Teavivre

I haven’t had this tea in a while. It smells mostly like sweet potatoes. There is also a scent of chocolate, and some caramel notes. The flavour is yam, and generally sweet.

Very good. Thanks to Teavivre for the sample.

I’ve not had this tea on its own before.

It smells like dark caramel, and maybe plum. The flavour is more malty chocolate though. This would good for the morning instead of coffee.

I had this sample in my cupboard that I have been saving, and since it is a gray and rainy day here, decided to try it today.

I have never had a Lapsang Souchong tea before, and it certainly does have a smokey smell of pine and peat which carries over to the brewed cup.

The taste is quite smokey in flavor as well and reminds me of campfires made with fresh pine logs, but there is also a sweetness to it.

Very interesting and tasty, and although this wouldn’t be my favorite type of tea, I am happy to have tried it and would have the occasional cup for something different.

Sipdown :( I guess I will wait for the spring harvest to get any more long jing, but till then it will be sad having none in the cupboard. Such a nice relaxing tea.

Really enjoying this long jing from the gift sampler, it’s so smooth and mellow. Teavivre is always good at long jing, but I feel like this is a particularly great batch.

WAY oversteeped this because I was mixing colors and, as usual, lost track of time. Fortunately the water was on the cool side and it’s still good.

My first order from TeaVivre came in! I was really excited to get the green tea sampler of their new spring harvest. Can’t wait to try them all! Plus, I am a total sucker for free prizes, and I love the beautiful silk scarf they sent. (There are little shoes printed on it :) It’s adorable!)

At first impression, this Long Jing reminds me a lot of the phoenix bud tea I got from Upton. They’re both China greens and they have a similar appearance: long, narrow olive-green leaves with a velvety finish. They both have a predominantly vegetal flavor, but the Long Jing is more nuanced, I think, with some mineral notes rounding it out. I love that someone said it tastes like chicken soup! I’m not really picking up on that, but I guess it does lean more toward the savory than the sweet. It is also very relaxing, the perfect tea to unwind with.

I’ll probably have another cup while I plan my next order!

I have been trying to post this since Friday. But steepster was not behaving. So I emailed Jason to get it fixed. So thanks Jason for fixing the bug, and also thank you Angel at Teavivre for this awesome sample!!!

The dry tea looks perfect. Beautiful dark green leaves. They are all uniform, minimal breakage or tea dust. The smell is so delicious and fresh, I just want to eat the dry leaves. Smells strongly of fresh green cabbage.

The brewed tea brews up very light straw colour. There is a string sweet spinach and cabbage smell. The taste is sweet spinach, green leafy vegetables. It is smooth and creamy. Definitely tastes very fresh.

My taste buds are vey happy I had a chance to try this one. I have liked all of Teavivre’s long jings that I have tried. But this one is definitely the best. The freshness of the harvest makes a huge difference in taste.

Thanks so much Angel (you are my Tea-Angel)!

My Teavivre sampler came in the post today, so I had to try this first.

It smells fantastic… like sweet potatoes and honey wheat bread. The flavour is smooth and a bit malty. I do get some yam as well.

Thanks to Angel for picking this one for me to try.

I have been sipping on this all day. I didn’t write down my thoughts on the individual steeps, but my overall thought is this is some mighty tasty tea. It’s creamy with the buttery smoothness of a good Oolong. There is also an orchid note that is usually present at the end of the sip, but in one or two steeps it was missing entirely. I do pick up more of the grassy flavor as the tea cools. I really like the grassy/milky combination. Very soothing.

Backlog from earlier this week

Sipdown!

I think that I didn’t mix these pearls up enough, as there wasn’t much peach flavour the further down I went into the bag. However, I am seriously considering buying the peach pearls on their own at some point.

I oversteeped this again this morning – I really need to keep track of things, because any longer than 2 minutes really destroys the peach flavour in this. But at least I’ve finished enough to move the remainder of my packet over to the sipdown pile.

This one seemed like it would be just the perfect thing for this morning – soothing, comforting, not too abrasive. I ended up not watching the clock, though, and steeped it for 3 minutes rather than 2. What a difference that extra minute makes! The peach wasn’t very noticeable at all.

Still got a few spoonfuls of this mix left.

Tried this again today after I couldn’t figure out which tea I wanted. I think I’ve figured out the trick to Teavivre’s jasmine blends – it’s better to go with a 2 minute steep time rather than a 3 minute one.

