The Seattle Tea Snob

I may have had to much tea today, I know that this is technically impossible but to much caffeine is not. Just hoping I don’t screw up my sleep rhythm. Nonetheless today was an exciting day, I compared this tea to two other TGY’s that I had in my cupboard. An interesting experience nonetheless.

I did come to on important revelation however, I really dislike this tea. Because now I realize what I have been missing and have to toss my other TGY’s cause I could never be happy with them again. This is indeed disturbing news.

But I will say it wasn’t even a contest, this tea blew my teas out of the water in every way. This tea is clean, crisp, beautiful and refreshing. The color is a beautiful green whereas my others had a nasty yellow tint to them, and the scent and taste didn’t even compare. Vegetal, buttery, smooth, crisp, clean, floral, refreshing. All things that pop into my head as the liquor hits my palate.

All in all a very nice tea, I am quite certain that there is probably better but this definitely ranks in the upper echelons. I will be keeping this one on hand for a while, at least until I find a better one that doesn’t cost me my friends firstborn, I am really running out of friends this way.

No notes yet.

Its Monday. I don’t really feel I need to go into any further detail to explain the reason that I needed a comfort tea this evening. I’ve recently finished the last of the golden yunnan I bought from puerhshop.com, good riddance to the vile stuff. I really love my dian hongs but I had a hard time finishing that crap, sorry I’m in a mood, I mean less than quality tea.

So on to better things, I picked this up from Xiu Xian a couple months ago and have been patiently waiting to try it. Its awesome. It does help that compared to what I was drinking just about anything would be awesome, but this is definitely what a golden tip yunnan should be like. Its not dusty and doesn’t taste like coffee, yes I realize these are simple qualifiers but I am still bitter about the last stuff.

The liquor brews up very crisp and clean, gorgeous stuff really. But the flavor profile is awesome, really sweet. I could see this becoming too sweet after a couple months of drinking it but for the moment it is a nice change of pace. It has a really mild flavor, I mean its good and distinct, but not in your face and overbearing. The current drawback is it doesn’t seem to resteep as well as some that I have had, I’ll keep playing with it though.

Ladies, gents and goons, the boys are back in town, well there is only one of me and I actually never left town so never mind. I should know better than to try and use pop culture references, never could quite get the hang of them, and if that means not understanding Lady Gaga than I am ok with this fact.

So its been some time since I’ve been on steepster, been quite sometime since I sat down and enjoyed a proper cup of tea as well, this is not an acceptable thing. But my life is beginning to calm a bit and I am indulging my fancies and enjoying my rituals again. Even bought a new pot to kick things off.

So yesterday I received a package in the mail, I like packages :), but this was no ordinary package it had green “China Post” tape all over it, these are very exciting packages. This parcel was particularly intriguing since I wasn’t expecting anything from China. I decided to leave the box unopened until I could remember what I ordered. This game lasted all of .0314159 seconds before I realized that this was a terrible idea for a game, the box probably contained tea or anthrax, either way inquiring minds wanted to know. Fortunately this time it was tea.

I opened the box and curiously discovered 4 high quality, sealed, opaque food grade bags, at this point I am relatively certain it is tea, the fact that the bags proudly proclaimed Teavivre didn’t hurt my theory. At this point I am confused, I really don’t remember ordering these, not that I am complaining however. Took me some time and I remember a lovely young lady contacting awhile back asking if I would review some teas for Teavivre, I know your asking yourself how I know that she was a lovely young lady, the answer should be obvious, she sent me tea! :)

So I should stop rambling and actually review the tea. First off many thanks to Teavivre! Now down to business.

The packaging was quite impressive! The aforementioned poly tea bags were packaged inside a decent size cardboard box with air mailers protecting the valuable contents. All in all the packaging was much larger than it needed to be but it was packaged in such a way to provide protection for the tea, not crammed into the smallest package possible like I have seen other companies do.

Today it was time to try one of them, as the sun decided to grace the pacific northwest with its presence today I settle on the TGY. As I prepared to open the bag I noticed that its contents did not feel like TGY leaves, or any type of tea leaves for that matter. I thought maybe they shipped me the seeds instead for me to grow my own bushes. Not that that wouldn’t be fun but I am glad I was wrong.

So inside of this sealed, opaque, food grade, thick poly bags there were 4 smaller, sealed opaque food grade bags that were vacuum packed with about 5 grams of leave in each bag. So I am officially impressed this degree of care in the packaging shows that alot of time, thought and money went into making sure your cup of tea is going to be the best it possibly could be. Considering these are samples I am a bit blown away. But wait there is more the package contains detailed information about the tea, location picked, manufacturer, production date. I really like that Teavivre went the extra mile here, makes you feel better about the quality of tea you are going to receive.

