teaplz

SENCHA FAIL.

Well, that was supremely unfun. I woke up pretty excited today, ready to hit up some sencha, serious-style.

I was all prepared to do 1 tsp/8 oz., but then I went onto Steepster’s description of this tea, and read 1 tbsp/9-12 oz. And that’s where everything fell apart.

Let’s start with the leaves first. Can I just wax poetic on how absolutely gorgeous these leaves are? Crumbly and a beautiful, beautiful deep green. Gorgeous! They feel so wonderfully silky and shiny. They’re truly a thing of beauty. The smell is somewhat similar to cut grass with a slight butter note. I was really excited to try this.

So I measured out 1 tbsp, dumped in 9 1/2 oz. of water, and waited a minute for this to steep. The water immediately became this murky, swampy concoction, not unlike Ryokucha from Samovar. And the pour took forever, because the leaves were so thick and mush-like.

My first warning sign was the color of the tea. I’ve read that sencha is a pretty yellow-lime-green color. Mine was deep, dark olive. Darker than Ryokucha. I seriously couldn’t even see the bottom. The smell coming off of it was promising, though! Leafy and buttery with notes of grass and brine. So I hesitantly took my first sip…

…and nearly spat it out in the sink. Oh my. That had to be the most bitter thing I’ve ever tasted in my LIFE. And ridiculously strong, too. It tasted like wheatgrass x1000. Like I just swallowed a mouthful of the most bitter, ridiculous grass I’d ever tasted. Seriously, that bad.

Panicking a bit, I began to dump leftover warm kettle water into my cup, hoping it’d dilute.

It helped, but barely. The flavors were so strong and dominant and disgusting that I needed to dump it all in the sink.

In a bit of a panic, I contacted takgoti (who sent me this probably wonderful tea, had I brewed it correctly!), who gave me some reassurance and suggested that I modify stuff a bit.

So I dumped out most of the leaf, until I was left with something closer to a teaspoon, used 8 oz. of water, and steeped it again. This cup smelled around the same as the first, and the taste…

Well, it’s still a bit bitter than what it’s supposed to taste like (the ratio is probably not perfect), but I’m getting a LOT more flavor that I’m supposed to. Now there’s more of a grassy-green taste, chased by a bit of brine, and followed by some assertive bitterness. Following that bitterness is a wonderful sweetness that envelops my mouth. It’s not a nectar sweet. It is a sweet that I can only say would probably be the way that grass would taste if it was edible.

I know that I royally messed this one up. And it makes me really sad, because I know that sencha is very popular, and I trust that takgoti has given me a most excellent sample.

I don’t really know if sencha will ever be one of my favorites. Right now, I can’t really get the memory of the intense bitterness out of my memory, and it’s sort of coloring the much better cup I’m having right now.

Not giving this one a rating for now! Hopefully when I steep it correctly I’ll have a much better time!

I was in the mood for something decaf, and I remembered I had a Vanilla Comoro sample from Harney!

I have to say, this has moved up to the pantheon of my favorite decaf teas. But I was a bit skeptical at first. I opened the little packet, took a big whiff, and went, “Hrm.” This one kind of smells a bit artificial. The vanilla isn’t as soft as SerendipiTEA’s Colonille. It’s kind of a candied vanilla smell. The leaves range from somewhat broken to pretty big and wiry, and you can clearly pick out the vanilla bits.

I steeped this one up anyway, and poured. The infusion is dark. Very dark. And the wet leaves smell like black tea. The infusion itself though… smelled like baked vanilla goods! I was actually quite surprised, but there is a really strong, bake-y element to this one’s aroma. So I began to feel a bit more confident…

The first sip of this one, and I’m content. It’s better than the Madagascar Vanilla by Golden Moon, even though it’s decaf. I can’t identify the black base, but it’s pretty robust and brisk. The vanilla is pretty creamy in this one. Not as soft as Colonille, and a bit more assertive, but it’s actually pretty natural-tasting, and leaves a pleasant sweetness on the tongue. The bake-y doesn’t really come out in the taste, which is a bit of a disappointment, but the tea itself is really nice to drink.

