smartkitty

Huh. Did I really taste all those things I wrote about in my last note? Or was I just unconsciously channeling things I read that other people wrote? It’s a constant fear when I write tasting notes, and I honestly don’t remember tasting so much. It’s been a while, and I just don’t recall the experience clearly enough to judge my last note as accurate or not.

That and…I didn’t get any of those flavours past steep two. I suspect maybe I need to use more leaf. Though I did use 5g in a 4oz Sado Nosaka kyusu (Hojo-ware I got back in Feb! Beautiful tea sheen developing and I’m such a proud teapot mama. BTW, remeasured it since the first few times I used it, so my previous note stating it’s 5oz? Erroneous.) So note to self – 5 grams is NOT enough to get me satisfactory flavour after steep 2.

I alternated between boiling water and 200F water, because…well, uncertainty. I second guess myself a lot until I “nail” it, and this is a tea with which I still dither. First steep? Beautiful maltiness with a whisper of chocolate and the toast-like flavour I associate with darker oolongs. Same with the second steep. And yes, I picked up the metallic texture, electrifying on the tongue and evoking burnt toast (not to a crisp, just browned to the point where it has the slightest edge of charcoal. I like my toast DARK sometimes).

But steep 3 and onwards? Not very much. Metallic texture and not a lot of flavour. I tried steeping longer and longer, losing count of what steep I was on after a while. 1 minute? 2 minute? Similar results. Switched to a 100ml gaiwan. Same thing.

The long and the short of it? I messed up. Not changing the rating, will try again soon.

Also note to self – stop reading what other people write before posting your own note, ‘kay smartkitty? Just in case, y’know?

ALSO. Anyone know if Hojo’s line of Sado Nosaka clay teapots develop similarly to zisha and zhuni clays? In terms of absorbing tea flavours, that is. The minerals in the clay already give the rock oolongs I use it for a smoother, sweeter taste. And don’t get me wrong, I love it. But I also love it when a good yixing starts giving back after absorbing tea flavours for a while and I don’t actually know if Sado Nosaka does that.

I finished off the last of my stash of this tea last night. Just coming off a rather bad stomach flu, so I decided to celebrate the end of my insanely boring bland diet of the past few days by making this.

I brewed it Jingshan style, which is by far my fave way of making greens. 7g of tea (in a brewing basket) to 12oz of water in a tall glass. Brewed five times, starting at 20 secs and increasing as I saw fit. I split the tea with my sister, who was at my place last evening, and saved a glass for sticking into the fridge.

Dry leaf smells deeply vegetal and crisp. Impossibly dark green and curled little leaves. Wet, the vegetal note expands into a buttery goodness that is just mouthwatering. My sister actually ate some of the wet leaves. “Tastes like the tea,” she offered. Well, not entirely specific, but it made us giggle.

And the flavour, oh the flavour. This is definitely a tea to brew correctly – oversteeped the taste is a little bit overwhelming on the vegetal notes, and the sweetness doesn’t come out to play.

But I was firing on all barrels last night. Vegetal, yes, but buttery and even nutty. I was reminded of biting into a salted (and perfectly buttered) corn on the cob. The tea itself isn’t salty, mind, just an image in my head. You’ve got the savoury vegetal notes at the forefront, buttery and delicious, fading into sweetness as the sip ends. I’m not sure I ever picked up on the cocoa, but that hardly detracts from the beauty of this tea. It’s more that I’m still training my tastebuds to find things. ;)

Not sure how I EVER confused the Laoshan Black with this, by the way – the liquor is a perfect clear and light jade. Everything about this tea is so green and beautiful!

One of those teas I need to keep in my stash at all times, I think. Though I may wait for the spring harvest to arrive before I reorder, and the anticipation is already killing me!

~

PS – I have to thank Krystaleyn for the word “savoury” for greens! Definitely apt.

(Note: I purchased the Spring 2012 varietal of this tea. The description was exactly the same, so I figured I’d post under this entry instead of making a new one.)

