Mellow Monk

Yesterday I started the weekend with decadence, today I went with something a bit simpler. That, and I need to use up my green tea before it’s shelf life ends. As usual, I used water that was putting off steam, but only just, which usually results in a very pleasant sweet tea. Today was no exception, with the first infusion being a perfect sweet grass and vegetables. Hopefully the next infusion will be just as good.

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OMG! Yesterday I didn’t know how little of this I had left and ended up finishing it! OH NO!!!!! I savored every minute tho! This is GRAND! I went thru a lot of it and FAST tho! I miss this already! I had 4 cups tho! SIPDOWN and BACKLOG :)

I am not a great drinker of green teas, but I am trying more each day to see how my preferences may alter!

I got this in a box of samples and must say it’s pretty tasty. The initial aroma of the liquor was a little overpoweringly like fresh seaweed, so I let my cup set a moment before proceeding much. As it cooled slightly, the scent was less pervasive and the flavor of the tea itself became more to my taste!

It’s a very solid, general green tea. It is lightly vegetal but not overpowering in any flavor. It’s definitely a mellow brew, and that suits me right now! I’m trying to determine where to draw the line between “grassy” and “seaweedy” in flavor, but this sort of balances between the two for me.

Not my favorite tea, as I don’t drink green teas with much frequency as I noted. But it definitely is going to be considered whenever I am in the mood for a mild flavored tea.

I really love this…can you tell? Anyhow…first two cups of the day! Backlogging. See other notes

Backlogging 3 lovely cups from the start of my day today…see previous notes :)

A delicious and wonderful sencha. Not-too-intensely vegetal (cooked greens) in the first infusion, slightly less vegetal with a hint of stringency in the second, and pleasantly astringent in the third. A great value indeed for the price!

First infusion – 5g. per 8 oz. water, 65 deg., 50 sec.

Second infusion – 5g. per 8oz. water, 60 deg., 1 min.

Third infusion – 5g. per 8 oz. water, 55 deg., 10 min.

Interesting tea, as it is my first guricha. Honeyed & fruity sweetness in the first brew, mildly astringent in the second. A pleasant tea, very mild, and great value for the price.

Had to really struggle to get the best out of this, however. Settled on 2 brews —everything after that was of no value to me. Brewed it as a cross between a Chinese green and a straight sencha.

First infusion — 3g per 8 oz. water, 65 deg., 1 min.

Second infusion — 3g per 8oz. water, 65 deg., 10 min.

I’m not actually sure what the water temperature was, as my dad had just recently made tea, and the water had been sitting for a bit by the time I got there…

Anyway, The only thing to note so far is that the tea isn’t as sweet as usual, and the grassiness is surprisingly subdued.

Again, my dad has been monopolizing the teapot today, so the water was most likely too warm for the second (and last) infusion. This time the tea was a bit astringent, where normally this tea does not demonstrate this flavor at this stage. Regardless, it’s still a very goo tea, and better than two of my other senchas.

For more information, see my previous notes on this tea.

The best of the three I’ve tried!

Delightful! Thank you to TeaEqualsBliss for sending me a bit of this tea. Its one of the nicest Guricha teas I’ve tasted. It tastes so sweet and mild and smooth. An earthy taste to it, but not too strong, I would classify the earthiness as more of a vegetative earthiness. It has a pleasant nutty flavor to it too.

A very nice tea indeed.

I did a bit of an experiment today, and brewed this at a really low temperature to see what happens. The aroma of the tea was softer than usual, and it was actually more pleasing as it wasn’t overpowering.

The taste of the first infusion was perfect. There was no astringency, no bitterness, and only a hint of grassiness in the taste. Truly this is a prime example of a Sencha.

The second infusion was a flash infusion, steeped for 30 seconds, and was very similar to the first, but the taste of the tea was a bit mellower, with the grassiness fading further. The third infusions was actually bordering on being sweet while still having a touch of grassiness. This was also a flash infusion, but it still produced excellent results.

The fourth and fifth infusions were very mellow, with no grassiness and were sweeter than previous infusions. The taste became very generic during the fifth infusion, which signaled the end of the session.

I think that the bottom line of this little experiment, is that this tea benefits greatly from brewing at low temperature and with short infusions. This resulted in a fantastic tea, which was even better than I remembers, and which certainly earned it’s top place among my teas.

Black Tea ZEN in a cup! So unique – hard to compare to others…see previous notes…YUM! Upping AGAIN :)

This green tea is fantastic. Great flavor!

So good. This tea always puts a smile on my face – especially on a cold morning. During the second and third steeps I tend to taste a slightly salty flavor. I’m not quite sure what it is but I like it.

Too tired to do a good review (local time is 12:39 am), but the tea was great, was just as good as I remember it. Got a lot of infusions out of it, and the way the taste changed throughout the steepings was interesting and delicious. Got sweeter during the last two infusions, which was interesting and refreshing when compared to many green teas I’ve had. Hopefully I won’t be too busy tomorrow, and me review will actually be substantive.

Backlogging 7 cups of this liquid gold throughout today…YES…SEVEN…

One of the smoothest Japanese style tea’s I’ve ever had. No astringent or bitter taste to it at all. This is a good staple to have in your stash to get your Japanese tea fix.

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I got this tea as a birthday gift, and I couldn’t wait to try it out. I saw that a lot of people had a lot of good things to say about it, so I must admit that I was rather excited.

After the first steeping, which was 2 mins. long, I found it interesting how it smelled grassier (is that even a word?) than my Yamakai Sencha. It also tasted a bit grassier, but that was restricted to being an undertone which enhanced the vegetative flavors. What was really nice about the flavor was the it was subtle, and I couldn’t identify the exact flavors (with the exception of the grass and a vague sense of “vegetable”), and it made for a nice tea to sip while stuck inside due to weather. All in all, I’m rather glad that I have a whole bag of this, as it is officially my new favorite tea.

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Starting my day with this…YUMMO!
See previous notes

I agree with TeaEqualsBliss – this tea has a buttered veggies kind of taste which I personally enjoy quite a bit. Delicious.

Started my day with 3 cups of this! AWESOME! See previous notes…