I was also happy that the tea didn’t get heavier as the cup cooled. The balance stayed pretty much on target.

Very comforting, especially as a late-night drink! Is this the best vanilla? Nah, Colonille still holds the top spot. But it’s a very good vanilla black, especially for something decaffeinated.

For such a light tea, this one has a surprising depth of flavor.

First, two shout-outs! One for Jon, for creating the randomizer that chose this tea for me this afternoon. Second, to Auggy, who sent me this tea from the wonderfulness of her heart!

I was in the dentist chair for most of the morning, which was pretty unfun. Half of the time was spent waiting for the dentist to even get to me. I spent an hour and 15 minutes watching Food Network. At least I know how to make peanut butter and jelly pancakes if the need arises.

That need is never going to arise.

So anyway, I popped open Auggy’s little baggy, and can we pause for a second and just say how pretty this one is? Fluffy, fluffy needles scented with a lovely jasmine smell. A very floral, perfumy smell, but still wonderful.

So I put a tablespoon in 6 oz. of water and waited quite impatiently for this to steep up. The infusion smells really light and floral, and it’s a very light yellow. I love the color of white tea in general. Probably the prettiest colored infusions around!

On my first sip of this, I was pretty surprised at the different things going on here. There’s obviously jasmine in full effect. In every single note of this tea, there’s some jasmine. More on the floral side than the juicy side, but very potent. Then comes some white tea notes. They’re almost drowned out by the jasmine, but I can somewhat pick up on them. There’s mainly that sweet nectar taste, and a very slight vegetal note that comes deep from within the silver needles themselves.

The only thing that bugs me a bit about this tea is the endnote. The jasmine lingers on the swallow, and sort of tastes a little… bath-product-like. Like jasmine body wash. Or something like that. This moment gives way to white sweetness, but it’s there, and it’s sort of disconcerting to me. The jasmine just manages to tip into somewhere overwhelming for a split second, before returning to a more balanced flavor profile.

I love how succulent and juicy this one is, and how surprisingly unsubtle it is! Definitely one of Adagio’s better flavors, without a doubt. It’s just that end note that has me a bit confused and perplexed. It’s like someone threw a cloud of fluffy snow at me and there was a rock mixed in.

Very pleased overall, though!

This is the best flavored rooibos I’ve tasted. This and Ocean of Wisdom. Except OoW is way more grown-up and sophisticated than this. They fit different niches.

ANYWAY, that Strawberry Chocolate let me down earlier today, and I wanted to end the evening on a somewhat better note. With a bit of trepidation, I decided to do this one by Art of Tea. The lovely Jon gave me this as part of my Christmas present, but I hadn’t tried it. The rooibos blend is very pretty, with the marigold blossoms and the bits of apples, offset by the red rooibos. It smells ridiculously of pear. Not even joking. I feel that pear is such a hard thing to nail. It’s one of my favorite fruits, but fake pear tastes are pretty gross. Luckily enough, this smells fresh and juicy and even a bit candied.

So I steeped it up for a bit longer than required, and the smell emanating from the infusion was pure pear. Almost like the aroma equivalent of Jelly Belly’s Juicy Pear flavor (which is amazing if you’re a pear freak). I took the first sip, a bit afraid of what I was going to encounter… and okay, all doubts have pretty much vanished.

This is a caramelized pear tea, and it tastes like a caramelized pear tea. If you’re not a fan of rooibos, the rooibos taste is barely noticeable. At all. I can’t even really detect it. What I am getting is succulent, wonderful pear all the way through. It’s in the top note, the end note, the everything note. The caramel comes through only extremely slightly in the end taste, and in the scent, but it’s definitely not the star. And there’s a wonderful sweetness. A fresh fruit sweetness that lingers on your tongue after every sip.

Needless to say, I’m pretty damned impressed with this one by Art of Tea. It’s very light and compulsively drinkable. I could see sticking this in the fridge and coming out with a delicious sort of iced tea. Now this is what I call a dessert tea!