Whoa. This is FRESH. And these leaves just don’t stop delivering. I’m not sure I can offer anything constructive, except to say that as of steep 12, these leaves show no sign of slowing down.

Malty and sweet, absolutely beautiful. My only quibble is that they don’t seem to show much in terms of evolution, aside from the maltiness fading a bit as the steeps progress.

5g in a 5oz gaiwan, 5 sec steeps at max. I mishandled it quite a bit near the beginning, oversteeping for my taste. I’m not that good at gaiwaning, see, and the only reason I can manage it with greens and whites is the lower temperature. I burned my tiny little hands quite a bit while trying to get into the rhythm of the correct technique while making this. The result was that my first five or so steeps were overwhelmingly malty. I wonder if any of my yixings in my collection are good for black teas… Hmm.

Anyway. INTENSE tea. I drank until I was tea drunk and then I had some more. I am still vibrating with caffeine a few hours later. Not sure I should have had black tea so late in the evening. Glad I did nonetheless, this tea is gorgeous.

I was very excited to try this tea. Doubly so, because I was going to debut my new sesame duanni teapot from Yunnan Sourcing to make this tea! No other sheng would do to break it in. It’s a bit on the large side for solo drinking (5ish oz with leaves in) but given how fantastic this tea was, it was hardly an issue drinking all the deliciousness over two days.

So 6g to 5oz at 212F, each steep around two seconds. Later steeps closer to 4 seconds. Made it to steep 8 on the first day, steep 17 on the second. I feel like the leaves had more to give even then. I gave the leaves a brief 5sec rinse at boiling before starting all of this.

The dry leaf smelled sheng-y to me. I’m a bit ashamed to say that I don’t know what else to make of that scent. Maybe with some experience I’ll have more to say about that. Wet, I picked up some tobacco smell from the leaves, which again, I tend to think of as “sheng-y”. There’s a whisper of mulled spices. It’s amazing how much the leaves expanded after the the rinse. From a compressed little clump, to endless, big leaves inside my pot. I love it.

My first impression, drinking the first few steeps, is how amazingly thick the tea is. It just coats your tongue and your throat, and it’s the most gorgeous mouthfeel ever. I was getting a tingling sensation over the tip of my tongue. I’m not certain I got the taste of mole, but there was a definite spiciness that reminded me of white pepper. Near the end of the flavour arc, I’m positive I tasted sesame seed candy. So sweet, so delightful!

By the middle steeps, starting around 6 or 7, the tingling had faded out, as had the sesame taste. At this point, my vocabulary fails me. The closest I can get to articulating the experience, is a dark and deeply nuanced older sibling to a chinese green tea. Astringent, darkly tangy, and then fading into an intense and never-ending aftertaste of grapefruit that reminds me intensely of the Sun Dried Jingshan’s aftertaste.

Then finally, in the last few steeps, a thick buttery sweetness. Definitely cinnamon-esque, though a lot more delicate. Maybe closer to a glass of almond milk with some cinnamon and nutmeg sprinkled across the top. So soothing, so energizing, so delicious. I’m so glad I have loads in my cupboard! I think this is the beginning of a beautiful (tea) friendship.

(PS – I suspect the rating will climb as my palate learns a bit more about puerh.)

I finally nailed this tea! But first, let me tell you about my nigh-tealess week.

It’s only just cooled down enough outside that my apartment isn’t an oven inside. I can do things around the home without feeling like I’m dying! Seriously, the past few days, the temperature inside my apartment reached the 90s almost daily. No amount of fans helped. The windows only open a couple of inches, so that didn’t help either. The Boy and I spent most of our evenings nearly immobile, moving only to feed the furbabies something cool. Needless to say, we didn’t go into the (significantly hotter) kitchen much. That included forgoing tea making for the most part. I did make a couple of tea slushies, but it was nothing too fancy. In fact, I was pretty sloppy with the steeps, because I just wanted to get back to vegetating in front of the two fans.

