/