Can’t say I’m really enjoying this one, unfortunately…

I got this as a sample from RoT in their catalog, and I was kind of excited to try it. Strawberry and chocolate! Where can it go wrong?

Well, for starters, the bag smells a little musty. I really wanted a bright strawberry smell, and it just smells like dusty strawberry mixed with dusty chocolate. So I steeped this bugger up for 7 minutes, and tossed the mini-bag.

Here’s where the problem begins. For some reason, the infusion smells like strawberries and chocolate, mixed with a cilantro-type smell. I loathe cilantro. I’m one of those people that has that gene that makes it taste like disgusting soap. I don’t know how people can like it. Soapy-cilantro-rooibos-strawberry-chocolate. No thanks.

It actually definitely doesn’t taste like cilantro, which is a plus. This is a very light rooibos, with the strawberry and chocolate clearly coming out. The strawberry is more on the forefront of the taste, the chocolate in the aftertaste, but the two blend together. The only problem is that this tastes like cheap chocolate, like the kind you get from CVS for Easter. That kind of musty, goes-white-very-quickly chocolate that kind of doesn’t taste like chocolate, but more like plastic-chocolate. The strawberry isn’t a round and juicy flavor, but an echo of something more akin to strawberry candy. Like those little strawberry hard candies wrapped in a pseudo-strawberry paper and had a semi-liquid filling.

The rooibos base lends an odd tartness to the blend. I definitely think this would have been better with a black tea base. The rooibos isn’t robust enough to support these flavors.

Is it horrific? Nope, but it’s certainly not great either. I’m having trouble finishing my cup. I could imagine other people enjoying this, though.

It would have been fun to do this War of the Roses style, and pit this against GM’s Rose Tea for fun like Auggy did!

Jon’s randomizer picked this out for me! Yay! Just thought I’d mention that. I was in the mood for a black that I hadn’t tried yet, and this was the first one that popped up.

Anyway, Auggy sent me this and I have to say, it smells pretty good. Softly rose-like, with the black tea coming across pretty mildly. The leaves are typical black-leaf length, and peppered with pretty flashes of pink rose petals. Very, very pretty to look at. Like rose tea should!

1 level teaspoon in 6 oz. of water later, and the leaves opened up a lot and ate a lot of the water. Which makes me sad, because my mug is only half full this morning. I’m definitely going to need to drink MORE TEA later. Yay! Anyway, the wet leaves smell like a musky black tea with rose mixed in. And the infusion itself? I’m actually not getting any rose on the nose (harrharr I made a funny). Instead, I’m smelling some nice cocoa and warmth from the black base.

My first sip of this was a bit confusing. The rose here definitely isn’t assertive enough. Instead, it comes off as a general floral sweetness than specifically rose. Even that floral note isn’t that strong. The tea itself is fairly light, with a slight bitter component and some astringency. The black base is pretty forgettable overall, and since the flavoring isn’t the greatest and most special, the tea seems to stall.

SpecialTeas recommends you try this with sugar, which I did not, and I’m kind of glad I didn’t. Because as the cup cooler, the sweetness definitely got stronger. If I would have added sugar, I fear it would have been a bumrush of sweet and barely any tea flavor. The sweet here is a bit cloying. It sort of sticks to your tongue and refuses to die. But it’s a sweetness that surprisingly enough, isn’t paired with a strong floral or rose note.

This tea is remarkably inoffensive. But that’s pretty much my problem with it. It doesn’t have much of a wow factor. The black is too light to make a mark, the rose is too shy to fully come through with a rose-like flavor. So all we’re getting here is a mild black with a mild floral note. On occasion I will pick up some toasty cocoa notes from the black, but other than that, it’s not full enough. And the sad thing is, if it was fuller, it’d drown out the shreds of rose that you can taste. So I guess it’s balanced in that way.

It’s not the best tea in the world, but it’s certainly not the worst, and I wouldn’t reject a cup of it. It just isn’t exciting enough to sustain itself over many, many tea days and nights.

Auggy ruined this tea for me, and I mean that in the nicest way possible!

I have a feeling I would have loved this tea, had I never tasted the sample Auggy sent me of SerendipiTEA’s Colonille.