Needless to say, this 60F weather is a dream come true in comparison. It’s still a bit stuffily warm in the kitchen, but I can tolerate it enough now that I can make myself tea more often. I feel human again.

Now, this is the tea that I sadly mishandled last time I tried. I crowded the leaves and oversteeped it Western style. Even then, I could tell how much I’d like it if I got it right. And now I’ve gotten it perfect.

I took Mr. Duckler’s advice to try this Jingshan style, though leaving the leaves in a basket so I could stop the steeping a bit more easily.

1 tablespoon to a 12oz glass (one of those Pom Tea glasses they discontinued a while back). 175 degree water. First steep – about 15-20 secs; second steep – 20 secs; third steep – 30-35 secs; fourth steep – I eyeballed it until it was the right colour, about 3 minutes, sipping every so often to check the taste.

The result is a beautifully thick, vegetal, delicate, and extremely compelling tea. I’m not sure I have enough tasting experience to do it justice. It’s some sort of buttered vegetable, maybe green beans, that melts into a vegetal sweetness that’s delicate without being boring. A whisper of a green apple tart at the very end – tangy and buttery and sweet.

Beautiful and soothing, hot. Wonderful and refreshing, cold (I made enough to stick some in the fridge overnight!).

I’ll keep playing with this tea, next time I’ll try it in a gaiwan!

Steeped it hot and stuck it in the freezer, today. Drank it as a slushie. So good! Doesn’t even need sugar. Chocolatey, sweet, and awesome!

I finally caved and bought some with my last order, because the sample incident was going to haunt me until I tried this tea properly. And let me just say? It’s all I can do to stop myself glugging the heck out of this tea.

4 grams in a 4oz ceramic teapot. Very short infusions, only a few seconds each. Jumped up to 10 seconds by steep 5ish. Made it to 7 before I called it a night, but I will definitely continue when I wake up.

(Side note! Not very happy about the pour on my new little teapot. It was a cheapy buy, but I thought it might be handy for when I didn’t feel like getting burnt with my poor gaiwan skills. Well, note to self: expect a dribbly mess, and expect to count the long, slow pour into the steep time. That said, I discovered I like this tea on the longer side of steeping. So it’s not all bad! And it’s a cute, titchy little thing, and I like the way it holds the tea scent.)

Back to the tea! Tea liquor darker than last time, a nice burnt creme brulee colour. Tea leaves smell intensely of chocolate and malt after steeping. And the flavour is a full, delicious chocolate. The description suggests dark chocolate, but I say milk chocolate. I’m not much for dark chocolate, but I’m nuts about this tea. Really, really head over heels.

I have to admit something – I combined all the steeps and had it in two batches. I feel bad, but there’s always next time to do it properly, right? It’s impossibly hot in my apartment. Beautiful, outside. But my apartment building still has the heating on. I just didn’t feel like getting up multiple times. The gong fu gods surely scowl at me tonight.

No notes yet.

I’ve been drinking this tea Jingshan style all evening. 1.5 tablespoons to 6-ish ounces of water, 175F and refilling every once and again. Made it to five refills before I’ve decided to pack it in for the night. Could have probably gotten a couple more, too! Oh, I love this tea, and I love this brew style! I love the way it builds from very subtle to a very pronounced presence. Completely different experience from last time I brewed it!

This tea fills me with a sort of soothing energy. I could do anything, but not in a frenetic caffeine-crazed frenzy either. Calm, collected alertness, mental clarity. Gave my cat some catnip today, and watched her trip out every time she rubbed her face on that bit of carpet. Her highspeed hi jinks are a bit like my brain feels, only, again, without the frantic quality. I could get used to this.

