Camellia Sinensis
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I placed a small order with Camellia Sinensis because I was interested in some of their herbals, namely Wintergreen, Labrador Tea and Taïga Sauvage.
Following a wake-up, chest-clearing mug of Juniper Ridge’s Yerba Santa, I had time for only 1 steep of this tea from Bhutan. According to Camellia Sinensis, this tea comes from the only tea production in Bhutan which is led by an all-women cooperative. Always keeping my eye out for unique teas, I couldn’t resist ordering a sample of the July 2020 harvest.
I prepared the tea close to package directions, using more tea than 2 teaspoons because the leaves do not rest uniformly in a teaspoon. I went for my standard-as-of-late measurement of 1g/100mL for green, white, and black teas prepared western style.
The tea is very clean and smooth. It sits well in my empty stomach. The taste evokes lightly buttered sauteed sweet green cabbage. There is an interesting minerality which Camellia Sinensis refers to as seashells and I think I can agree with that — calcium. A vague feeling, not taste, of smokey, earthy bitterness sits deep within the liquor. A spicy feeling sits only in the chest, something I could equate to the warmth of Saigon cinnamon, but like the smokey bitterness, it’s not a taste. A second steep when I came home for lunch brought forward lime-like and bright green olive impressions.
Overall, this is an exceptionally smooth green tea with an interesting profile that reminds me of sheng puerh. It covers a satisfying and nuanced range of flavors and impressions between sweet, vegetal, umami, mineral, citrus, bitter-smoke and warming spice. As I was just now browsing to purchase a larger quantity, the tea is now out of stock only 2 weeks after placing my order.
Preparation
Gongfu!
Steeped this up in a bunch of panda themed teaware as my pre-commute session! This is such a beautifully soft and buttery oolong with notes of fresh coconut, white Spring flowers, and just a hint of vegetal spinach. Really delicate in taste but with such a rich feeling liquor; an excellent way to ease into the day!
Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/CqDnTBFOZee/
Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJCg8HIWKTY
Gongfu!
Somehow I ended up picking a tea last weekend that capitalized on both the trains I seem to be riding right now: oolong teas and thing that taste like butter. It’s so buttery and creamy and the texture from steep tea steep is so soft and rich. Love the florals that crop up in this tea and the slight green banana undertones of some of the mid steeps. Got many, many steeps out of this one!
Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/CMaV-biAxSz/
Also – I need to get in the habit of using this pot more because it’s such a beauty!!
Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8n3Yo-4ofM8&ab_channel=Syence
So this past weekend my friend Marika and I started recording for our podcast! Ahh! I’m so excited, but also everything just felt soooo real! I have a nice backlog of tasting notes, aside from my normal tasting queue, that are completely podcast related – I’ll post them whenever the episodes start airing…
This was what I was drinking while we recorded our intro episode though! Jin Shuan is one of the teas that Marika and I had our first big, long nerdier conversation over when we were first getting to know each other – so it was kind of a nod to that connection, which has now grown into this cool endeavor we’re doing together! I’m excited to share that with everyone here on Steepster – well everyone who has an interest anyway, haha.
Flavors: Butter, Cream, Creamy, Floral, Flowers, Freshly Cut Grass, Green
Sipping on this one now and just… wow.
I think I really needed this tea today – it’s got that perfect sweet floral quality mixed with notes of honey, crisp rain water, and fresh garden peas. Really consistent with a gentle astringency. The weather has felt a bit like a ping pong game lately, and I’m missing having tea outside. It’s worse because it feels like that reality is soooo close to happening again. However, this cup is capturing that feeling for me and, truly, it helps.
From yesterday’s #SeptemberSipdown prompt…
The prompt was to drink a tea sourced from India, and my first thought was that I definitely had options but nothing I was super excited about – and then I remember I had this fucking INCREDIBLE Darjeeling that I could make! So I had a cup of this for the prompt, and just marveled in the delicious fresh and sweet Spring florals and sugar snap pea flavours that took me back to crisp and cool summer mornings helping my Grandma in her garden after an evening thunderstorm. So nostalgic!
So, I’m not a huge Darjeeling person – although I don’t mind one every now and then. I do have a preference for 2nd Flush though, typically. However, this specific Darjeeling from this year’s harvest has been recommended to me so many times this summer by the people in my MTL tea circle who are Darjeeling drinkers that I just HAD to go and get some!
Firstly – let me just start by saying that from the moment I smelled the dry leaf I felt like I got the hype! You get that tickle in your nose from all the tea dander/down that you’re inhaling and it’s so incredibly fresh and aromatic. Like sweet peas fresh from the garden and summer flowers, like peony. I could tell it was going to be really good!
