Teavivre

This tea was interesting. I did it pseudo gongfu (as almost always) instead of western.

The first infusion was really light, barely vegetable kind of not quite grassy, ending sweet and then GONE. No lingering flavors.

The second infusion was my favorite. It was just slightly stronger than the first, more almost grassy, sweeter on the finish, and then gone. I really enjoyed this. I wish it could have lasted.

After that, it got less green, less sweet, stronger flavored, almost spicy. It was still good, but after loving infusion #2 soooooo much, I was disappointed and missing it.

YUM! This is a wonderful Yunnan Black. Thanks so much TeaVivre for the free samples!!! This one is malty and rich and sweet. I could drink it all day long.

PS I am feeling much better today. Glad my bird is no longer suffering. Just exhausted/emotional hangover from yesterday. Whew.

Thank you to Angel at Teavivre for this sample!

I have to admit, though I have thoroughly enjoyed all of these fresh, bright Spring 2014 green tea offerings Teavivre has sent me to try, I feel like I am no good at describing them other than to say they are crisp and vegetal, and very enjoyable. Always with the spinachy/seaweedy notes, sometimes buttery, sometimes a bit nuttier.

Always clean and fresh tasting, great for this time of year.
I used to fancy myself NOT a green tea fan, but that’s because back then I’d only tried the grossed bagged green tea dust, and I’d always used boiling water and oversteeped. No wonder I hated it!

These Spring 2014 teas have been so nice to try because I can see what green tea is supposed to taste like.

I only wish I were better at distinguishing between them all.

I think next time I am going to try three at once, do a little taste test/sip off so I can hopefully reach a new level of understanding with them. Always trying to expand my tea horizons and improve my tastebuds!

Thank you so much for sending these my way. When I want a delicious straight green tea, I know exactly where to go!

Thank you, Teavivre, for a sample!

Used with the gongfu method. 2 one-second rinses. Steeping times were 5, 10, 15, 20, 30, 45.

The dry leaf aroma smells of honey and and pineapple. The wet leaf aroma, which sits very well in the bowl, has notes of a mixed juice, strawberries, and – this is an odd one – Juicy Juice gum (I haven’t had that since I was a kid). The liquor is pale gold, clear and clean, and thick in texture. After going months without having a Wuyi oolong, this one was refreshing to drink. I love me dark oolong any time of the year, especially when it is complex. A mineral note was prominent in the first infusion. Thereafter, a fruity sweetness took hold and was consistent throughout the rest of the session. For one of the middle infusions, sweet evolved to slight tart, prickling my tongue. At the end, when the flavor began to give, the sweetness faded, and a roasted quality took over.

Thanks to Angel for giving me this sample. I’m just now getting back to my samples. A floral green tea. not grassy on my palate at all. Love it!

Method was gongfu with 4oz gaiwan. 5 second rinse. Steeping intervals of 5, 10, 15, 30, 45, 60. The dry leaf aroma is floral and milky. (Aside: The milk brought me back maybe a decade ago to when I was at a friend’s house and she had made her own popsicles, one being with milk. I didn’t like it and I swapped with her for the coke one.) The wet leaf aroma is buttery and much more floral, and is sensorially evocative of late spring.

The liquor is very pale yellow, full-bodied, and slightly thick and creamy. At the first infusion it’s already bursting with flavor. The milk was totally dominant and too strong, borderline metallic-tasting and artificial, kind of off-putting. It clung to the gums even minutes after I last swallowed.

It gets better following this infusion, though. The milk backs off in the second, allowing the floral note to be more noticeable. 3rd: floral and milk are more balanced. In addition, apricot and mineral notes make an appearance and leave a pleasant aftertaste. 4th: the leaves are completely unrolled and the flavors are milder, though the milk is strongest but not so overpowering. 5th: even more milder, and the texture becomes thicker. Lastly, 6th: the floral note is supreme, and the liquor is sweet like maple sugar and candied flowers.

A complicated one. I might have to lower the temperature a little for the sake of the milk flavor. I appreciate the aromas, but I’m divided by the taste. The rating reflects overall quality, a balance of likes and dislikes.

Apologies to Angel and Mary from Teavivre for reviewing the samples I requested so late. I’ve had a congested nose for more than a week and it’s finally begun to clear up.