Very sweet in the first few glasses, a bit drying. Love that punch of grapefruit at the end, delicious. Juicier as the steeps progress, and the sweetness does fade a bit, turning into a rounder flavour. Still grassy, still citrusy. I can definitely pick up on the basil from the description this time around. More basil-like than basil proper, but no less delicious. This would be lovely with Italian food!

Makes me wonder what this is like brewed iced. Probably the perfect summer drink! I’ve got 2oz and I’m already worried about when I’ll run out. Hopefully this is one of those teas that’ll be stocked every year, because goodness knows I’ll continue to buy it.

Nudged the rating up, because let’s face it – I’m addicted.

This came in a little sample bag labeled as Autumn Picked Laoshan Green. I didn’t realize it was actually a black until much later. After reading some reviews on Steepster. The intervening time I just thought it was a very odd green tea.

My first impression was that the dry leaves were amazingly dark. I know the picture on the Verdant site shows some fairly dark leaves for the Laoshan Green, but even then I was surprised. It smelled buttery and malty and chocolatey and delicious. So far so normal, to me. The description did mention a chocolatey note!

Then the steeping. I…very obviously futzed it here. I thought it was a green. I steeped it as such. Western style in a small mug, 1 tsp to 6 oz for 2 minutes at 180F. And it steeped… caramel. “Huh,” I said to myself. “This looks, for all the world, like black tea.” And yet, I still didn’t catch on. The leaves smelled intensely like a Cadbury milk chocolate bar by this point. I really wanted to eat them.

At this point I started drinking the tea, burns and all. It was a bit light for my taste, but I attributed that to having run out of sample. I like a bit more than just a teaspoon, if I can help it. The tea itself was deliciously malty, with a distinct buttery, vegetal character that faded into a sort of deep caramel. I wanted it stronger! Sooo frustrating. Though, again, in retrospect, because I understeeped it.

So yeah, I started looking through the reviews for the Laoshan Green and noticed someone mentioned the liquor should be green. I decided to look at the spent leaves, and sure enough – not green in the least. I’m pretty embarrassed it took me so long to notice.

My rating is based on the way I steeped it, but I definitely want to try again properly. Next order I’ll get the Laoshan Sampler and give it a proper go.

I got my (ginormous) order from Chicago Tea Garden today! Yay!!!

I was really looking forward to trying this tea. I really wanted something dark in the oolong spectrum and nothing was quite hitting the spot. They were all turning out a bit too sweet to fulfill my ravenous need for roast. I love ALL oolongs, but sometimes a girl craves roasted tea, you know? I must say, the sticky rice tuochas very nearly turned my head, though.

The aroma of roasted nuts hit me as soon as I opened the tin. I’m smelling walnuts and pecans at Christmas. The tea leaves are really tightly rolled up. I had to give it two boiling water rinses before they started to loosen up. The delicious nuttiness was just enormous in the wet leaves. Oh yeah, this was definitely what I was looking for.

So, I went for 1.5 tsp for threeish ounces of water. I kinda faked the gong-fu with a small mug and the tea strainer (to keep the leaves in the mug when I poured, they were under the strainer!). My order for a couple of gaiwans has yet to arrive, and I kinda wanted to try this tea on porcelain before futzing with different clays. I’ve done it before, it’s not that hard. I gave the tea a few seconds at a time and increased the steeps from there – near the tenth steep I was doing a minute and a half. Only issue today is that I pulled a dumb blonde moment and poured the hot water from the kettle on my fingers. Derp. Lucky it wasn’t boiling, huh? :)

The liquor comes out a nice golden tone, with a delicious roasty smell that just made me want to hurry up even more. It tastes like it smells – roasted nuts, a bit like my mother’s walnut and pecan pie, without the sugar. It does have a mellow sweet finish to it, but it’s understated. Just the way I like it. My sister noted a chestnut flavour at the very end of it, which I agree with, though my experience with chestnuts is limited. The roastiness fades as the cup cools, the result being a very odd (though pleasant) nutty mellow quality.