And, well, it is! The taste is almost identical to what the dry leaf smelled like. On the greener end of the spectrum, but refreshing and sweet garden pea/snow pea with fresh Spring florals of peony, lilac, and lily. It’s a touch malty, a touch spicy, and just a little bit astringent but mostly in lives in that zone of refreshing vegetal and floral notes. It’s a bit atypical for what I personally like in a darjeeling (which is more of that muscatel note, though I do like floral flavours) but I’m digging it!!
Reaaallllyyyy impressed with this year’s harvest!
This is the final tea review from my big Camellia Sinensis purchase in 2018. (I repurchased the Gyokuro Okkabe and Feng Huang Hong Cha, but I’ve already reviewed these teas.) Camellia Sinensis regularly stocks three Dong Dings: Mr. Chang, Mr. Nen Yu, and Ms. Lin. The last of these is more often out of stock than available, so I decided there must be something to it. I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 195F for 25, 20, 25, 30, 30, 30, 45, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.
The dry aroma is of char, roast, honey, flowers, and plums. The wet leaves in the teapot smell like charcoal and roast, which makes me wonder why I have such a penchant for buying roasted teas that I can’t appreciate. The first steep has notes of roasted grain, honey, plum, caramel, wood, and roast. The plum becomes more pronounced in the second steep, and I also get orchid, other flowers, roasted walnuts, charcoal, and cream. The next couple steeps are more roasty, with roasted nuts, walnuts, honey, baked bread, roast, wood, and charcoal predominating and some florals and plum in the background. The tea is starting to get drying in the mouth. As expected, the session becomes increasingly focused on the roast and ends with charcoal, roast, wood, roasted nuts, earth, and minerals.
I understand why this Dong Ding gets snapped up so quickly. While it’s a little too roasted for me, I love its sweet, toasty, slightly fruity profile and think it would be a great tea for fall or winter.
Flavors: Bread, Caramel, Char, Cream, Earth, Floral, Grain, Honey, Mineral, Orchid, Plum, Roasted, Roasted Nuts, Walnut, Wood
Preparation
This is part of my huge 2018 haul from Camellia Sinensis. All of you know my fondness for bug-bitten teas, and based on my rave review of their Bai Hao, I thought I’d like their Guei Fei as well. I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 25, 20, 25, 30, 30, 30, 45, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.
The dry aroma is of intense honey, flowers, and stewed fruit. The first steep has notes of honey, baked bread, flowers, sweet apple, and other stewed fruits. (Camellia Sinensis says “red fruits,” which I kind of agree with.) A tart berry note emerges in steep two. The tartness, stewed fruits, flowers, and, most of all, the honey characterize the next couple steeps. This is definitely a dessert tea. The honey and baked bread just keep getting stronger in the fifth and sixth rounds. Sadly, I don’t notice any cinnamon, which both Roswell Strange and the website point out. The flavours become slightly attenuated as the session ends, although the honey and red fruit are still present. The final steeps have a bit of astringency and are somewhat vegetal.
This is a sweet, luxurious Guei Fei that’s easy to drink. Though it lacks the complexity of the Bai Hao, this is kind of expected given the nature of this type of oolong. I’ve had a lot of bug-bitten oolongs recently and the flavours have become somewhat predictable, but this oolong executes them very well.
Flavors: Apple, Berries, Bread, Floral, Honey, Red Fruits, Stewed Fruits, Tart, Vegetal
Preparation
I bought this tea in 2018 because it was recommended as being fruity. I was a bit skeptical since this is a Wuyi oolong, but I decided to go for it. (I believe a 15% off sale was involved.) I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 195F for 7, 10, 12, 15, 18, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.
The dry aroma is of strawberries, grain, honey, and roast. The first steep has notes of honey, walnuts, grain, wood, roast, and flowers. There’s an indistinct fruity aftertaste. In the second steep, I get peach, raisin, and strawberry, along with more roasted nuts, honey, grain, and wood. The floral notes become more prominent in the next couple steeps, but honestly, this is still mainly about the wood, nuts, and roast. I don’t get any spice, as Roswell Strange did. The tea doesn’t change much over the session, fading to wood, minerals, nuts, honey, and roast near the end.
While this tea doesn’t really change my mind about Wuyi oolongs, it indeed has some fruity elements. I enjoyed how smooth and sweet it is and won’t have trouble finishing the bag.
Flavors: Floral, Grain, Honey, Mineral, Peach, Raisins, Roasted, Roasted Nuts, Strawberry, Walnut, Wood
Preparation
Oh, Leafhopper. Yours is the only note on my dashboard. It’s like the internet gods have picked you!
