New Tasting Notes

Each time I reach for this tea, I fully expect to find that soapy aftertaste that I used to notice. However, I think time has been very gracious to this tea and that soapy aftertaste is long gone. I am pleasantly surprised each time that I brew up a pot of this tea. It has a great smooth base that nicely complements the fruit. Harney does a really good job of balancing flavor and tea bases, and this one is no exception.

I’ve mixed this with a bit of spearmint and it’s delicious! Not quite as flavorful as I’d like, but I’m blaming the tiny infuser on this pot. Definitely want to try in the ingenuiTEA.

This tea is basically a decaffeinated herbal version of a chai tea.

My low rating of this tea is because I do not like pepper in my tea and found the pepper in this to be overpowering. It does have a nice blend of sweet and spicy.

Another beautiful Sheng. I tried yesterday to buy the whole cake and it was sold out. All of the Xizhihao were sold out on JAS eTea. He who hesitates is lost. My loss.

My only free day this week, and so it deserved a latte morning. But I didn’t want my usual tea so I decided to try this one, having read on someone else’s review that it did a really nice job.

They were right. I think I used just a tad too much milk as the tea flavour wasn’t as strong as I’d like, but this was delicious. Subtle notes of cinnamon and berry and just a really nice way to start the morning.

the morning cuppa. I raised the rating a few points today, I am liking this stuff a lot. A strong tea with a sweet flavor – See previous notes for more info.

I’m a novice tea drinker who used to have to add loads of milk or sugar to anything but I love this one without anything in it in the mornings! I discovered it in one of the Twining’s variety boxes and now I buy it alone all the time.
Random discovery: I was drinking this when I was up late studying one night and eating Girl Scout Thin Mints at the same time and it was a great combo!

When the hubby and I went to The English Tea Room, this one was the one I ordered as my first pot. I wasn’t disappointed, necessarily, but it was a lot darker than I’d expected. I couldn’t really find the safflower petals, but the jam flavor was there as soon as I got some cream into it. It was very rich, and went excellently with the Scotch egg I’d ordered. :) I probably won’t order that one again, but it was a good one-timer.

I received this tea in a swap from Missy and Dylan. (You have no idea how excited I was to find out how to make bold print. It is ridiculous how “techie” I feel.)

I have reached that very special age where things with small print have to get further and further from the face to be read. I thought my eyes were worse than I knew as I puzzled over the label on this one. Finally I called my youngest over and asked her to help me with the label. Yes, it said Golden Imperial Lotus. Yes, it said Teavana. But did it really say, “OMG! Tarantulas!”? LOL! She confirmed that indeed it did!

Opening the package, I get it! These are little hand-tied bundles of gold and brown tea leaves like Golden Mudan which used to be sob! carried by Harney and Sons. Cute! They said you don’t have to use a strainer but I did. I may try it without next time.

I tossed three spiders in my pot, poured boiling water over, and steeped for four minutes. The aroma is one of the greatest strengths of this tea. It is rich and thick and molasses-y. :) The taste is so smooth. There is no astringency or bitterness. It has medium body and could really have been steeped longer I think without doing any harm to the taste. The liquor itself is orange/ amber and mine was the tiniest bit cloudy like an Assam, and there is a light malty note as well though this certainly doesn’t taste like an Assam.

I think this is probably the same thing as Golden Mudan which I loved. Too bad I missed out on the sale! A big thank you to Missy and Dylan. I will definitely be resteeping this!

This tastes like mango more like mango nectar than fresh mango. In fact, it’s so generic “fruity” nectar that if you told me it was apricot nectar flavoured I would believe you. Despite the generic fruit taste, the green tea base – Chinese Sencha – is decent. Nice full mouthfeel. I would use the majority up iced because I generally prefer hot green tea plain despite what my cupboard of 52teas implies.

This oolong has a nice mineral aftertaste just like the other rock oolongs I’ve had. I taste a little bit of the honey but the peach is very faint. It has an interesting grittiness that the other wuyi oolongs didn’t have, almost sandy. The roasted flavor is great and comes through strongly without being overpowering.

Tea of the morning……

I think I would call this more of a Purposeful Combination. I have been wishing for a good jasmine black tea ever since sampling the Jasmine Golden Yunnan at thepuriTea. Kind of like Rosy Earl Grey from Teas Etc. without the rosy or Earl. I tried getting some at Harney, but they are out of stock with no immediate prospects because the recent offerings were not up to Michael Harney’s standard. I would order some from thepuriTea, but the thought of spending $16 for 4 ounces of tea and then another $7.50 for flat rate shipping is a little pricey for me when I know there will be a shipping sale sometime this year. (I did break down and order 100 grams from Dragon Tea House on ebay for about $12 shipped. I have ordered teaware from them before, but it just takes so long to get here….economy shipping from China.) Then I remembered that I likely had something close in my own cupboard.

Jen’s Jasmine Black

I started to prepare a mug (12ish oz.) of Zhi Gong Fu Black (Bailin Gong Fu from TeaVivre is a great sub if you have it), but I also added a scant tsp. of jasmine pearls. This time I used the ones from the Asian Market, but I am guessing any sweet jasmine tea would do. Then I steeped by my usual method for my mug, but at a slightly cooler temp than boiling. The result is very good! It is not as heavily jasmine flavored as the tea from thepuriTea, but it is still very enjoyable. I could probably add a full teaspoon of the jasmine pearls next time. This will be a habit. In a way, I almost like it better than the Jasmine Golden Yunnan, because I could pick my most chocolatey tasting unflavored tea and run with it. Yes, I do get more chocolate and lighter jasmine, but still reminiscent of Cadbury’s Mini-Eggs. I am also thinking the JGY will be taken off the shopping list….. I am so excited that I have three teas for the price of two, and the Frugal Fanny (tm JacquelineM) in me is loving this.

