Teavivre

What a wonderful tea. Milky, surprisingly sweet. I was also surprised by how much the leaves expanded in my ingenuiTEA, with the leaves filling up half of it after the first steep. This is perhaps my favorite oolong that I’ve had so far.

Deliciously nutty and sweet. I couldn’t be happier with the teas I’ve ordered from Teavivre so far.

Absolutely phenomenal. I brewed it at 185°, per the instructions, and this is easily the best tea I’ve ever had. Grainy, chocolate goodness. I must order more of this very soon.

A new encounter for me so m expectation are a bit high.

the smell inside bag was very smoky, the dry leaves smelled very good, dark and campfire like, just like a goos Lapsang. Using 2tsp of leaves into my teapot for making a cup, and used the suggested time and steep temp. The brew was as expected smoky in flavor, still powerful it filled my senses.

So I scooped out 2 tsp of leaves and put it in my gaiwan, then adding the hot water at the suggested 90 c. temperature. Sniffing the tea liquor as it brewed, the scent of smoke is still pretty powerful, perfect.

My first sip was lighter than the smell earthy, slightly smoky, slightly sweet and a velvety feel. a slight cocoa aftertaste reminiscent of the aroma, very nice touch.

In all it was a very good Lapsang, that i enjoyed. classic but just different enough to be engaging, and work its way into my cupboard.

Why are their tea names so long? I don’t know. It’s a bit annoying, but hey, words, whatever.

Thanks so much to James R for the sample of this! Apparently it’s much like Teavana’s Golden Lotus. Cool.

The leaves are beautiful – really long and thin and beautifully silky. They’re like little tubes. Many of them are a bright dandelion gold, and some of them are bronze and black. It’s so nice to see such a wide variety of colors in a bag of tea.

The first steep is rich, dark and malty. I drank it while it was probably still a bit too hot, and while driving, so I suppose I can’t really comment too much on it. But it was full and promising.

The second steep, I didn’t steep for very long – I poured water over and let it steep until I had finished packing my bag for class. That was also malty, but there was a beautiful natural sweetness to it, especially as it cooled. On my last sip I got a whiff of marshmallow.

Third steep. The tea starts turning bronzey-orange as I pour the water over the leaves. Beautiful. I smell some of that sweetness I picked up at the end of the last steep – I’m not sure I’d go for marshmallow right now – but a cinnamon sort of graham cracker? Maybe I just have s’mores on the brain. Dunno. But I’m starting to get some roasty notes from here, almost like a dark oolong. I didn’t steep this one for very long either – too impatient.

This tea’s too good!

As I was sipping along on this very enjoyable oolong, a new box from TeaVivre arrived-I get so excited when I get a new box of tea. Previously, I had enjoyed a sample of the unflavored version of this oolong and this is my third time drinking the flavored. I wish I had the two side by side to compare. Going from memory, I probably prefer this one, though both are very good. I have not brewed it exactly as instructed because I was afraid of going to boiling with this light oolong. I used 5 gms of tea in my Perfectea Maker, which is similar to using a Gaiwan due to the large brewing basket. I did a quick rinse, then brewed in 6 ounces water at 195. I steeped for 1 1/2 minutes to start with and added 30 seconds for each subsequent brewing. I added just a touch of sweetener. I would describe the overall taste as pleasantly floral and creamy, very nice. For today, I have steeped it 5 times so far, with great results. It just keeps on giving! Not sure I’ll try for more because I want to try Taiwan Dong Ding which came in today’s package. This is one I would order-its something a little different when you’re in the mood for a “comfort” tea.

Thanks to Angel at Teavivre for a bunch of samples that came yesterday. Lunch with a friend fell through, so being the tea addict that I am, I thought it was a perfect day for some tea tasting. I was in the mood for an oolong and now I have the time to do several steepings. This is the first time I had tried the flavored version of their milk oolong. Previously, I had enjoyed a sample of the unflavored version. I wish I had the two side by side to compare. I did not brew exactly as instructed. I used 5 gms of tea in my Perfectea Maker, which is similar to using a Gaiwan due to the large brewing basket. I did a quick rinse, then brewed in 6 ounces water at 195. I was afraid of going to boiling since this is a light oolong. I steeped for 1 1/2 minutes to start with and added 30 seconds for each subsequent brewing. I add stevia to all of my tea, and I think it really brought out the flavor in this one. I would describe the overall taste as pleasantly floral and creamy, very nice. As I write this review, I have had 4 good steepings, and will see if I get any more.Thanks Teavivre for a great selection!

Thanks to Teavivre for this sample!