Also, I am intrigued by strawberry note tea.
Ya, earlier today the Dashboard was just completely missing… now it just seems to not be loading anything in the history that was prior to this note.
Yes, I was surprised when this review showed up on my dashboard and assumed it wouldn’t appear on anyone else’s. Glad that notes are starting to be posted again. The strawberry flavour in the tea is kind of faint and mostly consists of sweetness.
Gongfu!
As always, I found this session settled into the familiar and comforting notes of pine sap, rosemary, and cedar that I just adore from yabao but with a beautiful freshness and lighter body and liquor than the shou pu’erh I generally turn to for those resinous forest-y notes. Both are good, but I’m suuuuppperr guilty of wanting to have a couple different options in my tea stash so I can match to my mood – and this was perfection!
Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/Chpn6LcpoF-/
Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3cMfzxH3ys
Grandpa Style!
I took a sick day on Thursday because I hadn’t slept in like twenty four hours and I was on day two of a migraine that just would not quit. I spent most of the day curled up in bed waiting for it to stop without much tea drinking – but I did indulge in some of this tea during the late afternoon and that helped a little bit. There was just something very peaceful about the smooth notes of cedar, rosemary, pine, and corn silk.
Gongfu!
I have such a soft spot for Yabao, and the kombucha that CS carries made from this tea is just mind blowing so I thought it was probably about time I picked some up to have as LLT…
Gongfu has gotten a bit away from me over the last two busy weeks but making time for it and sitting down with this tea was very meditative & relaxing for me – even if it was later in the evening than I would normally have a tea session like this!! These beautiful, funky little buds are smooth, slightly lemony and very herbaceous tasting – with prominent rosemary/pine sap and cedar kind of notes. Delish!!
Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/CDFTE4Cgzsk/
Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpeRTXhJbms
I bought this back in 2018 based on the catalogue description. I have a well-known weakness for Mi Xiang black teas—and anything else with pronounced honey and fruity flavours. I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 195F for 10, 12, 15, 18, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.
The dry aroma is of honey, malt, stonefruit, and muscatel. The first steep has notes of honey, malt, cookies, wood, nectarine, blood orange, and muscatel. The second steep adds plums, apricots, brown sugar, and additional malt. The tea is a bit drying in the mouth. In the third to sixth steeps, the plum, apricot, and muscatel notes get stronger and the tea has a typical Mi Xiang profile. The final rounds feature honey, malt, wood, tannins, faint plum, earth, and minerals.
Compared to the Mi Xiang Hong Cha from Cha Yi that I drank a few days ago, this tea has more pastry notes and a wider variety of fruit, but the flavour peters out more quickly. This could be due to the fact that this tea is two years old now. Honestly, though, this is a minor fault and I’d be happy to drink either of these teas.
Flavors: Apricot, Blood Orange, Brown Sugar, Cookie, Earth, Honey, Malt, Mineral, Muscatel, Plum, Stonefruit, Tannin, Wood
Preparation
I bought this in 2018 to compare it with the fresh spring Mi Lan Xiang. I wish I’d added it to the database then, as it’s been taken off the Camellia Sinensis website. Since I don’t have a catalogue description, I can’t say whether this is an aged version of their regular Mi Lan Xiang or a different iteration of this Dan Cong. I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 195F for 7, 10, 12, 15, 18, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.
The dry aroma is of roast, char, honey, wood, and faint guava. The first steep has well-integrated notes of honey, roast, barley, orchid, guava, wood, and roasted nuts. The second steep adds lychee and hops. Far from being only in the aftertaste, these flavours present themselves up front as well. They continue in the next couple steeps, and I also get a hint of orange. The char and roast become more prominent in steep five, but not to the point that they obscure the honey, guava, lychee, and orchid. Wood and incense appear in steep seven, and the roast gets stronger, though it’s still not overpowering. The persistence of the signature honey orchid flavours is amazing. The session ends predictably with honey, roast, and minerals.
If this is indeed an older version of the same tea, which seems likely given that some flavours are found in both, it represents a marked improvement. The roast level is about the same, but rather than hiding around the edges, the honey, fruit, and floral notes are front and centre. If I hadn’t read the labels, I’d have pegged this as the newer Dan Cong. I’m glad I had the chance to compare these two teas, and will keep an eye out for older Dan Congs in the future.
