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.