I’m really liking this one. The dry leaves are so consistent in color, size, and shape, it really leaves a great first impression. They actually remind me a lot of a gunpowder green tea, just lighter in color and a bit larger on average. The leaves smell very clean and fragrant, of dried fruits, flowers, and grasses.

I also get a great deal of complexity from this one. It starts off pretty common, with flavors of florals, grass, and a tiny bit of a milky taste. Yet it develops a great number of nuances including parsley, kelp, grass, cream, and vegetal flavors. The flavor is lingering and “blossoms” over the tongue and through the mouth with each sip. The milk tastes become stronger throughout steeps and with later flavors of vanilla bean, artichoke, asparagus, and green beans, this tea really becomes quite savory. The mouthfeel began like the smooth, creamy, and thick goodness I was expecting, but really faded into the eighth steep, becoming more drying and “woolly.” However, the balance and interesting flavors remained through to the final steep, unlike the other Jin Xuan I have had previously, even becoming earthy with notes of tapioca in the twelfth steep.

The liquor’s aroma has a very subtle aroma, and is difficult to detect in the first steeps. The appearance is a light, but vibrant yellow-green. The wet leaves were also in great shape. It was quite a hodge podge of shapes and sizes, but their were few, if any, loose stems and the coloration was a healthy deep forest green. They were, however, quite thin and fragile, tearing easily. The aroma was of pungent greens, spinach, green beans, and maybe a little kelp. This tea really had that cross between a tieguanyin and a gyokuro that I had noticed in the last Jin Xuan I had.

Overall, a very nice tea that I’ll be drinking slowly.

OK, second time around I had to admit that I didn’t like this as much as I thought. I was trying too hard to like it because everyone on Steepster said how great it was and I thought I was missing something. But, well, it’s just OK to me, to be honest. Onto the swap list she goes!

So I’ve been absent from Steepster for awhile. I have an autoimmune disorder and when I get sick, I get sicky sick. It’s just a reality of life every now and then that I have to disappear. But I’ll always come back! I’m sorry I can’t do a backlog, it’s been too long.

Therefore, I’ll start with this morning’s tea. Bailin Gongfu. I sure was hesitant to try it when I smelled it. It smelled like hay. Then when I brewed it, it smelled like wet hay. What the heck, I thought, my senses might not be all there yet. So I tasted it. Wow! I loved it. My taste in unflavored blacks runs to English Breakfast, which technically is blended, and that’s about it. So this was a revelation. The more I drank, the more I enjoyed it. I’m sorry I couldn’t pinpoint the flavor I was getting with this tea, but it was different. My girlfriend thought it was OK until she sweetened it, and then she liked it a lot more. I had sweetened mine as a matter of course. I was glad it didn’t taste like wet hay though. :-)

It’s great to be back!

What a lovely Oolong!

Sweet, delicious, roasty-toasty nut flavors with hints of browned butter that has been drizzled over mild steamed vegetables, and a lovely peach-like taste in the background. Honey tones too!

YUM! I love this tea … I’m on my second cup (third and fourth infusions, combined), and I am noticing now a hint of vanilla starting to peek through, as well as the peach tones emerging more. The vegetative tones have softened some what, as has the charred roasted taste that I experienced with the first cup.

A really enjoyable tea… I need to spend more time with this one!

A big thank you to Angel at Teavivre for this sample!

Oriental Beauty indeed: the liquor of this tea is a deep honey-blonde, and the mouthfeel is buttery and luxurious. I taste honey and something borderline fruity/floral: peach blossoms? Straight-up peach? I’m not sure. I will be steeping some more to see how this complex brew continues to morph.

leaves smell dark/dull smell, liquor smells like a fujian

tastes very earthy and maybe a bit what would be described as dark chocolatey, overall a very blunt flavor… i almost want to say it has some taste characteristics of a keemun but very earthy

got this because people said it had a caramel taste to it, i dont really taste it and this tea isnt one of my favorites. was far outshined by the tea i got just for the heck of it, the yunnan dian hong

I am ashamed to admit that I still have samples untasted that Teavivre sent to me. Tonight, after a productive work day, I decided that it should also be a productive tea day. So, on to tasty Teavivre samples! This particular one was one of the ones I was most excited to try.

The smell of the dry leaves is a mix of malt and hay. I get a hint of chocolate, but mostly I get malty notes and even a bit of molasses. The leaves are a beautiful mix of black, brown and golden.

The brew is a dark burgundy brown. It smells thick and inviting. I can see how it reminds some people of chocolate. I get sweet molasses notes and a hint of creaminess. The flavor is malty and still holds hints of hay. There is a strange sour flavor that lingers at the end of each sip. I added a little rock sugar and it helped smooth it out a little. It did taste quite a bit like malted chocolate balls! (or Milo which is malted chocolate milk that they have here in Ecuador!)