But let’s talk about this tea alone. Anyway, when opened, the little packet exuded a scent of warm vanilla. Not very overpowering at all, but pretty natural-smelling. Very, very happy-making indeed. No sad panda over here! The leaves are fairly standard sized, and you can clearly pick out the vanilla bean. So far, off to a good start!

The wet leaves and the infusion itself smell surprisingly similar to Colonille! So I was pretty excited. Could it be? Another Colonille? Alas, it wasn’t meant to be. Make no mistake, this one tastes really good at first. But the vanilla is pretty mild, and the black tea base here is nothing special. I actually think it’s the Vietnamese black in Colonille that elevates it to awesome heights. So rich and with a lot of depth, and even cocoa hints. Here, the black tea doesn’t really serve any purpose except as a backdrop for the vanilla.

As this cooled, I liked this a bit less. A too-sweet aftertaste comes with every sip, almost syrupy. This flavor began to completely overtake the entire taste of the tea, until all I was tasting was vanilla syrup and no tea. It’s not the most pleasant flavor, either. It feels too heavy for the type of light tea that this is. It’s a weird type of flavor that I can’t wrap my head around, but it’s lingering for a bit too long to be welcome.

I definitely would not have been so nit-picky about this one had I not tried something better, but the truth of the matter is that better vanilla tea does exist. Colonille is all I could even want in a vanilla tea. This one is definitely better hotter than cool.

“This smells like a fish tank!”

That’s what my boyfriend exclaimed after he opened up the little Gladware takgoti sent me containing Ryokucha. I laughed at the time, but I couldn’t shake the idea that it kind of DOES smell like a fish tank.

Anyway, Ryokucha, Samovar’s version of the popular genmaimatcha blend. It’s neon-green from the matcha, filled with powdery-ness, with little bits of puffed rice and sencha. Certainly one of the more bizarre teas that I’ve come across, but I’m pretty much up for anything. If I lean in a bit closer, I can pick up traces of nuttiness and a buttery note. I got some of the matcha on my fingertips while trying to clean my teaspoon, and those were definitely highlights of the scent.

Anyway, steeping this up was a memorable experience! It looks like an explosion at the fields surrounding a nuclear waste facility. Cloudy neon-green murkiness, random leaves, bits of rice floating at the top. The entire thing is really bizarre.

The pour is pretty weird too. Now I have radioactive liquid in my cup, and there’s all the sediment left behind. The wet leaves smell a lot like puffed rice cereal. Very toasty and delicious smelling. I was tempted to eat the rice out of the pot, but I didn’t think that was such a good idea.

The tea itself smells really, really good. Very roasty-toasty buttery notes. Mmm.

So how does it taste? Very, very complex, for starters. I guess the best way to describe it is if your morning cereal got invaded by marine life and grass. I should probably explain that a bit further. There’s the toasty component of the puffed rice, which adds a delicious nutty note. There are hints of a milkiness that come across a lot in the aftertaste and sweet taste that lingers on the palate after every sip. The forefront of the flavor is an almost oceanic taste, with a slightly grassy component. Maybe like kelp. But in a good way.

As it’s cooled, the milky taste becomes more prominent, overtaking the puffed rice taste. This tea is thick and silky. It definitely has a mouthfeel, and it’s almost making me feel full. I haven’t felt that way about a tea before – it is like a meal. And for the sweetness in the aftertaste, you can almost certainly pick out very savory components as well. I could see this making an excellent foundation for soup, as they prepare it at Samovar.

The very bottom of the cup is a tiny bit astringent, but the rest was silky smooth. I usually drink my tea with a spoon at the beginning, that way I can sip it when it’s very hot. I used that spoon to continually stir it, so I don’t have any dregs at the bottom. And yay, you can finally see the bottom of the cup! Cause this stuff is MURKY. SWAMP MURKY. SWAMP THING IS IN MY TEA.

I think I’m already starting to feel the effects of the caffeine, even though I haven’t finished the entire cup yet. This one is kind of more than a tea. It’s more of an experience. A foodie experience. A radioactive foodie experience.