As the steeps progress, there’s a very odd toasted…chamomile?! taste that emerges. I don’t mind chamomile, but I prefer the earlier steeps by far. Or maybe I didn’t steep them enough at the end of it? I was very confused to pick up on it, anyway. It’s the only reason I didn’t rate the tea higher. Maybe I did something wrong. Weird.

Anyway – final judgement on the tea? SO GOOD. Do try. And do drink it hot. The tea really shines.

Non-garlicky update!

The cream just unfurls in your mouth, doesn’t it? This time it’s not being cut short by the garlic either! A bit of orchid at the tail end. This tea really coats the inside of your mouth, it’s just so silky.

Yeah, enjoying this more than last night. Still going to try different steeping parameters in future, but for now I have a rating for this.

I was feeling incredibly lazy today. I somehow managed to hurt my hip, my sister (whom I’m babysitting) is being difficult, I couldn’t find one of my socks… It was just one of those days, and I didn’t feel like clearing the table so I’d have room to gong fu my tea. So, I brewed this western style in my Breville. One tablespoon to 500ml for 6 minutes at 195F to start with. I thought I’d go with what the packet said for the first few tries, but I’ll definitely try brewing it up differently, in future. Not convinced I got everything out of this tea that I could have.

On opening the packet, I was struck by how much everything smelt of cream. I even handed it to The Boy. He’s not very good at picking up scents and flavours in tea, generally, but he immediately picked up on the cream as well. There’s maybe the slightest whisper of floral at the tail end of the scent, it’s reminding me of the Verdant TGY.

It brews up fairly light – translucent, faded caramel. The smell of cream is unmistakable now. It reminds me of making cream of pumpkin for Thanksgiving. I’ve been known to steal a sip or two of the pure heavy cream when nobody’s looking! The floral note is more muted, though it’s still hiding in there. (Second steep is less floral than the first. But it’s still there, under the cream!)

It tastes exactly how I thought it would – milky, silky, sweet. A bit overwhelmingly so on all accounts, which is why I need to try different steeping parameters next time. And a different menu. I’m fairly sure the garlicky dinner (mofongo, tostones, arroz con gandules, beans. ALL slathered with garlic to nearly shameful levels!) I had is clashing with the tea! Drinking water didn’t particularly cleanse my palate well enough. Actually, I’m certain that’s what the issue is, so I can’t in good conscience rate this tea right now.

It IS rather nice. I do quite like it. But I’ll steep it differently and have it after a more appropriate dinner next time. Mmmm, I can’t stop smelling this packet of tea, though. It smells soooo good!

My appreciation for darker oolongs has been slowly growing since I first started drinking loose-leaf tea in earnest last year.

I wanted the soothing buttery goodness of an oolong, but I didn’t really want the flowery-ness of a greener one, so I dug through the samples box and pulled this one out. It well and truly hit the spot.

I was a bit on edge – two of my boys got into a serious scrap, and one of them came out looking like he’s been through a war. I freaked out, to the point where I couldn’t do anything except shake. The Boy told me to breathe… and eventually I did. It really wasn’t as bad as I originally thought. So once I cleaned up the poor, scratched up fatty, I decided to make myself a tea to soothe myself back into complete sanity.

And wow, this tea… I didn’t fully appreciate it the first time around – probably because I mis-steeped the crap out of it – but this time I took my time and the results were gorgeous. GORGEOUS. Brewed it up in my new little sado clay kyusu acquired from Hojo just recently, about 5g of tea for about 5 oz. I can definitely see this being one of those teas where the more is the merrier. Alas, this was the last bit of my sample. Next order, Verdant!

Heated up, the leaves smell beautifully roasty. Chocolate and molasses, and brews up the same dark liquor you’d expect for that taste. Beautiful dark caramel, with a sort of full-bodied roundness in the mouth. I don’t know how else to describe it, it’s just a very complete tea. The metallic note in the description is definitely apt. It’s like biting into a deeply roasted walnut with the slightest hint of metal at the back of it. In a good way!