I chose this one to start with. Gongfu method with 4 ounce gaiwan. Steeping intervals were 15, 15, 30, 45, 60. In the dry leaf aroma, I detected raw almonds, chocolate, and raisins. And in the wet leaf aroma, a burst of malt and bitter chocolate. The liquor is a beautiful honey-gold, which looks lovely with sun rays passing through the glass. Medium-bodied, smooth, just a little thick. It has flavor notes of chocolate, malt and freshly baked raisin muffins/bread.

This one feels darker and heavier than other Chinese black teas I’ve had, providing comfort, coziness, and soothing internal enrichment despite the temperature being over 80 degrees F right now. Ideally it would be drunk during a winter storm, when the landscape is snowridden or with dark gray sky above (in contrast to Jin Jun Mei or Laoshan black, e.g., which are both good for cold days in general).

I don’t like flavored teas. I usually end up burping the added flavor for hours after I’m done with the tea, which is about as pleasant as the picture I just forced into your head by typing that first sentence. (ew) So I have put off trying this tea. This is my last Teavivre tea left to try. I couldn’t put it off any longer, so here I sit, staring into the cup.

Dry there wasn’t a blast of rose, only a rose scent (which for me translates to a floral mustiness) that actually blends well with the scent of the dian hong leaves. I DID get a full wee rosebud (about the size of a mini marshmallow) in the sample pack. It was kind of…well… lovely! Hmmmm… maybe this wasn’t going to be as bad as I expected! And guess what?

I almost love this tea! I’ve finished half the cup and I’ve not burped once. I adore TeaVivre’s Dian Hong, and this cup is no exception… the tea is lovely, smooth, no astringency, nice healthy mouthfeel…. and that is usually enough for me. But today it feels like I got the piece of birthday cake with a letter from someones name on it….you know…that sugary hard letter that sometimes had part of the cardboard still stuck to it? Yeah, that! That is what I’d compare this tea to. Getting the cake is great, but when you get something unexpectedly extra, like a letter or a flower on the piece of cake, you feel special. TeaVivre’s dian hong is lovely by itself, but adding the rose (though not something I would want to do every day) made it feel special. I don’t think I’d drink it every day, but I most certainly won’t be giving away the other sample packets I receive, because, hey, sometimes you need to be the one that gets the sugary letter on the birthday cake. And it always makes you smile when it’s you.

I’m surprised by the strong melon notes of this tea. The melon is followed by a hint of grass that then transforms into hay. A nice delicate tea, with little complexity and a very smooth body. The texture of it is very soft, and it is making me happy right now :)

Artichoke, mint, and a slight grassy flavour, with no bitterness or astringency whatsoever. There’s also a wonderful nutty aspect to it, the mouth feel is sublime and it is very fresh. I don’t LOVE green tea, but this cup is very enjoyable.

Ok, I ordered from Teavivre like 225 years ago and I still haven’t tried a single one. What is WRONG with me?

Tonight is the night and this is my first pick. It is very soft with a velvety texture. The scent is floral, but the taste is not. As soon as it hits my tongue, it is almost salty, and when that saltiness starts to tone down, I meet the beautifully smooth taste of cream, with a barely there vegetal je-ne-sais-quoi. I can’t remember the last time I had a straight oolong and I feel like I’ve been punishing myself or something. Oolong is so GOOD! I should have it more often. Why don’t I have it more often? Oh yeah, I’m too lazy to check my water temp ha.

This review is for you, Cameron B!

Method: 7 g, 3 oz, 208 degrees, rinse and then 25-35-45-55 seconds, ru kiln gaiwan and Dr. Who mug

Aromas: milky, creamy, fruity and floral. Oddly the tea smelled a little different this time, but I did stick my whole nose inside the little sample package. Heaven!

Flavor: After a short rinse, I brewed 4 steepings at 25-35-45-55 seconds and poured them all into one taller mug. The flavor is stronger this time, but the tea also has an odd perfumey note. It’s like floral, but with a slight after taste. This tea has a nice body (ha!) and a substantial feeling in the mouth. But there’s an astringency on the end and it’s a little more than I like.

I think that maybe this was too much tea for 3 oz water. For me, anyway. Since the samples sent by TeaVivre were so generous, I have enough to try this again, but I am thinking that maybe 3-4g per 3 oz might be enough for gongfu style. I shall try that and report back once again when done. As it stands now, I preferred the western style brew that I did yesterday, so I am going to leave that numerical rating.

