Nishi Sencha
Has anyone tasted both Rishi and Samovar’s Nishi Sencha? Is it essentially the same tea?
I go through a 50 g bag of Samovar’s Nishi Sencha in about a week. I just noticed that Rishi carries the same first flush Nishi Sencha – for almost half the cost. Judging from the photograph on Rishi’s site, the quality of the leaves and color look very similar to Samovar’s.
I have had both, and they are essentially the same tea. The only difference may be in the batch and age. Rishi’s Nishi Sencha really tasted fresher to me, which could be more about the packaging, and number of hands the tea goes through before it gets to you, the consumer. BTW, this is one of my favorite Senchas, next to Den’s tea’s Sencha Zuiko and Obubu Tea’s Kabuse Sencha.
Yesterday I received a package from Samovar, and was surprised that their individual tea packages all came to me covered in dust. Looks like they had been on a shelf for some time and no one bothered to clean them before sending to me. Also, no receipt or packing slip. I’m thinking this will probably be my last order from them.
@E Alexander Gerster: I just happened to pop into this thread to read the posts (as I am starting to enjoy Sencha myself).
In my opinion, what you wrote here is valuable information about your experience purchasing tea from Samovar (especially the part about the dust on the packages, as I judge that is one indication of the freshness of the tea they sell). It is typically not the kind of information given in an individual tea review, as it is only incidentally related to your experience with the Nishi Sencha tea itself. My popping into this thread—and consequentially discovering interesting information about both your and @DarjeelingDreams’ experience with Samovar and Rishi—is merely happenstance, as I personally don’t read EVERY discussion thread out here. Putting this kind of information in some review about the company Samovar itself (or Rishi) would, I judge, be a great way to store—-and so make it easily available to others—-such information; it can be very useful when considering making a first time purchase from any online tea retailer.
That is why I have put my experiences regarding purchasing with an online company in the Places tab, by creating a place, and appending the word, ‘online’ to their name. I have emailed Jason about this, and he seems to agree that although it is only a temporary solution, it can be one place to store online company information at least until they get the opportunity to have their developers dedicate such a place in Steepster to store such reviews (and he did not say when that would be).
No one has to do it this way (or provide the information about the company at all). It is simply one possible way to get easy access to others experiences from purchasing from online tea companies (If I was thinking of buying from Rishi or Samavar, I would love to be able to easily find this kind of information about them).
Btw, I have not purchased from Rishi yet, but this is certainly something good to hear about them. : )
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