Now to be fair I do have mixed feelings about the packaging, while I like the care that was involved, the amount of disposable packaging that was used is not the greenest way to go and not terribly environmentally friendly, kinda a catch 22 though. Not really a complaint, more of a general musing.

Well this review is gone on long past long enough and I haven’t even reviewed the tea yet. T provide a fair and accurate review I am going to wait till after I have another sitting with this tea to get a good feel for it. I will say that I am on my seventh infusion and still getting a good flavor from it though. Yeah I’m impressed.

Also I promise the actually review will be much shorter, but I couldn’t help myself, I just missed ya’ll so much!

Well I’m going on a very last minute backpacking trip this weekend, the good news is I didn’t have to run to the store and got my gear packed in just over an hour, not bad. Now I sit here decompressing with my dinner of pita bread, hummus and a shou puerh. This is sad given the fact that I have some delicious greek stuffed chicken sitting in my fridge that I made the other day, but there are some days that you are just too lazy to use the microwave. Yeah, I’m that guy.

I’m debating about continuing the story of everyone’s favorite traveling tgy, but its late, I’m getting up early and I’m not sure that anyone besides me reads it. Good thing I like to hear the sound of my own … keystroke? So tgy shall wait till next week.

…

Oh right I’m supposed to be reviewing a tea, I knew there was a reason I was here. So I love pu. Yeah I just said that. While I generally prefer sheng, there is something enchanting about shou’s. Delicious earthy flavor, rich deep intoxicating smell, and sultry good looks. Yeah I think they may be some of the most beautiful teas I’ve had. A deep rich almost purple color. Sometimes I forget how much I like puerh and since this is the only loose one I have its the easiest for my lazy butt to brew. Therefore when I haven’t had pu for a while this is usually the one that reminds me, “Hey moron, remember me, I’m kinda awesome.”

I wouldn’t say this is a particularly stellar shou, but then again I haven’t had that many that I would say are. It does however have that amazing rich earthy flavor profile and an incredible nose. Plus as my first pu, it holds a warm fuzzy spot in my heart.

Well now I saw stick some fresh leaves in my gaiwan and retire with my book. Goodnight addicts.

4 grams leaf. 120 ml water. 10 to 60 second steeps. 205 F.

Steepster has gone retarded on me and won’t let me add a picture, almost gave up on adding the tea as I wasn’t sure if it was worth it. This was a very whelming tea, I mean it’s a golden tip dian hong which always warms my heart but it really wasn’t anything special which is sad. :( Oh well its drinkable and I’ve had worse but I won’t be buying this one again.

4 grams. 12 ounces. 4 min. 190F.

Kinda in a meh mood, so this is probably not the greatest time to be reviewing a tea, cept the fact that I feel this tea fit my mood quite well. This tea is like the friend that tries to please everyone and becomes what they think other people want them to be. Pretty soon they lose who they really are and just become a collection of fake personalities none of which are real. In the end no one really dislikes this person perse but they also fail to develop any kind of a meaningful relationship because they are not real.

That is what this tea is to me, it hints at being smoky, with a rich toasty robust flavor, while trying to also appeal to those who favor the more delicate lighter roasts. In the end it just kinda fails at life, you can’t really hate this tea, but just something about it bothers you.

Kinda a meh tea for a meh mood.

We’ll I just got home from five days in the backcountry and after having the obligatory greasy burger and cold beer, I decided to treat my self to a cup of tea, like I really need a reason to do that though.

I have to admit this is the first da hong pao I’ve had, I’ve had many other wuyi’s but this one is quite fantastic and unique in its wonderful qualities.

I think this is the darkest tea I’ve brewed out of the wuyi region, and while being bold it still retains its delicate subtleties. This tea definitely would not cut it when I’m craving on of the lighter roasted wuyi’s yet when I want something a bit more robust this is the ticket. Sweet, bold, somewhat malty, layered and complex. Yeah I’ll drink this again. looking forward to trying the other da hong pao I got from jerry ma. Thanks again for the samples.

I feel like kinda a douche bag, all my reviews of late have not been overwhelmingly positive, unfortunately this isn’t going to be the tisane to change that.

First off let me state that I hate rooibos and honey bush, or more correctly my strainer hates rooibos and honey bush. But that has absolutely nothing to do with this review I just needed to get that off my chest.