Flavors: Char, Floral, Grain, Guava, Honey, Hops, Lychee, Mineral, Orange, Orchid, Roast Nuts, Roasted, Roasted Barley, Wood
Preparation
Just posting here because it’s the most recent post in my dashboard – but is anyone else having issues posting notes now/their dashboard stuck? Both VariaTEA and I tried writing notes today and the note appears to “post” but then the tasting note isn’t visible on the dash/our personal tea logs/or the specific tea page… Definitely not what usually happens when posting a tasting note glitches…
Yep, this is also my most recent tasting note showing on the dashboard.
tea-sipper, do you mind trying to post a tasting note to see if you have the same issue?
I posted a tasting note about an hour ago and it doesn’t appear on the dashboard, only my tealog
When I click on YOUR tealog, the last one I see is Banofee
…Welp, I tried posting about the issue on the discussion board and the same thing happened – comment appear to “post” but then it neither appeared in the thread and the discussion thread also didn’t get bumped back up to the first one on the board…
So it’s quite possible that comments are the only thing posting right now?
Also not seeing e-mail notifications for any comments on tasting notes that I liked.
@tea-sipper – I wrote Banoffee yesterday before whatever is happening started happening; the last one I attempted to write was for Keemun Congfu…
This seems too consistent across multiple users to be one of the weird glitches the only affects a few people, and inconsistently. I wonder if it’s the result of Adagio attempting to fix something??
Fingers crossed it’s a short lived issue & we get back to normal quickly.
Well, I wrote a message to the Steepster FB page but I don’t know if it’s being monitored anymore and, if so, by who…
Everybody’s notes are showing up in /recent. The last to show up on my dashboard is this one, posted 15 hours ago. In /discuss, the last thread to show as being active was 16 hours ago.
I guess it’s good they’re not totally lost? That’s weird though – in seven years I don’t think I’ve ever seen this happen, especially with the discussion board too. The dashboard, years back when Jason was still actively supporting the site, used to “freeze” occasionally but IIRC the recent section always froze with it & it never affected the DB at the same time…
I just posted a reply to a thread in /discuss. It posted but did not update to the first page, nor did it show in the Recent Activity tab on my dashboard. The last update in my Recent Activity tab was 16 hours ago, and in my Notices tab 2o hours ago. It looks like there was a big bot thread bump 20 hours ago, and it seems the offender was deleted. I wonder if all of the issues are related to that massive bump.
Hm, now my post to the thread is missing.
And now user reviews in /recent are missing.
I think some of us should have grabbed Michael @ Adagio’s e-mail before this happened. haha
derk My posts to the discussion board, responding to Arby appeared to be posted but they are nowhere to be seen. The last tea reviews I see under ‘recent’ are 7 hours old. I thought the board was oddly slow today…
Just popping in here to say I’m having the same issues with my tasting notes from last night. Also, this is the most recent post on my dashboard (from 17 hours ago). White Antlers – I did see your post to Arby a few minutes ago, but now it has disappeared.
I’m having the same issues. This is the most recent post on my dashboard, I wrote a review that hasn’t shown up in my tealog, and my reply to a discussion thread posts but doesn’t show up. Seems like Steepster is definitely broken.
Shae Weird. Just weird.
I posted a note this morning. It was a little dodgy then seemed to go through. It is on my tealog but never made it here.
Ashmanra, after you mentioned it, I saw the note in your tealog but not on my dashboard. I hope they can sort out these issues.
ashmanra If it’s the note for Huang Jin Gui, it’s up. I see it. Posted 6 hours ago.
LuckyMe’s tasting note for a baozhong oolong is now the last tasting note on /recent. Everything else posted after that has disappeared. I checked on my phone which has never been logged into Steepster, and while logged in on my laptop.
Same on my Kindle and lap top. That last tasting note was 17 hours ago. Odd, though…when I click on ashmanra’s name, I see her last tasting note from 7 hours ago.
Yep, Huang Jin Gui was posted this morning! That is the last one I have done, but it doesn’t show up anywhere but my tealog.
I just successfully posted another review, only to have it not show up on my tealog or dashboard. Weirdly, the submitted review said I had 208 notes, which would be accurate if the two reviews I posted today showed up (my tealog says I have 206 notes). Hopefully this means they’re in the database and will appear eventually.
Mine is stuck too. 15 hours behind.
Same problem here. My posts and tasting notes since the past 24 hours have stopped showing. Frustrating…
a day ago… last tasting note :/
Damn, I was really hoping to wake up this morning to a functional site…
Same here. This is frustrating!
Same. I’m hoping Michael, or whoever else might be running the site, looks at it this week. Michael said in one of the discussion threads that we should see upgrades next month. I’m really hoping that doesn’t mean that they aren’t planning on working on Steepster until August.
