564 Tasting Notes
Resteep with the leaves from earlier. Tried it right at boiling since the leaves can handle it. Right now I’m loving that houjicha is possibly the easiest green to deal with. You can’t burn it, oversteep it, or anything else I’m always doing wrong with them (although I am slowly getting better).
This produced a stronger cup. At its strongest it’s medium-bodied and a little nutty, I really like it. I keep upping the rating but I think I’ll have to do so again.
Well… There doesn’t seem to be a way to brew this without it getting bitter. It also brews up incredibly dark for a green (darker than my last cup of houjicha), which is surprising and a little strange to me. I made a pot of this and was very careful to do a short steep and take the leaves out before they could stew, but it’s still bitter. Darn.
The flavor isn’t bad, exactly, but it’s overly floral (and this is coming from me!) and strongly bitter up front and then just sort of dies. It has a lightly sweet aftertaste but I’m not impressed.
Luckily this one is a few cups away from a sipdown, but I’ll be looking elsewhere for jasmine from now on.
Have you tried dropping the temperature to about 175 and doing a 90 sec – 2 min steep? That can cut the bitterness in green tea and reduce some of the jasmine potency
I’ll try that, thank you! It’s tolerable, I’ve just had much better jasmine teas that are less work.
Decided to make this with lunch. My tastes seem to be okay, but I can’t taste much of anything with subtle teas. Unfortunately that means most of my lovely oolongs are out, so instead I think I’ll go with some stronger greens.
This. Smells. So. Good! I can’t believe I never tried roasted teas before this year, because now they’re some of my favorites. I used about a teaspoon and a half for 8 oz. this time, with water just cooled down from boiling. It seems to be a good way to prepare this one. Deliciously roasty, very calming.
Preparation
Decided to make the rest of this sample up. I wasn’t all that impressed by it last time so I didn’t think it would be much of a loss to drink it now. Golden Moon has plenty of other teas I love.
I put honey in it this time, which I normally wouldn’t do but it’s actually good this way. It’s a very light black and has some woody and citrusy notes to it. Probably not going to be buying it, but it’s not bad at all.
Ugh. I’m seriously missing good tea at this point, but I don’t want to waste stuff I love on my confused mouth right now. This glass is iced and sweetened with agave but I honestly can’t tell the difference between it sweetened and unsweetened. Maybe I’ll mix this with juice later? There has to be some way to force my way through it.
Having a cup of this iced. It’s significantly better this way, and I’ve stopped caring about the tartness. It’s soothing my throat after the coughing I’ve been doing. I still won’t be restocking but if I’m lucky I might sip this down in the next few days.
Of course a new box came in today after my tastes started going really off! My American Tea Room stuff is here, but I’m not going to dare trying anything else new until I’m over this.
Another I liked when I was sick, and it continues to be a good sick tea. Definitely better than the obnoxious fruit blends, at least! Spicy, a little citrus-y, and a little comforting. I don’t like it as much as I used to but I don’t think it deserves as low a rating as the others even though I’m trying to get rid of it. Every time I drink it it’s slightly better than I remember, which either means I have a bad memory or the smell of the try leaf puts me off. I’m guessing it’s the smell.
Urgh! Even to my sick tastebuds this is pretty awful. I had this about a year ago when I had a raging sinus infection and it helped my throat, but now it’s so tart it could walk away and I’m not liking it. I have no clue what I’m going to do with all these bags, though… Maybe mix it with lemonade? Ice it in the summer? I still have at least 20 left.
ETA: Now have a large pitcher of this cooling in the fridge. There are 20 bags left, which means about two more pitchers. It’s marginally better iced, but I don’t think I’ll be touching hibiscus again after a few more sipdowns. Let this be an example of why not to impulse-buy tea you liked when you were sick!
If you have some plain honeybush you could try mixing that. I have used honeybush to cut the tart in herbals before.
Sadly I don’t, but I do have an apricot honeybush I’ve been wanting to use up. I may attempt a mix and see what happens, because it definitely can’t get worse.
Sipdown! At least while my tastebuds are half-dead I can get rid of some of the dreadful hibiscus teas we have lurking around the house. Also a good boost of vitamin C, which I’m not sure will help but at least it can’t hurt. If I’ve caught what my mom has it’s probably pneumonia, so I’m really hoping I didn’t catch what she has.
Considering the smell, I think this would be good mixed with limeade, chilled, in the summer. As it is I won’t be buying it again to try. I think all those Zinger teas I liked as a kid put me off hibiscus/rosehip/cranberry in tea permanently. This is too sweet (stevia? I didn’t even know until now), overly fruity, and just kind of weird, but right now it doesn’t taste too bad. In fact I’m kind of liking it. It’s like warm kool-aid, and while that shouldn’t be comforting in the least it is. Now we’ll see if I can sip anything else down.
I think I may be getting sick, and as such this resteep isn’t nearly as good as I know it can be. This has everything to do with my tastebuds and nothing to do with the tea. I’m not noticing any of the flavorings at all, just the oolong flavor; however, the oolong base is so nice that it’s still a good cup. It’s just not earth-shaking like previous steeps have been.