Again beautiful packing and kudos on the single steep idea, it is wonderful for samples however that very environmentally sound for anyone who would drink this stuff regularly, but since I doubt that is likely that is a moot point.

When I opened the package I was quite impressed with the scent, it was as advertised, kiwi, lime and ginger all readily apparent. As I was pondering how they did this so well I soon picked up a chemical scent, then it started to smell like cleaner, not promising. Once brewed it takes on a strong ginger scent. Yeah I’m kinda nervous now.

As I poured the water onto the dried bits it immediately started to fizz slightly, what the ..? Once brewed it is quite hazy, why the smeg is it hazy? Ok time to suck it up and take the first sip.

…

…

OK FINE if your going to just sit there and watch then I’ll do it!

Well its not as bad as I … wait yeah it is. To be honest this is not terrible stuff, just not at all what was advertised. I was expecting a clean crisp cup of kiwi-lime with subtle ginger notes. Its very heavy for some reason, and the ginger completely dominates the palette with nearly indiscernible notes of citrus. I supposed that if you really like ginger or have stomach problems and ginger makes you feel better than you may enjoy this. As for me I’m tossing the rest of this and making myself a cup of tropical rooibos.

First off thanks a bunch to tea forte for the samples! The cherry cosmo was however a disappointment, the tea smelled like cherry cough syrup with … plastic? And no this was after I poured it out of the bag. The taste was worse, it did hold up to its cherry cough syrup scent though. It was overly tart almost to the point of tasting carbonated. I did manage to finish the cup but not by much.

This was however the one that looked the least appetizing so here is hoping the rest are better. On a plus note the packaging was fantastic.

This is what gives pu-erh a bad name. I bought these really not expecting much but more a a gimic gift for some friends that I am trying to convert to tea. And they suceeded in being just that, a gimic. This is a perfect example of what many mini toucha’s are, dust that has been sweep up off the floor. These are shu so you can’t screw them up as easily as a sheng but still.

They are fun to introduce new people to tea but other than that really not worth your time.

205F. 1gram tea per 30ml. start with 15 sec infusions.

This tea left me feeling very whelmed, it is nothing to right home about, but appranently it is something to write on steepster about. I’ve had worse yancha’s but I have definitely had better. If I was given a tin of this stuff I would drink it, unlike some others I’ve had. But this won’t be going on my wish list.

This tea is a bit dull and flat and lacked the floral subtleties that I have grown to crave in some of the better teas that emerge from the wuyi region. It held up quite well to multiple resteeps, on my third at the moment, but honestly I consider that a shame.

Again thanks to China Cha Dao for the sample but I can’t in good conscience recommend this one. 2 down 4 to go.

185F. 4min. 1g leaf per 80ml water.

Not to be selfish or anything but I’m revamping how I do tasting notes a bit. They are going to become much shorter and be more tailored to be useful to myself in remembering teas I like and dislike, rather than being a full on review.

Well its sample time, I’ve gotten a number of samples in the mail and its time to start going through them. This one is thanks to Jerry Ma and the China Cha Dao tea store.

This is the first one I tried, and I’ve got to say in the past I haven’t been much of a Wu Yi Yan Cha fan but this one is changing my mind. Delicate, sweet and pretty mellow with good flavor. Definitely would drink again.

I’m going to try all 6 samples and then buy a couple hundred grams of which ever my favorite is.

185F. 4min. 1g leaf per 80ml water.

This Nam Lahn is really a very nice smooth afternoon tea, not one of the best teas Vietnam has to offer but a good example of what can come from their jungles.

Dried leaves: Somewhat unremarkable, very few tips and also it looked very twiggy which made me unduly nervous.

Wet leaves: Smell woody which is to be expected and I detect hints of chocolate other than that the scent is actually fairly tame.

Liquor: A beautiful and quite vibrant golden amber, the unadulterated clarity was the first thing I noticed, if their was such a thing as a mountain tea spring this is what it would look like. The taste did not disappoint, it is a ridiculously smooth tea, almost too smooth if that makes any sense. Not even a hint of astringency and the tea seemed to dance across the tongue while tickling the individual taste buds. There are some subtle chocolate notes, and if definitely has an underlying woody theme but that does not dominate, rather this tea strikes a perfect balance of sweet and smooth and earthy. Perhaps because of the geographical closeness to the Yunnan province or other factors unknown, but this Nam Lahn is remarkably similar to a nice Dian Hong.

In fact this tea reminds me of going out with your girlfriends twin sister, they look a lot alike, they smell, feel and taste similar. And the sister may even be smoother, and better polished, yet their isn’t the familiarity. In fact the sister may remind you to much of the original girlfriend to enjoy yourself.