Yup – I’m not sure who to email about the issue. I already reached out on FB, but my message hasn’t been read yet (and I don’t know if anyone monitors the FB account anymore). I guess one option COULD be Jason? He could potentially redirect to Adagio/Michael – but I’m feeling conflicted on whether that’s an appropriate ask since he’s no longer the site owner. Isn’t that a big like asking your old manager who has since resigned to call the current manager to complain about an issue with your schedule? It’s not his problem anymore…
I submitted an e-ticket using the “contact us” button at the bottom of the discussions page. If the site has legally changed hands that should go to the new admin. Other than that, I don’t know what to do.
Personally, I wouldn’t reach out to Jason. Not his site, not his problem.
I tried to find a phone number or email address for Adagio’s head office, but with no luck. Maybe try to message them on social media?
I’ve been in the middle of the “updating the database” project, and those pages are also stuck. That is, after I edit a page, it says the tea page is updated, but shows the old tea page, without the updates. If I click “Edit” again, however, the page I’m given to edit has all the edits I just made… they just aren’t showing on the public website anywhere.
Here, I did my librarian thing and this is Michael’s contact info, for anyone who wants it:
Media contact:
Michael Cramer
e-mail: [email protected]
Marketing Manager
(973) 253-7400 ext.111
Thank you always for your librarian skills, Mastress Alita. :D
Librarians are awesome. :) Both of my sisters are librarians, and I jokingly call them Google1 and Google2.
Mastress Alita, this is great! Has anyone contacted Michael, and is there an update?
Can’t believe we’re still frozen – this might be the longest freeze ever in Steepster history…
What’s curious is that nothing in this thread about the freeze can be seen on the front page where this tea note is featured.
Never mind, Leafhopper isn’t one of the featured people anymore. :/
Ooh, I’m glad I made it to the front page of Steepster, if only temporarily. :) Has anyone gotten a response from Michael?
I haven’t received a reply yet. Also, it was a tea note from three days ago, not this one. :) I should be slower to speak.
Thank you Mastress Alita.
Veronica, whichever note it was, I’m still happy! Too bad there hasn’t been a response. I hope this isn’t a sign of things to come.
Leafhopper, absolutely! Your tasting notes are awesome, and you’ve been on the front page a few times that I’ve seen. I just don’t want to spread false information. There’s enough problems here without me adding to them.
I totally understand. Let’s hope we wake up to a working Steepster tomorrow morning.
…nope :/
Can anyone else suddenly access their inbox? I’m not sure if the messages are actually going through, though. I wish Adagio would provide a service update on when the site will be working again.
No, I cannot access mine. It took me 10 minutes to log in this morning. I kept getting the 503 error.
not updating either
It’s not only US and Canada thing :/
Anyone hear anything?
I’m not the most tech-savvy person on the planet, but wouldn’t a company typically make changes in a test environment before pushing those changes to production so that there is minimal impact to the site? We do this at work and I asked my husband, who works in Technology, and he is baffled that this would even be happening. Assuming this freeze is due to Adagio’s updates, of course.
“Traveler’s log, Day 4. Still trapped in Mi Lan Xiang 2010. Still no word from the new Overlords who had repeatedly said, ‘Trust us, everything will be fine!’ Leafhopper wasn’t expecting such a rush, and the tea is running low. We’ve been abandoned to rot away in this lone tea review, the last of its kind before The Great Steepster Freeze of 2020 began. I fear soon we will grow restless and desperate enough to resort to eating each other…”
Mastress Alita, lol
LOL! Yes, we are stranded and getting restless.
Whether this is a bug they can’t fix or part of their efforts to update the server, Adagio’s failure to give us any information is very frustrating.
haha. I think something like this happened before about a year ago where things were stuck? Though not to this extent. But I remember things being stranded in the last posted tasting note. This might be something that Jason had to fix behind the scenes a lot that the new owners didn’t know about…
Yes, Steepster did periodically freeze for a few hours or even a day or so, but never for this long.
I keep checking in… Aww.
On a positive note, this tasting note now shows up in the list of the most popular notes on Steepster…
LOL! Yes, people seem to have a lot to say about this tea. :D
Plenty of brand new spam in the Discussion section.
I don’t see any spam, and the last discussion post is four days ago. Who’d have thought I’d actually want to see more recent spam posts?
Weird, Leafhopper. I logged in earlier today and there was half a page of new spam there. Some of it was just a few hours old.
here’s one from today:
What Are The Benefits Of Using Buzz B Gone?
buzzbsuper in General Tea Discussion about 4 hours ago
0 about 4 hours ago
White Antlers, now I’m getting some spam from three days ago, but nothing more recent. Steepster sure is acting weird.