Yeah, I think the caffeine is definitely kicking in. I’m hyper-concentrated, but at the same time, prone to just random tangents of nothingness.

Okay, I think it’s time to end the review now, before I start jumping around and breaking out in song and dance.

And this was such a rational review before, too!

Backlogging from yesterday.

It’s difficult to even remember a lot about this one, since I was drinking it while I was packaging up some teaswaps for Auggy and takgoti. I was more concerned about the ratio of tea to bag, and how I was going to fit everything in a box, than I was about the flavor of this one.

Anyway, it’s a rooibos blend, and it actually smells very pretty when you stick your nose in it. There’s a strong berry scent, but underneath those berry tones is a warm, comforting twinge of vanilla. The entire tea looks very pretty as well, with the red of the rooibos contrasting against the deeper reds of the currants and hibiscus, and the white shavings of white chocolate.

So I steeped this one up, and the flavor is a bit disappointing. The tart, berry flavors completely overwhelm the vanilla here. The only thing that works out well is that I think the vanilla does tame down a lot of the tartness, and allows for flavor elements like hibiscus to be muted (which is always a plus, in my opinion). The white chocolate, I couldn’t taste, and the rooibos has its typically woodsy-sweet flavor. None of it is particularly aggressive or assertive. If anything, the blend is a bit bland.

But the tea wasn’t bad enough to distract me from the wonderfulness of getting prepared to share tea with some awesome ladies, so I guess that’s a point in its favor!

I’m actually really enjoying this one this morning.

When you bust open this package, lemme tell you, this tea smells delicious. I kept inhaling. There are some cocoa notes overlaid with honey smells, and a dash of a floral component as well. It smells three-dimensional and it beckons you out of that awful stupor upon waking up.

And the dry leaves themselves? People have mentioned this before, but they’re absolutely adorable! Very wiry with golden and brown hues. So pretty! Little curls, some in almost an eyelash shape. So I put a tsp. of this in my IngenuiTEA (which I just marked with a Sharpie in increments for 6 oz. and 8 oz., so I feel pretty special) and watched it steep up. I figured that the leaves wouldn’t do much and… they didn’t. Just sort of floated around.

The wet leaves smell more like a regular black tea with some honey blended in. And the infusion smells just as good as the dry leaves. The cocoa is a bit subdued, but the honey and floral scents are still there. Now, I’ve never had lotus or sandalwood anywhere near me, so I can’t speak from experience of those two scents/flavors. But I’ll try and explain how it tastes.

It’s fairly light with a bit of spice. I’m not getting any bitterness, but many floral and honey components, melted into a traditional “default” tea taste. This almost tastes similar to the Keemun Imperial I had by SpecialTeas the other day, if you tripped out the smokiness and added floral/honey components instead. At points I’m thinking this is full-bodied; at other points, it feels a bit watery. My cup doesn’t really have any astringency; Ancient Emerald Lily had much, much more than this. There’s a subtle sweetness underneath it as well, and some spicy qualities. I can’t pinpoint what spices, exactly, but it’s that feeling of warmth that comes from some of the more comforting spices out there.

Overall, really enjoying this cup. I’d rate it higher, but I don’t think the flavor profiles and components are really going to stick in my mind. It’s like that one acquaintance that you have that always remembers your name. They come up to you and say, “Hi, teaplz!” And then you feel awkward because you can’t for the life of you remember theirs. So you stand there and go, “Hi…. hi.”

And then the rest of the night you’re trying to deduce their name. You’re eavesdropping on their conversations with other people just on the sheer chance that someone might say their name. And if someone does, you’ll remember it that night. But after that night, it’ll be gone. That’s sort of this tea. I bet two weeks from now, I’ll probably forget I even tasted it.

What a cute name.

Anyway, this was the only holiday tea that I ordered from TG, and when I opened the package, I immediately fell in love with the smell. Mmmm. It smells like almond pastries, specifically anything made with marzipan. It’s delicious. Like pignoli cookies. It’s really strong and assertive, with a hint of cinnamon and maybe something citrus in the end note.