Sadly it, isn’t quite what I wanted but I recognize that it is very very good. I can see how it could be some people’s favorite. :)

First, I would like to thank Angel at Teavivre for sending a very generous pack of samples for me to review!
Second, I can feel a seasonal flu sneaking up on me, so a large cup of jasmine tea was exactly what I needed. This tea is fabulous. Others have commented on the lack of astringency and I would agree; the cup is so smooth, so delicately flavoured, and the pearls put on an excellent show as they unfurl. The scent of jasmine is very comforting without being like drinking a cup of jasmine perfume. I feel better already.
Check out a picture of the beautiful pearls: http://instagr.am/p/QDu9edSkQc/

Thank you Angel for the sample. I actually forgot I had this and some other samples to try until last night when I was looking for something to drink before bed. I was thrilled to see this in the samples as I do love Black Dragon Pearl (see the note from yesterday).

The dry leaf smells slightly malty. Actually smells the same as the other companies tea I was drinking yesterday. But what about the taste? MALTY CHOCOLATE goodness!! Now I see and taste what all the talk was about. This is mighty good tea! I’m going to need to place an order when I get low on the other tea I have like this. Def. one for the perm. collection.

I also wanted to add there seems to be a sweetness on the end like honey or something. I don’t know what it is, but I love it! I also love that a few pearls will probably get me a few more steeps today. :)

decided to place an order with teavivre a few weeks ago. mainly wanted to try out their bailin gongfu and figured i would pick up samples of other black teas while i was at it, i ended up buying this tea in a larger quantity because the value seemed very good and it was well reviewed here at steepster.

few notes on the teavivre packaging, everything came in bags(generic like most companys) but teavivre only puts 3.5oz into each bag and has the teas inside the zip bag in another bag, superior packaging imo.

the tea itself when you open the bag it smells sweet even spicy; a really pleasant aroma. taste wise it reminds me a lot of an earl gray at first…. just a really subtleness of the same flavor. the sweetness/mild spicyness comes through pretty well to the taste, also has a nice heavy mouthfeel

at first i wasnt sure if i was going to like it, was interesting but reminded me of earl gray too much(wasnt fond of); after a week-two of drinking ive taken a liking to it(complex teas take a while for me to get acclimated to.. had this experience with a fujian in the past)

overall so far this outshines the bailin gonfu for me, really glad i picked up more than a sample size of this…. great value tea, good tasting especially to those of you who prefer sweeter teas(blacks)

I’m not sure what I think of this pu-erh. It’s flavor is so light it’s almost not there. I guess, I can say there’s none of that common fishiness to it.

I’ve had two sweepings so far and am not getting much actual flavor out of it. Will see what happens on the next couple.

I got a sample pack of this from my swap with aisling of tea! Thanks dahling!

Usually I have a straight up black tea in the mornings, but today I had a hankering for a pot of green.

This is such a pleasant, gentle tea. I find the taste to be light and delicious – no astringency and so gentle, in fact, that I kept my leaves in throughout drinking the entire pot and it just got tastier and tastier, without a hint of bitterness!

The taste is slightly sweet and spicy, like a pink peppercorn. Definitely not heavy like a Dragonwell – I think it’s like comparing a thick juice to a flavoured water! Very quenching.

As I get to the end of the pot, the aroma is grassy and the flavour reminds me of fresh black olives – juicy and savoury – just a bit nutty.

So happy I got to try this one!

Based on pre-infused aroma I wasn’t sure if I would ‘dig’ this one much but it tastes different than I anticipated.

The taste was of a sweet wood – maybe with a hint of something citrus. There was a dark-type of mocha likeness to it, too, which I wasn’t expecting.

THINK – walk in the woods after a light rain…in the fall…while sipping on a Dark Mocha.

Dry leaf: The dry leaf smelled a lot different than I expected. I has a much darker and creamier aroma than I expected. The first thing that came to mind was a really light milk oolong. The leaves are very light colored and super flat.

Wet Leaf: At first I thought that this tea smelled like a light sencha, but as I smelled more I found this very bright sweet note. If I had to compare it to something it would be like a buttered pea. It has that creaminess about it, but once you bite into it a dark, sweet, and bright flavor comes out.

Taste: When this tea first hit my tongue there was a crisp vegetal note that didn’t have the sweetness I was expecting. As I began to swallow, however, I got that sweet oolong creaminess. After I swallow this tea is my absolute favorite, because I was left with a very sweet pea flavor running down my throat. It left a refreshed feeling in my mouth and a very smooth feeling in my throat.