Now, I’m not sure what elderberries taste like, but there’s definitely a fruity note at the very tail end of the after-taste. Maybe the slightest hint of parcha? Definitely a sharp edge to the fruit for the first couple of steeps. I can’t taste it nearly as clearly anymore.

Around steep five it starts mellowing into something darker. I can definitely pick up on the slightest malty note here, without being overpowering. And it’s just such a soothing cup of tea! So many interesting flavours going on, that it’s hard to focus on much else. A classical or romantic era symphony frames the tea perfectly – the complexity just works you know?

Let’s see…I can taste burnt sugar, walnuts, dark chocolate… It has a certain quality that reminds me of cajeta quemada! I bet a banana would go well with this tea, and I can keep drinking without the worry of over-sugaring myself as is often the case with cajeta.

I made it to steep 5, but I plan to continue after dinner. I’ll write more!

Lovely!

I brewed this up in my brand-spanking-new little houhin that I acquired through Yuuki-cha. I was SO EXCITED to brew this up! My first gyokuro!

I’ll admit that 000 is correct in the assertion that the leaves are a total mess. They look like they’ve been through a wood-chipper. Even so, the dry leaf smells gorgeously kelpy. Seaweed in a way I like. I have trouble articulating where the line between “good” and “bad” seaweed goes – the best I can do is say that “bad” seaweed is the taste/smell you get in cheaper sushis, kinda overpowering and kinda fishy too. (Different than the fish “fishy”, if you know what I mean.) Anyway. None of that here. It’s GOOD seaweed.

I’ll admit I didn’t brew this in the ideal conditions. The result was a slightly more astringent tea than should have been, though I can still see beautiful potential. I used two teaspoons for my houhin – which holds about 5.5 oz to a reasonable water level. (7oz to the rim, but then it would be one hot mess.) The instructions enclosed with the shipment said to brew a strong gyokuro at 105F for 3 minutes. I couldn’t wait for the water to cool any longer and ended up doing it at 130~F.

The liquor turned out a BEAUTIFUL light jade green. It should have been clear, but there was a lot of leaf debris getting through the houhin’s ceramic filter. Unless I get a pitcher or serve it in a mug, not sure I can use my trusty extra-fine strainer with my tiny little teacups. Even so, I’m sure tea dust would still get through.

The smell of the brewed tea is gorgeous. A vegetal ocean breeze, and just as soothing. It tasted like it smelled – savoury goodness melting into a vivid vegetal sweetness. Beautifully thick flavours, super satisfying! I got 4 good steeps out of it, each one grassier than the last. Unfortunately, the delicious umami note didn’t really carry over to the other steeps, though it’s possible that it’s because I used hotter water than I should have the first time. Definitely a bit too astringent if your water is too hot, treat this tea with care!

Right now I’m having the fifth and last steep, which I cold-brewed over night just to see what I’d get. Grassy water with a hint of kelpy sweetness. One too far!

Can’t wait to try this again, and get it right.

Hmm. The lingering aftertaste is pretty rad. Same buttery mouth-feel as an oolong, and I worship at the altar of the oolong. Needless to say, I’m REALLY going to like this when I get it right. Maybe a touch of floral? I’ll keep you posted.

Bah! What is it with my steeping, lately?!

I followed the website instructions for western steeping, a tablespoon per cup at 175F for 1.5-2 minutes, but that’s a bit long I think. Came out a bit bitter. It’s not too bad, I can tell there’s a great amount of beauty under there, but still disappointing. Can’t wait for my new teaware to get here! I’ll gaiwan it up and fiddle until the tea suits my palate.

That said, did anyone else pick the slightest hint of chocolate in the dry leaf smell? It’s gone after brewing, the only scent I could get then was a very fragrant edamame. I’m having trouble describing the liquor, actually. It’s edamame but without grossing me out, so there’s definitely more at play. And from what I could tell under the bitter tang, it tasted like a smooth, delicately buttery vegetable.