So I steeped this at 194 degrees (yeah, it’s that specific), and the infusion was a lime green-ish color. The cup smelled absolutely mouth-watering. Seriously almond pastry. Not almond cookie, like SpecialTeas’ tea, but a more robust marizpan-ish smell. The wet leaves have a similar flavor.

There’s a lot going on in the taste! The tea is there as sort of a grassy note, but it’s not really assertive. In fact, it’s a little bland. That’s probably my main complaint about this. But the other flavoring in here… mmmmm. We’ve got some citrus that comes up. It’s sort of similar to the flavoring in a sfogliatelle, an Italian pastry made with phyllo with an orange-flavored ricotta-style filling. It’s that sort of orange flavor. Not the tart quality of the citrus, but the orange-ness. This probably comes from the orange blossom.

The other flavor that’s the most dominant in the aftertaste is that almond pastry taste. Pure pignoli cookies (which are made predominantly with almond paste). There’s a teeny creamy component, but it’s barely noticeable. It’s almost an almond extract flavor, or a scented flavor. It’s very subtle, and doesn’t overwhelm the rest of the flavors. If you concentrate, you might get a bit of cinnamon. I only got it on a few sips.

The tea base of this definitely isn’t the greatest. If it was better, this rating would probably be higher. It doesn’t taste fresh and doesn’t play well into the balance of the other ingredients. But the flavoring is definitely spot-on. The flavors aren’t as strong as the smell (thank god, or else I’d be pretty unhappy). Very nice for a holiday blend, though!

takgoti sent me this tea, even though I had bought a canister of it for myself! So I figured I’d try her batch first, since it’s “older” than mine.

Yay! Anyway, the dry leaf is absolutely gorgeous. Green and silvery and long and wiry. The dry leaves have a sweet leafy smell. Like sweet hay, in a wonderful way. Not a barn-y, old way.

Anyway, I dumped a tablespoon of this into my pot, and let the steeping begin! The leaves unfurl very prettily, expanding. They’re all completely full leaves, gorgeous and green. I couldn’t wait for the pour. The tea itself smells absolutely delicious, let me tell you. Buttery and a bit of nice vegetal. Like buttered peas, maybe? A bit floral too.

I actually liked this tea a lot better as my cup cooled. On first sip, when it was pretty hot, the flavors didn’t come out as much, and the slight vegetal notes were a bit strong. But as the cup cooled… mmmm. The buttery notes came out as an aftertaste, delicious and creamy. A bit like buttered corn on the cob, maybe, but it’s very subtle. With more of a veggie taste than a white tea.

The upfront of the flavors are highly complex. I doubt I can even begin to put them into words properly. There’s definitely a floral note. It’s very light. There’s also faint nuttiness if I swish the tea around my mouth. Maybe that’s the chestnut? Then there’s the lingering sweetness on the palate, which makes you almost want to eat your tongue. Yes, that sounded bizarre.

The only complaint that I have is that it’s a tad bit astringent. Not anything overwhelming, but there is a bit of dryness to the tongue that comes with each sip. I found that I liked taking breaks between series of sips to almost “refresh” my palate.

But boy, is this tea pretty damned complex. In a wonderful way. It boggles my mind that the tea plants these leaves and buds are harvested from are ancient, and still producing wonderful and delicious teas such as this.

Absolutely NOM NOM NOM. Thank you, takkerz, for sending me this! So yummy!

This tea is warm. And I don’t mean temperature-wise!

takgoti sent me this in the huge box of tea she gifted me, and I was eager to try it from the first time I smelled it. First off, the tea itself is quite beautiful, with the varying shades of reds. The honeybush and rooibos are specked with little pieces of cloves, cinnamon, licorice, and ginger. The whole thing is extremely aromatic and spicy.

I used 3/4 of a teaspoon (Samovar’s little video said 1 tsp for 16 oz., so I halved it). Looking back on it, I should have used more. Anyway, I steeped it up, and the color was very typical of rooibos. Deep scarlet with a wonderful smell coming off of it. Spicy. You can’t pick out every spice in the scent, but it’s complex and incredibly warm.