Method: 1.5 tsp, 8 oz, 208 degrees, 3 minutes and 8 minutes, brew in mug strainer

Dry Leaf And Brewing Aroma: milky and buttery with a little hint of floral

Flavor: this tea is very light and “green”. I sipped it a bit and found the flavors to be pleasant, but quiet. I put the strainer back in and steeped to 8 minutes. The flavor is more present, but I could still use a little more, personally. Next time I’ll use more tea. This isn’t super creamy, but it has a nice milky flavor and has a hint of butter. I can taste some very mild florals as well. On some sips, I even pick up a slight roasty taste. This wasn’t my favorite of the TeaVivre samples, but I like it enough to drink more. :)

I guess I had forgotten to add this back to my cupboard, but it was another bummer sipdown. Teavivre has my favorite Huang Shan Mao Feng greens and this one is exceptional. Just a lovely cup!

I am sad because I typed up a very long and detailed review only to have it vanish for some unknown reason. :( This one will not be as comprehensive because I am running out of time to type it. Let me thank Angel at Teavivre for the generous sample though- I love this green!

Onto the review, the dry leaf is sweet and savory both, like crushed sweet grass. The leaves are army green and rolled tightly. In the infuser, the leaves become a brighter green and the liquor is clear and yellow-olive. It smells very pleasant, sweet with a nutty vegetable broth aroma.

The steeped tea tastes delightful- water chestnuts and minerals with a savory green vegetable finish. This tea has a very smooth mouthfeel and is light and flavorful. I remember my previous experiences with Huang Shan Mao Feng to be on the faint side, but this one was just right with more tea used initially than I had previously. I really enjoyed it and would even say it is one of my new favorites. Lovely and elegant, what is not to like?

for the first time in months I got to go to game night at my favorite gaming store. I had to stop going because I am allergic to the protein in male cat saliva, and they have the most adorably polydactyl (sadly not pterodactyl) shop cat. Being around it was making me really sick, after an hour or so I would end up having the worst flair up that left me feeling miserable for at least all of the next day. Thanks to my new medicine and a better inhaler, I can go back and have a blast! It was so good catching up with old friends and trying new games.

Not too long ago, Teavivre had an excellent review themed promotion/contest, of course I entered. Once the winners were revealed and my name showed up, I did a happy little dance, expected to have some tasty new tea. When it was revealed that I won the top prize a Hand Made He Huan Yixing Zisha Teapot, well, the amount of happy noises I made were so loud that I am pretty sure the entire neighborhood heard it. After many tense days stalking the mailbox, waiting for my new treasure to arrive, my waiting was over!

Once I unboxed the teapot from its velvet lined brocade box, the first thing I noticed is the size. It fits perfectly in the palm of my hand, which is a great size for gongfu tea. You do not want a teapot that is too big (unless you are serving a bunch of people) because the whole point of gongfu tea is having multiple steepings, it is about the journey of the leaf. If your teapot is too big, then you will be too full of tea after one or two steeps that you start to slosh if you try to drink more. While enjoying the size, next I cannot help but admire the craftmanship of the pot.

The pot is smooth and the color is beautiful. I go back and forth if I prefer the color of the red clay or the purple clay, they are both fantastic in their own way. I love the shape of this pot as well, I find the little up turned spout very adorable. While I was getting the teapot ready for seasoning I examined the pour and the lid. With a good yixing teapot you can hold your finger over the little vent hole in the lid and have no liquid pour out the spout, it creates a perfect seal. Also you should be able to have your teapot at a complete vertical angle and not have the lid go flying off. This beauty passed both those tests with flying colors.

I decided that this teapot would be perfect for my love of Wuyi Rock Teas (or Yancha if you are fancy) and seasoned it accordingly. I season mine a little differently than the various ways I have seen recommended, I mix a few methods and it seems to work for me. Of course I was super excited to try out my new teapot, and the experience was amazing. Usually with my Sea Dyke brand Shui Hsien I can get three good steeps out of it using my gaiwan before it just starts tasting watered down, with my new teapot I got an extra steep and each of them tasted more rich and floral than it usually tastes.

This teapot is way out of my usual spending range, all my other yixing pots were gifts or a fantastic find at a thrift store. I certainly say if you can afford it, get one of these pots, it might take me quite literally years of saving money, but I think my next yixing teapot will be from Teavivre. Afterall, I still need at least one more, always just one more.

For blog and photos: http://ramblingbutterflythoughts.blogspot.com/2014/07/teavivre-hand-made-he-huan-yixing-zisha.html

What a delightful cup of tea.