Yes in my case while this is really a lovely tea it is to similar to a dian hong and lacks the soul that the Chinese black has. However if a tea from yunnan is a bit to harsh for you I encourage you to give its twin sister a whirl, you just may like it.

I am very excited now that I have discovered Vietnamese tea, and look forward to seeing what else this small country has to offer.

3g tea, 8 oz water, 4 min, 205F.

On my never ending quest to find the best tea that hails from the yunnan region I’ve given this remarkable tea a shot. The tea leaves themselves are quite beautiful, a fair amount of gold for not being a gold tea, they are also fairly large and as such they tend to twist when dried. As has been stated this is a very neat tea to watch as it steeps, the leaves graceful unfurl and untwist and seem to dance about in the beautiful amber liquor. The fragrance of the tea made my heart palpitate and I could tell I was in for a treat.

The best way I can describe this tea is like a good strong dark beer. It just tastes right and feels comfortable like you’ve known each other your whole life, yet it is best served as a treat rather than a staple. This yunnan has a wonderfully earthy taste and the pepper is surprisingly strong, and in a region known for smooth teas this is one of the smoothest even with the pepper accent. That is due to its malty nature. Without a doubt this is the maltiest dianhong’s I’ve ever encountered, and can become a bit overbearing after a cup or two.

Like an overbearing mother, this tea is best in moderation.

While overall this is a nice tea, it is not an accurate representation of a dianhong nor is this the end of my quest.

Perhaps your individual who thought the “cold war unicorn play set” was a good idea, or maybe you lean more along the lines of thinking kids should have the “cat acupuncture model” or maybe you went out and bought an iPad. If you fit into one of the above categories then you too probably thought Brown Rice Tea was a good idea.

But don’t feel bad who of us at one time or another hasn’t been duped by a wily sales man selling popcorn tea? But whats not to love about Genmaicha you ask? Well if cheap and inferior Sencha leaves paired with toasted brown rice that has a flavor reminiscent of Chex cereal is your cup of tea then you should promptly disregard this review and your self esteem and run out to buy several kilograms. However if you don’t have the overwhelming urge to drink Chex cereal, and who of us hasn’t at times, then I suggest skipping this one.

In all fairness and seriousness however there is something special about drinking this tea. As the old wise tell relates, this tea was developed by poor peasants who didn’t have enough money for tea, therefore in order to stretch their meager supply they cut it with rice, therefore it become a kind of “peoples tea”. Nowadays its more of a novelty, and of course as such not the cheap tea it was developed to be. However while slightly more expensive then cheap green tea it still does come with a low price tag.

As far as Remedy’s Brown Rice Tea is concerned there is nothing to complain about, you can expect a rather fine representation of Genmaicha.

So if are trying you recreate what it would be like to be a poor Japanese peasant without enough money to buy tea, then you should probably get off the internet, or want to impress your friends on how authentic you are by drinking cereal flavored tea then buy a couple ounces. But after that please do me a favor and have a cup of long stemed Sencha or a nice Gyokuro to cleanse your palate.

Side note if you insist on drinking Genmaicha, look into Matcha-iri genmaicha, I personally haven’t tried it but it intrigues me.

In a world where men are men, woman are men and little girls are FBI agents its nice to have something to count on. While this is not the best Yunnan there is, it will always be in my cupboard because its reliable. From time to time your car won’t start, your lights won’t work and your mom will call down evil upon you. But this tea will always be there ready to step in when life lets you down. If only one of Job’s three friends would have offered him a cup of Yunnan Red.

A relatively forgiving cup of tea, and by relatively I mean providing your not a complete moron and had to Google Yunnan to know what it is, then you should have no problem creating a cup that will sooth the nerves of a balloon in a knitting shop.

This Yunnan is a fairly bold tea, with a mildly astringent middle and a silky buttery after taste. Which when run over your palette creates a very smooth tea. Slightly sweet to compliment the earthy nature of Yunnan’s.

You know your loud obnoxious Uncle Jack that doesn’t care what anyone thinks and just does what he wants as to proudly exclaim this is who I am and you can piss off? Well this tea is nothing like him, its more like your Grandpa Stan, he may not be loud, showy and flashy, he is always there for you. And after basking in his quiet strength and spending a little relaxing one on one time with him you feel ready to face the world that called you a pansy and lit your underwear on fire today.

Tasting Notes: 2.5 grams, 4 min, 212F water, 1 infusion (if you trying to infuse it a second time snakes will grow in your belly)