The first steep of this was delightful – the jasmine flavour was very soft, and the peach flavour was light but still discernable. This was a great choice for this morning.

However, I think this is best reserved to one steep. The second steep had almost no peach flavour at all, and the jasmine was sharp – in a way, it reminded me of laundry detergent or fabric, which I’m sure most people don’t want.

So, to sum up: light, flavourful, very soothing – but stick to a single infusion of 2 minutes.

I mixed the last of my remaining Peach Jasmine and Jasmine Dragon Pearls together into a single packet, with a ratio of about 2 peach to 1 regular jasmine.

This is nice, though the peach flavour is very, very faint. I just figured that since other members have blended the two teas together, it would make sens to add the blend to the database.

I found this one in the back of the cupboard with the Bailin Gongfu black (score!) the other day. I tried it for the first time today and while it was tasty, I screwed up the steeping and the flavor was weaker for it. I think I looked at too many teas and for some reason I thought it needed 2 min @ 212F, but when I tasted it I wasn’t getting much chocolate so I investigated. On the TeaVivre site, it says 5-10 minutes @ 203F. Kind of a big difference. Oops!

So in the meantime, I am going to reserve the score until I steep it correctly. Even now it is smooth and pleasant though. I have enough to make it one more time, wish me luck!

The Leaf: Multicolored, with black, brown, light-brown, tan, and red leaves throughout. Very nice but light scent much like a black tea; not too earthy like some pu-erh. It is a mix of malty and earthy tones. Most of the mass is leaf, but there are some stems present.

The Brew: The liquor is very lightly colored; a greenish brown tinge. The aroma is very unlike the dry leaf; fruity and grassy. The taste is an amplified version of the aroma with an added slightly sweet note. The flavor is much stronger on the back of the tongue, and it reminds me of standing in a greenhouse. The mouthfeel is soft while drinking, but leaves a bit of a dryness in the mouth. There is also a very long, and very light, aftertaste that has more of a nutty or roasted overtone to it. The brewed leaf scent has an even stronger impression of a greenhouse atmosphere.

I drink all of my teas cold.

Wowza, the super small, curled leaves kinda surprised me. Drinking it reminds me of a lighter, more caramel and less chocolate version of Laoshan Black, with a hint of honey. It’s quite lovely, and I may just need to add this to my wishlist to get more at some point. As it stands, it was a freebie sample that Teavivre sent me (thank you!) and I’m sharing the rest with someone that I think might enjoy it just as much.

Brewed in the “Chinese Gongfu Way” from the product website. The leather flavor is less intense than the few other black teas I’ve had from Teavivre, but it was still the dominant flavor for me, and not something I am looking for in a tea.

This tea is still my favorite jasmine tea. I know that Jasmine Dragon Pearls are more popular, but this one wins by a small margin for me.

It’s so sweet, with just the right amount of jasmine. It has none of the soapy perfume taste often found in this type of floral tea.

The green tea never turns bitter and is good for multiple steeps.

After looking at some of Boychik’s pics on Instagram, I’ve decided to start using my fancy antique bone china more often. What is it good for if you don’t use it right?

Well, it actually made my tea taste even better :-)

Pics of this afternoon’s session:

http://instagram.com/p/yVEllcQh48/

http://instagram.com/p/yVFP0rwh55/

http://instagram.com/p/yVD61dwh4B/

Thank you TheTeaFairy for sending me this one.
I don’t know what happened to my world – All the green oolongs I’ve drank this week I’ve enjoyed. I like this one too. I’m confused. I need to ponder this situation…….

This is exactly what I needed this morning.

Fiance was up at the crack of dawn to do some work related things (ERP upgrade going live this coming Monday and all). So, while I’m glad I’m not him, I am usually incapable of falling back asleep once I’m woken up. No exception today.

Basically I needed something that perked me up and cheered me up all at once.

What a way to fit a bill!

This is delicious, malty and bready with notes of dark, rich cocoa, and a bit of fruity caramel.

I suspect if you enjoy a floral tasting tea, especially jasmine, then you may love the subtle flavors in this tea. Maybe it was in my head, after reading the name, but I thought I tasted something like a bit of milk, in addition to the jasmine-like floral, and mineral flavors.

I prepared it using the “Chinese Gongfu Way” described on the product website, using a small porcelain teapot. The first steep after the 5 s. rinse was my favorite, while the second steep was a bit too strong for me. The second steep was fine once I watered it down a bit though.