I am still experimenting a bit with temperature, steep time and leaf quantity. I find light notes of cocoa, smoke and malt and consistent with my prior experience, this tea is smoooooth with a sweet aftertaste.

Not the I stayed up all night working so I need a """BANG""" of a cup of tea in the morning to get me started rather, it is a soft, mellow cup of comfort that provides the perfect accompaniment for a calming respite.

First tasting for me of this tea.

Very nice, smooth with distinct sweet, chocolate taste.

The flavors appeared more distinct in the second and third steeps as I raised the temperature of the water and allowed a longer steep time.

Another quality black tea from Teavivre.

Sipdown! (60 | 190)

Hmm, so I’m not sure if my tastes have just changed or if the harvest is different, but I’m shocked that I’d previously rated this a 95?!

I mean, it’s good and enjoyable and everything, but not that good! Definitely reminds me of Golden Monkey. The flavor leans very savory for me, with a noticeable smokiness along with thick malt and bread notes and perhaps a bit of potato starchiness. Overall a bit reminiscent of smoked meat, or even meat stew?

I also taste a strong earthy undercurrent, as well as some dark molasses and burnt sugar or caramelized notes without any sweetness. Perhaps also a hint of dried stonefruit.

Like I said, it’s good but it’s not amazingly fantastic or anything. Overall rating is 88 though, so clearly I’m missing something.

(SAD) SIPDOWN! (104)

Aw, my very last cup of this tasty tea (for now). Gotta love the light and delicious pastry notes, the honey, the mild fruitiness. Sigh… Soon it will return to me! I want to try gong fu brewing with this one, since the name pretty much demands it.

I also found out today that Tan Yang Gong Fu (also called Panyang Congou apparently) comes from the same varietal as Golden Monkey! They’re also processed in the same way, apparently Tan Yang is slightly higher grade though. Interesting! They were listed as the same tea in The Tea Enthusiast’s Handbook, so I looked it up and found more information here:

http://www.cantonteaco.com/blog/2013/07/a-trip-to-fuan-and-golden-monkey-tea/

Gotta love learning! I will definitely be repurchasing this tea when TeaVivre’s black and oolong sale starts! SOON.

So I’m trying to pare down my stash a little bit, so I’ve started to go back and finish some of the teas that I’ve already tried, even before I try new ones. Right now I have a ton of 1-2 cup samples and I figured it won’t take long to sip a lot of them down. Plus I was very curious if I still find this one amazing after trying a LOT of Yunnans (technically this tea is Fujian, but it tastes way more similar to Yunnan teas in my opinion). I also tried just a tad bit longer steep (2m30s instead of 2m).

And the verdict is: this tea is super fantastic and delicious! I will most definitely be picking some up during the black & oolong portion of TeaVivre’s 3rd anniversary sale in August. Bread notes have been very common among Yunnan teas I’ve tried, but this one has the most amazing creamy and smooth pastry note, especially during the second half of the sip and the aftertaste. It reminds me of white tea, and it’s so delicious! This may be my favorite straight black tea so far. I need to try the “wee snaily yums” again to compare. Cannot thank Nicole enough for sending me this one! THANKS NICOLE! ;) I’m glad that this wasn’t a sipdown, I have one more cup left!

SO GOOD! <3 BUMPING IT TO 95!

This sample is from Nicole. TeaVivre announced their third anniversary event today and when I saw that they’re going to be having a black tea sale, I remembered that I hadn’t tried this one yet. So I figured I would give it a try so I can have some idea of what I want to order during the sale! The leaves are so cute! They’re very petite and extremely slender. Half golden, half brown and quite curly. They smell of honey and malt, and to a lesser extent, raisin. There’s also a tiny baby stonefruit peeking out at me. I went with a two minute steep because it was the average time here on Steepster.

Brewed, it smells quite bready and similar to pastry. That’s not something I’ve really encountered before. There’s also light bread and honey. My first impression after tasting is that this reminds me quite a bit of white tea! Mixed with black tea, of course. There’s a prominent hay note and the texture is rather light. Then there’s a lovely creaminess that conjures up visions of croissants. Mmm… I found myself wishing for just a touch more honey to compliment the lovely pastry aspect. Adding a tiny bit of sugar just pushes it completely over the edge… Luckily I’m in an indulgent mood. ;)

I am so in love with this tea! The only (small) complaint I have is that it is quite astringent in comparison to most teas I’ve had. But a small price to pay for such a delicious croissant tea!

This makes me wonder if I should try other teas with a two minute steep… Hm…