I can tell I will like this. Just I need to find how to do it! Will rate this at a later date.

I never thought I’d find a green tea that would shake my obsession with senchas at large. What. A. Tea. Bravo, Verdant!

I had this tea tonight on a whim. The sample was sitting in my tea box, waiting to be tried, but I was pretty sure I was going to end up making another batch of my much-beloved SA matcha before bed. For whatever reason, I decided to dig through the tea box instead. This was the first little bag I pulled out after a blind rummage.

On opening the bag, I took a deep whiff and instantly picked out the citrus the description talks about. Wet, they smell distinctly green. A bit toasty, maybe? Or at least what I tend to attribute to senchas as toasty.

It brews up light, definitely, but not as light as the yabao. A clear, light yellow-green. Very pretty to watch the colour seep out from the Breville basket. (Don’t judge! I’m waiting on some new tea ware I just ordered! Including a gaiwan that will get some HEAVY use, I promise.) The liquor itself is indeed vegetal in scent, reminiscent, again, of sencha. At any rate, the scent seems intensely interesting to my pet rats, who keep trying to shove their heads into the mug whenever I put it down.

Hot, it tastes beautifully vegetal, but sweet. At the same time, there’s a distinct note of effervescence that only grows as the tea cools. And then, after you sip, the notes turn into a beautiful citrus flavour that lingers pretty much indefinitely.

I had a hard time placing the citrus. The description says lime, but that’s not quite it to me. Lemon isn’t it either, as the note isn’t quite as sharp as all that. I kept thinking of having breakfast on weekends when I was growing up, and I could not figure why. Then I remembered our grapefruit tree. It wasn’t much, but the grapefruits had a distinct sweetness and character that I have yet to find in any commercial offering. Sweet, but not overpoweringly. Tart and sour, but only perfectly so. THAT is what the tea’s aftertaste is to me – grapefruits from my youth. I miss that little tree – it was battered by hurricane Georges and finally succumbed in the ensuing tornados it caused.

As the tea cools, the grapefruit note starts to make itself known DURING the sip. It’s even more sparkly, just gorgeous. I could drink this forever. I’m getting more after my sample runs out.

No notes yet.

Hmm… Not sure I did this one justice. I’ve been having a bit of issue figuring out new teas in my collection, lately. Just yesterday I ruined my entire Xingyang 2007 shu sample because I brewed it incorrectly. I may have gone to the other extreme and underdone it with this yabao. Fortunately, that means I still have enough leaf to try again later!

I used about 3 teaspoons of the yabao in my decidedly huge swan yixing, about 10 oz. I used boiling water to rinse the leaves and the pot, then used boiling water for a few seconds to make each steeping. I made it to around four steepings with some help drinking the tea – otherwise in pretty sure I wouldn’t have been able to drink so much tea!

The smell of the wet leaves is sweet and delicate. I can definitely pick up on the pine needles the description mentions. I’m not sure I’m reminded of snickerdoodles, but there’s definitely a lightly spiced smell. The brewed tea is alarmingly clear and colourless – they really weren’t kidding!

As for the taste… I definitely did something wrong, as I can barely taste anything. What I can pick up, is lovely, though. It’s sweet, and it lingers. It reminds me of the bite of pine needles without the followthrough of pine needle taste, if that makes sense. There’s a toastiness, but whether I’d call it marshmallow, I am just not sure. It’s very nice, really, but I need to brew it properly to get a good idea of what I’m tasting.

Gonna hold back on rating it for now. I have a feeling this is something I could rate much higher than I would right now.

Oh! As an amusing postscript, my boyfriend walked in as I was cleaning out the pot, and thought there were insects in my tea. “You eat crazy things, wouldn’t put it past you to drink them too!” Ha.

I can only describe this tea as transcendent. Beautiful, delicate, floral, buttery smooth transcendence.

