Oh China Green Tips, I really want to like you. I take you home for my weekly mark-out hoping that maybe THIS tin will be the tin that does it. I’ve tried you hot, cold, strong, weak, blended with other teas; I’ve cut open your lovely sachet and tried to use you as a seasoning. I’ve even put you in an oil warmer to take some stink out of the air. But you’re just like that one friend that you really want to like because they seem nice at first, but when you get to know them, there’s something kind of ‘off’ about them, yet every time you get together, you hope that somehow they have changed.
As a lover of all things green, I should be delighted that I have a free supply of China Green Tips available to me by virtue of employment at Starbucks, but it just doesn’t do it for me. It smells okay, the leaves look pretty, and it’s supposedly high quality stuff. But I steep it and it just, it just… doesn’t taste that good. It has a metallic bitterness, and I wonder if it comes from the metal tins the tea comes in, or just a feature of the leaves. I’ve tried short steeps and long steeps, and a range of temperatures. Steeped short and hot and then poured over ice until it’s just barely flavored water is the most tolerable way I can drink it. If my stomach is feeling gross, sometimes I will make a hot cup to sip for the astringency. Resteeps? Forget about it… leaves are too deteriorated.