Usual mug method just a little cooler than boiling. Lightly sweetened.

I brewed this with a well-heaped teaspoon steeped for four minutes, boiling water.

The colour is so intense a dark brown as to be opaque and almost black, with a yellowish cast round the edge of the surface circumference.

In the nose there’s a doughy element and there’s a meaty element reminiscent of Oxo or Bovril or some such thing.

In the mouth … I’m actually struggling for words, this is a bit different. First of all, as you’d expect from the seller’s notes, there’s absolutely no Lapsang Souchong taste of pine, nor is there any smokiness. It has that smoothness and body I usually link to a ‘butter’ element, but this time it’s definitely not a butter taste; perhaps I could call it toffee, but it’s not sweet – not that it’s at all harsh or bitter. It’s almost as if it ‘thickens’ the tea and it definitely gives a richness of flavour. There’s that Bovril or Oxo element – just a hint of beefiness. There’s just enough good basic tea there, but, oddly, I’m getting a rather stronger basic tea element in the aftertaste, from a second or so after swallowing, onwards. There’s the faintest hint of liquorice in there. These things blend together to give a quite savoury, meaty whole.

I could characterise this as a very ‘satisfying’, ‘soothing’, ‘comforting’ tea, but if that makes it sound like the traditional British cuppa it’s the wrong impression. This is a bit different – something out on it’s own. It’s a really excellent cup of tea.

This doesn’t seem like the kind of stuff that would bear a second infusion, but the instructions say one or two, so I’m trying a second – four minutes, again.

Surprisingly, this is still quite an intense colour. It may be a fraction less intense but I still can’t see to the bottom.

It smells almost the same, but with, perhaps, the very faintest metallic hint.

In the mouth it strikes me as a slightly lighter cup of tea than the first. That thing I was hesitant about calling toffee is now definitely a toffee element. The meaty thing is, perhaps, reined back a little. That tiny metallic hint is there, too, but I’m not sure if it’s right to call it ‘metallic’; it’s not grassy, perhaps it’s something between grassy and metallic. It’s very, very faint though, just enough to put a slightest ‘edge’ in the flavour. There’s something in the aftertaste – now, this sounds horrible, but I’m really not describing something horrible – that is reminiscent of that ‘smell of sick’ note you get in good champagne (I’ve actually seen it described as such by wine professionals, so it’s not just me being fanciful).

This is an excellent cup of tea, again, but not quite the same thing as the first one.

At £30 per 100g ($48 plus or €39 plus at the time of writing), this stuff causes some soul-searching, though. I only have a sample and I’d love to get in a stock of it; but it’s not as if it’s the only expensive tea in this batch that I’m thinking the same thing about – I can think of at least three without looking at my notes. If I gave in to the temptation, bankruptcy would loom, I think.

Not particularly impressed by this one. Especially after perfect Da Wu Ye treat I had yesterday. I will not rate it just yet, to experiment with quantities and brewing a bit more, but so far it only has one strong point – its aroma. Others I find lacking…

Upd: nope, not my cup of tea indeed. More leaves – failed, lower temperature – failed, different steeping time – failed… :( Not that it is bad, but I don’t feel the desire to drink more, like with some other teas…

I asked my wife to make me cup of this last night before bed and oh man, this tea. I could smell it throughout the whole house, it smelled so good! And so sweet! This is definitely the tea to reach for when I’m craving something sweet. Mmmm. It was a bit too sweet for me last night, I may need to try it without my usual addition of sugar.

Took some to work with me yesterday (iced), we were so busy I didn’t actually get to it until an hour before close. But what a lovely hour that was. This is such a beautifully tasty tea!

This was delicious! I think I might have to keep cinnamon in the house if only to stock up on this blend! It’s so, so good! It tastes like home and fall and yumminess. Next time I might throw a bit of french vanilla, round out the corners a bit, but this was wonderful.

I cannot believe I haven’t had this since I decided not to put the massive backlog into Steepster and it’s not in my cupboard on here. [edit: Apparently, I have logged this tisane on Steepster. I just forgot to add it to my cupboard.] This is one of my favorite herbal creations that I’ve had from 52 Teas. I love love love and hearts it.

It tastes like a date nut muffin and is eminently drinkable. I usually finish my first cup before I even notice I have.

2nd steep: 12 mins.

From 52 Teas’ 2011 Xmas sampler, the first time I had this tea I remember getting a general sweet that I could think about and maybe get maple. I didn’t see what all the fuss was and didn’t think it tasted like pancake breakfast.

Last night, I decided that I wanted to have this tea again in the morning when I was looking through what I had left still from the Xmas sampler. I woke up this morning and steeped up a cup. Both the dry leaf and the steeped tea smelled of maple syrup, the dry leaf smelling more so. Sipping, I got the maple right away but I had to hunt for any hint of pancake and I’m still not sure I found it. As the tea cool, it hit its sweet spot and I started to enjoy the cup quite a bit. I think I’ll want to drink this one again instead of putting the rest away thinking of it as something I have to finish off at some time. I think I have about 2 servings left.

I had the second steep a few hours later and it was lightly maple and lightly tea but still drinkable.

2nd steep: 6 min 30 sec.