It sure is, Leafhopper. I think a lot of us are seeing different things, but what we want to be seeing (and doing) still isn’t working. : P
White Antlers, I’m humbled. Thank you! I will fulfill your request.
Derk, I just looked at your tealog and saw an entry with no notes that was posted ten hours ago. I’m heartened that our reviews might still be in the database, though who knows at this point? It may be worthwhile contacting Jason if Adagio doesn’t know how to fix this bug.
Also, checking my own tealog doesn’t magically bring up the three reviews I posted since this debacle began.
Just thought I’d let you all in on some potentially happy news. Yes, at first glance everything is well behind on my end, but after some finagling, I can get some of the newer things to show up. This to me says that our posts are being saved in the database.
For instance, if I go to my Tealog, the newest item that shows up is 4 days old, but if I change the sort order to Most popular, then change it back to New, my newer tasting notes all suddenly show up :)
derk The pleasure is mine! Enjoy. : )
MandyJS, this works! I can get my last three reviews to show up. I’m glad my tasting notes are being saved.
@MandyJS – Genius! Worked for me too. I also tried this on the Discussion Board and it seems to work there as well – it gave me the chance to flag all the spam from the last four days (though w/ the weird cacheing issue it’s still showing up even after I marked it). Some of the edits I’ve made in discussions, like the Samurai TTB thread, still aren’t displaying – but it’s a start!
(And of course, once again, it’s the users finding work arounds for the glitches…)
So I just got a message back from the Steepster FB Account:
“Hi, thank you so much for letting us know. Things may be a little spotty while we begin making the transition of Steepster over to Adagio. I’ll pass this along to our team and hopefully we can get things working properly again soon”.
Anyone else get any response back?
…day six.
Yep, this is the longest time Steepster has been down since I started using the site.
All of the comments are finally showing up on the tea tasting note page (it wasn’t before for me), although the likes and comments still don’t show up on your profile.
I was wondering why there was only one note in the last days of the dashboard. I had the same issues trying to upload a note, today, 7/31/2020 2:27 PM Eastern time. So essentially, Adagio is absorbing this site and they now own it?
Adagio definitely owns it, though it’s questionable how well they’re absorbing it!
Mmmmm. Lovely. And here I was having great luck trying Wang Family Teas roasted teas and green oolongs, Whispering Pines with Lorien, and a new Georgia/Estonia company called Renegade Tea. The Renegade ones are all on the lighter end and are more grandpa style teas, but they do have some quirks.
Can I also get more background about the Adagio absorption? (I know they used to have their own site for tea notes too).
I can still post reviews and it looks like they’re being added to the database, though no one can see them. (If a tree falls in the forest without anyone hearing it, does it make a sound?) I just got six teas from Tillerman (plus a customs charge, yay!) that I’m eager to write about.
For more info about Adagio, you can look at the discussion thread called “The Future of Steepster.”
I just saw what looked like Daylon’s latest review from 2 hours ago, but maybe times and updates are still fubar…
It was mine, and I did write it 2 hours ago.
Daylon, I had to click on your profile to see the review, but it did show up. Still nothing on my dashboard since this Mi Lan Xiang review.
My Dashboard and the Discussion Boards, edits to tea entries in the database, etc. still aren’t showing up “in real time” (everything there is still showing stuff from 6 days ago, or how it appeared six days ago). Yes, there are “workarounds” to see more current postings (like going to someone’s individual tea log, switching the Discussion Board from “Recent Replies” to “Date Posted”, which really just brings up the hordes of new spam, etc.) I can still post tea reviews, but they only show up on my Tasting Notes page, not in the Dashboard. At this point I almost wonder if I should just close down Steepster and check back in a month to see if anything has finally changed. It’s getting ridiculous…
I commented on Daylon’s most recent review. The comment appeared to post but when I went back, it was gone.
Mastress Alita you might have a good idea to check back here in a month. I’ve only stuck around because I sent out some tea care packages to folks and wanted to be sure they arrived safely. I never post reviews even though I drink lots of tea every day. Maybe waiting a month and coming back will bring wonderful, happy surprises. Or so we can dream and hope…
Has anyone other than me gotten a reply back to the message they sent out?
I have a few more replies that I’ve gotten since the one I posted above – I’m not sure if I’m talking w/ Michael or someone else, but this has been through the Steepster FB account:
I asked if the delay spam accounts I’ve flagged being cleared was related to the cache errors/glitch and this was the response…
Unfortunately, the transition of the website is ongoing and proceeding less smoothly than we had expected. The damage to the original code is more pervasive than we had anticipated, but we remain optimistic about the site’s future. Please bear with us as we go through the difficult migration.