Caveat theae potor – overcooking this one makes it lose its delicacy. The leaves are also huge, so you need to give them lots of room to expand.

Making it western style in the Breville, though convenient, just isn’t the best idea. The basket just isn’t big enough, and the minimum 500 ml makes it difficult to rebrew and take advantage of the evolution of the flavour. Gong fu that baby, you won’t regret it.

I’ll post again with more details in a couple of days, as I somehow lost my tasting notes for this. But yes, it’s beautiful and I love it so much!

I know I haven’t posted in a while. Shame on me! I haven’t stopped drinking tea, not by a long shot, but I’ve gotten very lazy with the writing. I do still read, though! Avidly.

Anyway, I wanted to make another note about this tea to add my experience with their Genmai Cha POWDER. Yes, folks, the same tea in powder form. Just as easily as with my matcha – I just pour some powder into my water bottle, shake it up, and voila! It’s the same taste, maybe a tad stronger on the toasted rice than I’ve gotten out of the loose leaf version. Delicious.

Cold, warm, hot, doesn’t really seem to matter in terms of taste. I’ve had it every which way, and it’s still the same amount of deliciousness. My only quid is that it’s kinda expensive. Or at least, there’s a fair amount of sticker shock. (The website claims you can get 600 cups out of a 300g bag, but I swear $40 still seems a bit…high.) After I’m done with this “powder sampler” (which includes sencha and hojicha – DELICIOUS) I’ll probably not be ordering it again. Or maybe not until my birthday. But still. SO GOOD.

No notes yet.

I’ve been fairly ill lately, so I’ve cut down quite a bit on drinking caffeinated drinks like I was doing. Right now I’m limiting myself to two cups of tea per day, instead of the quart and a half or so I was drinking previously. Geez, a quart and a half per day! Crazy!

That said, this tea makes it fiendishly difficult to exercise any form of restraint. It’s amazing! It’s the only tea so far that has beat out Constant Comment and Lemon Zinger as top dog in the race for my tea affections. And those have nostalgia behind them!

My first experience with genmai cha was with Adagio’s blend, from their samurai sampler. I liked it quite a bit, but the bitter finish from over roasted rice was a touch off putting. This one doesn’t have any bitterness at all, even when I oversteeped it (2 minutes) experimentally to see what would happen.

At first glance, I’ll admit I was nervous. This blend has matcha, so everything inside the tin is green, green, green. You can sort of pick up the scent of roasted rice, but olfactorially it’s mostly all about the green tea.

Scooping it into the tea basket won’t do you much good unless you already have it inside the teapot – the matcha goes right through. I tend to let my water cool in the pot before I add the tea leaves, so I had the filter basket on top of my (closed) laptop. Green everywhere! I really should think things through a bit more. Anyway, my fix to this was that I measured out what I needed into the lid of the tin, then poured it into the filter once the water was at the right temperatur. Easy as pie.

It brews FAST. I mean, this much is obvious from the fact that the instructions say to step 30-60 seconds, but it’s even more fascinating to watch. The green pretty much starts swirling out from the word go. I’ll expect the matcha is why. It’s a nice light jade by the time it’s done – not quite matcha colour, though. It’s less opaque.

And the taste! This is what I like to find in a green tea – vegetal, but sweetly delicious! I’m not a fan of the “saltier” seaweedy greens. The rice, which was a bit hidden in the scent, comes out beautifully. It works well with the green tea. And now I know for certain that Adagio’s version is NOT what a genmai cha is all about. No hint of bitterness anywhere.

The tin says to pour to the last drop, and they’re right to say so. As you get to the bottom of the teapot, the tea becomes sweeter and more flavourful. I love it!

One thing I haven’t had the chance to try is whether this resteeps. I have a little collection of ziplocs with genmai cha that I’ve only brewed once, in the fridge. After my little debacle with resteeping Lemon Zinger, I’m shy with all of the teas.