Mellow Monk

My first order arrived from Mellow Monk! Do I need any more green tea? Er… ummm… well, in fact no! I just couldn’t resist once they got their new stock in.

I wanted to try this one out this afternoon, though I am a little wired already from having some gyokuro matcha with lunch. I followed the MM instructions which said to steep for 2 minutes @ 170F — I guesstimated.

There’s a TON of dried yuzu peel in this package. My cup ended up being a light yellow so I was somewhat worried about the flavor, but it’s delightful, IMO. The yuzu lends a grapfruity/lemon note and I am definitely picking up on the rose element. It’s got a lightly sweet and tart flavor and the green tea is just lending a slightly vegetal quality with a hint of berry. Hmm. This is good, I like it! Very refreshing for the afternoon. I bet this would also be good iced or mixed with some sparkling water as an apertif.

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.

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

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

Third infusion – 5 g. 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.

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

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

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 don’t care what anyone says, this is a very good and affordable sencha. I prefer the Top Leaf but when trying to save money I turn to this tea for my daily fix of Japanese tea.

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.

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.

Once again, I’m drinking a neglected Sencha and wondering why the hell I haven’t been drinking this more regularly. The first cup was made using barely steaming water, steeping the leaves for a minute since this tea is also a bit picky. The result is very sweet, with a pleasant grassy taste and subtle fruity notes, and a smooth, clean finish. I could definitely drink this every day, but sadly I’m running low, and apparently Mellow Monk is waiting on the next shipment…darn.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

This green tea is fantastic. Great flavor!

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

Drinking the last of my Top Leaf sample presently. It’s quite good. I enjoy this more than most of the sencha teas I’ve tried. It’s characteristic smoothness is very appealing. The deep grassy flavor is maximized with with almost zero astringency (at least the way I brew it: < 1 minute). It’s a very refreshing and invigorating tea for early morning drinking. First time I tried this was actually at a tea gathering with friends in the evening, and having been away from Japanese green teas for a while, I found myself at a low tolerance to their higher caffeine levels (relative to whole leaf Chinese teas) and could not get to sleep that night.

Anyway, I find this kind of tea very well suited for the morning, especially when it’s still dark out. Drinking before and during dawn is one of my favorite times for tea. It’s a liminal and contemplative time, when I feel completely free of distractions. And I’m finding the Mellow Monk teas I’ve tried to be apropos in that space. Not just anything will do here. A more astringent sencha would be like the shock of a bad alarm clock, starting your day with a nervous jolt. I can’t have that.

Honestly, I’m generally much more fond of the shaded Japanese greens, as I had indicated in my tasting note of Mellow Monk’s kabusecha (Shaded Leaf). I enjoyed the kabusecha quite thoroughly, and this tea doesn’t fall that far beneath it. I would take this over a standard sencha any morning. Though if I had my way, and money was no concern, I’d be going for the finest gyokuro all the time (which is really my favorite of the Japanese greens, far and away).

For the price, which is less than half of Mellow Monk’s kabusecha, Top Leaf is much more reasonable for the possibility of drinking a good Japanese green tea daily. And it’s certainly a tempting prospect…

Been waking up to this tea and Mellow Monk’s Top Leaf for the past week or so. Fine teas to wake up with! The Shaded Leaf definitely stands out as my favorite of the two, but I’ve enjoyed them both. Just finished a first steeping of Shaded Leaf, and am now beginning a second. For a Japanese tea, this is quite good! Creamy, smooth, beautiful, and yes, I do believe that Mellow Monk is justified in describing this tea as exquisite. From color and aroma, to the flavor, mouth-feel and aftertaste, it is thoroughly that.

I’ve been steeping it at the low heat suggested, but for much less time than what is outlined in Mellow Monk’s guidelines. The description on Steepster recommends a 3 minute brew time, which I find a bit shocking. As it happens, the recommendation on Mellow Monk’s website lists a 2 minute brew time for this tea. For my part, I’ve been brewing it for about 45 seconds to 1 minute each time, and I am more than happy with the results from that. At 2 or 3 minutes, I think I’d have to take this tea with some sugar, which isn’t necessarily out of step with Japanese tea drinking norms, but I’ve practically abandoned sweetening teas since I started drinking Gongfu style.

A small sample of Shaded Leaf (enough to make about 5 cups) was given to me by a friend, and using the last of it in this present cup I’m sad that I probably won’t have any more for a while. The price on this one is more than I want to pay right now. I believe it’s worth it, but if I bought a green like this one I would want to drink it every morning, or at least quite frequently. And the thing is, this tea is too refined and cost-prohibitive for me to drink that way. Alternatively, if I purchased a 100g pack for special occasional use, I worry that some of it might go stale from neglect before I got around to using it all, or that it might turn green with jealousy as I give abundant attention to so many of the other great teas in my cupboard. It would be a shame to offend a tea like this. So for the time being, I don’t think Shaded Leaf would fit well with my drinking habits or budget, but I’ll be sure to remember this one when I’m feeling an unambiguous kick for Japanese green tea.

This is a drier earthy-sweet. Quite different yet pleasingly tasty! The cooler it gets – the flavor changes a little to a slight grassy flavor. Thumbs up!

First tea from Mellow Monk. They had a promotion going on after Top Leaf won an award.

Smelled very…. green, similar to fresh cut grass. Its a good smell, but not at the top of my list. With the first steeping it was shockingly smooth yet the flavor was distinct and noticeable, not in an overpowering way. The flavor demands and holds your attention. The second steeping, while having a fainter flavor is remarkably similar in quality to the first.
Verdict: Beautiful and delightful, this tea is under-priced. No reason you shouldn’t treat yourself to top notch, award winning tea.

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 :)