After that I asked if they could provide a rough estimate of the timeline for the remainder of the migration based on the current challenges they’ve come across and pace of the migration thus far. This was the response:
It’s really hard to say. Like I said, the issues are deeply rooted and we want to take the time to get it right. But we are working on it and hoping to get it up and running ASAP.
So it looks like what we’re all experiencing is directly related to the migration of Steepster over to Adagio. While I think some advance warning that the migration had started and could (though clearly it did) cause issues would have been VERY appreciated, Adagio is definitely aware of the problems we’re experiencing and is actively working on fixing them. No ETA on how long it will take, but it sounds like this will definitely be temporary.
Possibly related, and possibly not, for a brief moment I saw a new thread on the discussion board today called “Tea 123” and while my first impression was that it might be spam or a user trying to figure out why nothing was recent, what I actually think it might be is Adagio trying to test/trial updates relating to the migration.
The account is an old one from about ten years ago that has primarily only reviewed Adagio teas, and the only recent tasting note was an Adagio blend with the comment “Lorem Ipsum”. I don’t recognize the username at all but the hyperlink for their user profile is https://steepster.com/adagio – and whatever you first signed up your account as is the default address, so def seems like this was Adagio’s OG account from like a decade ago…
So they’re clearly trying – I’ll give ’em that.
Maybe you’re the only one who contacted them, Roswell? I didn’t want to send a rush of e-mails if others were… so thank you for doing that Roswell. Just as long as they are trying to fix the problems, I’m okay with it. I’m still drinking tea…
I didn’t contact them either. I’m glad Adagio is aware of the issues and is trying to fix them.
Discussion page has some info updated.
It’s good to see the update, though it would be nice to have an ETA.
Is there an update from Adagio on the discussion board? I’m not seeing it.
Neither do I Shae :(
you have to first find the ‘future of steepster’ thread, then go to the fourth page, where you will be able to see there is a fifth page and that’s where Michael has written a small message.
No 5th page for me on ‘Future of Steepster.’
The last post I see on this topic is Leafhopper’s inquiry about the site working on the IE platform, and that was 10 days ago.
The fifth page only shows up for me when I’m ON the fourth page.
This is what Michael wrote there:
The past two weeks had been very frustrating as our intention was to dedicate time and effort to address the many deficiencies you’d identified for us to fix. Unfortunately, this work can’t begin until we receive access to the Steepster server, which has yet to occur. We will continue to work with Steepter’s founders on finding a solution that will permit us to begin at last the task of making this website easier for all to use. Please accept my sincere apology for the unforeseen delay and your frustrations. I share them as well.
There’s going to be so much backlogging once the site is up and running again. :)
Thanks, Angrboda.
I can’t even add new tea, add or remove from my database either. Still can never respond or write in forum :P or update my profile for over a year… However, how nice to see all of you writing on this thread hehe. Thank you for all your updates!
Thank you for posting Michael’s comment here for us, Angrboda.
Steepster has been frozen for ten days now. Let’s hope Adagio gives us another update on their progress.
Well, we know a tasting note can have over 100 comments now. I’m at least grateful that I can access old tasting notes for reference while Steepster is being worked on (and the site isn’t completely missing for ten days and counting.)
Could it be? Are we fixed?? I’m getting email notifications and new notes in my feed!!
Same here, and my dashboard has updated! Amazing!
THANK YOU Steepster overlords!
Same Shae! I started to get email notifications and I knew something is happening. And now I checked, and all notes are there!
Thank you everybody involved!
Mastress Alita: that traveller’s log, lol.
Yep, that traveller’s log was great!
I bought this tea fresh in 2018 along with a 2010 version to compare it to. But as often happens with ambitious tea experiments, this one fell by the wayside. However, I thought I’d better do it while I can still use Steepster, so I unearthed these teas and am ready to drink a lot of caffeine.
I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 195F for 7, 10, 12, 15, 18, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.
The dry aroma is of honey, roast, orchid, and faint fruit. The first steep has notes of honey, roast, hops, grain, and orchid. It’s drying in the mouth, with a beautiful honey scent at the bottom of the cup. The second steep has stronger honey and roast notes, with faint lychee, wood, and what I would call green plant stems. The third and fourth steeps have honey, roast, hops, grain, and char in the foreground, with a lingering aftertaste of guava, lychee, roast, orchids, and honey.
