Recommend me some teas for beginners

While I don’t have a specific tea recommendation, I would recommend a specific shop, Simpson and Vail at www.svtea.com. They don’t get a lot of press on steepster but they have high quality tea for reasonable prices. There quality may not be quite as high as Whispering Pines but while their prices are half that of Whispering Pines, the quality is not half that of Whispering Pines. If money is not a problem then I would certainly recommend some teas from Whispering Pines. They have the highest quality tea available in this country generally speaking but there prices reflect that too.

For someone who is an absolute beginner, I would recommend trying a little bit of everything to see what you like. I feel that there is something to appreciate about every type of tea and I can’t really say that there is any one particular style or category that I truly dislike. Personally, my favorites would be savory, vegetal Chinese green teas (Mao Feng, Gunpowder, and Dragonwell I tend to consistently like), Wuyi blacks and oolongs, Tieguanyin, Mao Xie, Taiwanese high mountain oolongs, Assam, Darjeeling, and Keemun. This year I also discovered that I have a serious weakness for Laoshan black, green, and oolong teas. I also adore Earl Grey and rose scented blends.

And if you’re looking for vendor recommendations, I’ll provide a few. I’m also a big fan of Simpson & Vail. They have a very wide selection, their customer service is fantastic, and their prices are very reasonable. The quality of their tea does not match what one can find from smaller, more specialized ultra premium vendors, but it is still quite good overall for a generalist vendor. I like a lot of their classic blends and several of their unflavored black and green teas. DAVIDsTEA is another good vendor, especially if you like flavored teas, though some of their unflavored teas are good too. I can also vouch for Andrews & Dunham Damn Fine Tea, Whispering Pines Tea Company, Verdant Tea, Upton Tea Imports, Mark T. Wendell, Kusmi Tea, Harney & Sons, Tealyra, Floating Leaves, Beautiful Taiwan Tea Company, and Steven Smith Teamaker among others. It depends on what you’re into, but I feel like you can find multiple quality teas without much difficulty with each of the vendors listed.

I recently tried some 58 Classical Black tea,manufactured in Yunnan, which is surprisingly aromatic and smooth.
I live in Kunming, the capital of Yunnan province.The other day i just ran into this shop and asked for what they recommend. in CHinese the tea’s name is 经典58.

I was just talking to a vendor about his experiences getting people new to tea into tea, and he said he was surprised that some with no background took to sheng pu’er, when he did public tastings. I thought shou might work better, or that something like lighter oolong (Tie Kuan Yin and such) would be a much more natural starting point, but the point seems to be that it would just depend on personal preference. Wuyi Yancha (roasted Chinese oolongs) have been a favorite general type for me for awhile, maybe not the most natural place to start, but then you never know. Depending on budget issues a natural path into tea might start with basic types that are relatively consistent across a quality range, factoring in preference, trying some light oolongs, black teas (Ceylon or Assam, and Darjeeling, along with the other range of Chinese styles), various green and white teas, etc. If budget isn’t as much an issue everything changes. Someone could take a running start at trying lots of types and vendors, scanning discussion sites like this or other forums and blogs and try it all. No matter the approach it seems best to make peace with there being more teas out there you haven’t tried than those you have, with quality level or natural variations expanding the range way beyond the countless types, countries of origin, etc. If trying teas by country is appealing—perhaps not the most natural approach, since focus on Chinese teas within a limited range, or teas like Japanese greens seem like ordinary starting points—then looking into What-Cha might help.

Upton Tea is a beginner-friendly tea company, with tons of options, all of which you can get in a sample size. I read their print catalog like a novel.

It drifts a little more into theory than might be necessary, but I think people would naturally experience different initial preferences and different preference curves, changes in what they like over time. That vendor I mentioned was surprised some people take to sheng pu’er at first because those teas can be less approachable, some more bitter, sour, smokey, or astringent, or with flavors based on mineral tones that may not appeal as much initially (and other ranges, of course). Of course if someone happens to like sheng or shou pu’er at first there is nothing wrong with that.

A tea friend that loves pu’er once said that someone drinking tea primarily for flavor aspects might be less inclined to like pu’er, since a lot of the strengths of various teas—which vary by different versions—include aspects related to feel and aftertaste, or even effect, the “qi” idea. I read an interesting article recently that made the same type of example in a different way, about a well-known vendor sharing pu’er with non-tea drinkers, explaining that the effect should be appreciated, not so much the taste. One taster said they couldn’t get it down, that it tasted like soapy artichoke water.

That discussion with that vendor had me considering what my grandfather might have liked in tea, if he could’ve been exposed to a broad range of types. His taste / preference in foods was unusual; he ate raw onions the way other people might eat bread, and ate heavily smoked foods that normally might not be smoked, with more unusual likes going further from there. He probably wouldn’t have preferred a soft, floral lighter oolong, a tea that would seem a natural starting point, to me.

just start trying everything, and don’t dismiss anything. I honestly believe there is no such thing as a “beginner” tea. When I first tried puerh like 10-15 years ago, it was a Xiaguan tuo from that same year, super fresh, smokey, bitter, and I did not know how to brew it. But in time, and reading, and practice, I was persistent and figured it out and now puerh is my favorite tea. To me, nothing else compares. I kept saying to myself, there has to be some reason why so many people like this tea, I just need to figure out what I’m doing wrong. But I was drining sencha at the time, and herbal teas, etc. A beginner’s tea to me would probably be lower priced teas with the intention of using them to learn how to brew, and saving the more expensive teas for when you’re savvy enough to know how to handle them (brewing technique, tea ware, storage, etc).