To try and coax the complex flavours in the aftertaste into the actual tea, I lowered the temperature to 190F for the next couple steeps. This seems to have been a mistake, since though the roast is less pronounced, there’s more greenness and the honey/fruit is still not coming through. In the seventh steep, the honey and roast let some orchid, violet, grass, cream, and other florals make a faint appearance. The end of the session features roast, wood, tannins, and minerals.
Perhaps due to its age, this tea never really fulfilled the fruity and floral promise of its aroma and aftertaste. It’s quite heavily roasted, and the roast dominated the tasting experience for me. Other reviewers, who presumably had the tea when it was fresher, didn’t have the same impression, so maybe this is a consequence of two years in storage.
Flavors: Char, Cream, Drying, Floral, Grain, Grass, Guava, Honey, Hops, Lychee, Mineral, Orchid, Plant Stems, Roasted, Tannin, Violet, Wood
Preparation
When organizing my spreadsheet and tea cupboard, I realized I still had a fair number of teas from 2019 so when I couldn’t decide what to drink today, it seemed like a good idea to take one of these older teas. As none of the flavoured ones spoke to me today, I grabbed this. It’s rainy and this suits that pretty well. It’s not floral but rather more full and is giving me malt and baked good vibes. Are those supposed to be there? Are my tastebuds off because I’m still not 100%? Could be either but I’m here for it regardless! Thanks for sharing, Roswell Strange!
Had this tea, which was kindly shared with me by Roswell Strange (thank you!), while trying a Montreal style bagel company called OKO Bagels. I don’t remember the tea distinctly since my head has seemingly been out to lunch today but I do know it paired nicely with both a sesame bagel with sundried tomato cream cheese and a cinnamon sugar bagel with Canadian Maple cream cheese. Pretty good brunch!
From the start of the week prior to having this cold settle in. Something about the way I steeped this mug was even fresher and more juicy tasting than it usually is. Very peach forward in a deep, rich and ripe way with a gingery finish that seemed to reach down deep all the way the back of my chest. It was warming and cozy, while having such life and brightness.
Made an iced cup of this with some agave earlier in the week.
I drink a lot of cold brew but I actually rarely make iced tea – mostly because I don’t have a consistent way of making/storing ice at my apartment and, while I know I could come up with one, it doesn’t affect my life enough to bother. However, there was a day this week that proceeded a rain storm and a day of snow that was so sunny and warm outside that it was t-shirt weather, and on that day I felt really strongly that I wanted iced tea.
This was a good choice because it just tastes super classic! Very basic but well executed combination of semi earthy ginger (not too hot/spicy) with ripe, succulent peaches and a very brisk, malty and citrusy tannic black tea. It’s “pitcher tea” in that it’s the kind of tea you make by the gallon full to sip on in your backyard during a hot summer day or BBQ party. We’re not quite there yet in terms of summer weather, but this refreshing and balanced iced tea felt like a nod to the fact we’re approaching that turning point!
Sipped on this earlier in the day – I just filled a drawstring teabag and left it in the mug. The tea never got bitter, so big props for that! In fact, it was almost like the peach notes ended up being a little sweeter and more syrupy, while still having that nice warmth from the ginger.
Hot cuppa – even though this is part of the CS iced tea collection…
I said earlier this week that I’ve had a lot of good success lately with peach and ginger blends, and I’m including this tea in that category. It’s very juicy in terms of its peach flavour without being over the top, too sweet, or tasting artificial/like candy. It’s just natural and perfectly ripe tasting. The ginger has a hint of heat to it but is mostly warming and complimentary; something about the combo of ginger and peach gives me a Southern kind of vibe? This definitely feels like that sort of Southern “Georgia Ginger Peach” profile even though it’s named after Lisbon, haha.
One of the things I love about flavoured CS blends, too, is that as much as this is a nice and balanced ginger peach flavour it’s also a black tea and the malty sweetness and brisk, slightly astringent quality of the black tea isn’t lost either.
Yum!
Gongfu!
I brewed this up today in my new yixing pot from Umi Tea Sets, which I just wrote a review on. I spent so much of the day cleaning and running errands that sitting down this evening with some tea feels like a real treat!! Tonight I’m finding this tea is very thick with woody forest undergrowth, pine smoke, clove, and black cherry notes – full bodied and coating in the mouth. I got about six really good infusions of it.
I can totally see why it’s sold out!
Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/CCRr5gxAcyN/
Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_jWpZ6XDIc
This tea caught my eye as well when I was browsing their catalogue. Glad you had the chance to try it.
Labrador Tea! I’ll be looking that up for sure. :)