On first sip, I was surprised how light this was! I think I’ll definitely steep it for a longer time next time. You can’t really taste all of the spices separately unless you concentrate very hard. Then the cinnamon comes out with some warmth. Then there’s a bit of kick and bite from the ginger, and the warmth of cloves (and I’m happy about the clove not being overpowering, because I’m not the hugest fan of cloves). The rooibos comes through with that signature woodsy sweetness. The licorice is a big hit here, not in licorice flavor, but in sweetness. This baby is sweet and spicy at the same time in a delicious way.

What a great herbal! Sometimes herbals are a bit medicinal or cloying. I thought I might have this problem with this particular one, but Ocean of Wisdom is an ocean of awesomeness.

I’m a big fan of white tea, so I couldn’t wait to try Harney’s version of silver needle. This is actually my first silver needle (everything else has been white peony/bai mu dan, which is absolutely delicious), so I was REALLY psyched to steep this up.

I used a heaping tablespoon in ~6 oz. of water, but I had to stop to admire the leaves. HOW pretty. The sample I received from Harney was full of unbroken, beautiful needles. So downy and soft and fluffy! And a beautiful silvery down over bright green. Gorgeous. The smell was a bit woodsy and vegetal. I’ve learned that whites aren’t exactly the best-smelling teas.

I anxiously awaited the steep. If you want something that unfurls and dances around in the pot, then this isn’t for you. The leaves barely budge. But still. Gorgeous. The infusion that came from the pour was a light yellow, a very pretty white color. And the smell coming off of the liquid was similar to the dry, but more concentrated. Very woodsy, a hint of sweetness, an a lot of planty goodness.

On the first sip, I was pretty disappointed. This lacked a lot of depth of flavor that I’ve experienced with other whites. And I really do enjoy subtle notes. But this one was mostly vegetal. As Steepster’s description says, this is definitely the most vegetal white I’ve ever had. It almost tastes like edamame, or the water that would result after boiling some of those nom-worthy beans. Edamame tastes wonderful, but I’m not sure I want my tea to taste like that. It’s nearly savory, in a very bizarre way.

There’s not much sweetness hitting the palate, which is a shame. That nectar-like love from white tea is one of my favorite things about it.

There are plenty of better whites out there. Samovar’s Bai Mu Dan, for starters, has to be one of the best whites I’ve ever had. I’m sure there are better silver needles out there as well, that will give me the sweet and yummy cup that I so crave.

Well, I’m certainly not tasting orchid!

Auggy sent this to me with fair warning that it was going to be merely average. I pretty much love trying all tea, so… this one was quite fun to dig into!

The smell of the dry leaves was black tea with a hint of something deeper… maybe cocoa accents? I really didn’t sniff them for long. This one is chopped into somewhat tiny pieces, a pretty standard black size. It isn’t anything to look at.

So I brewed this up in 6 oz. of water (per Auggy’s suggestions), and the resulting cup was very dark and beautiful. The scent off the cup reminded me of raw cacao, deep and powdery (don’t ask how I got powdery from a smell), with a chaser of a tart-like smell that I often associate with the Keemun taste. As for the taste… it’s pretty smoky, actually! Not a smoke like a lapsang or a gunpowder, which taste of actual smoke. More like a quality. There’s flashes of a cacao-like taste, and an underlying tart quality that gives way to a bit of astringency in the mouth. In the aftertaste (and in the flavors that linger on the palate after the sip has been swallowed), there some sweetness. Orchids? Hell no. Not even close. It’s just a general sweet. I couldn’t distinguish a flavor from it.

Even though Auggy advertised this as a “meh” tea, it was definitely serviceable. And as I described, very flavorful! I really liked that this wasn’t weak or lacking depth. Is it stellar? No… it’s a bit rough around the edges. I feel like the flavors don’t extend and lengthen. They’re stunted a bit. But that’s okay, because the ones that manifest are pretty good. I could see myself craving something similar to this. Of course, the only Keemun I’ve had in comparison is Adagio’s English Breakfast, which tastes very different from this. This is more full-bodied and interesting than that EB, which tastes more “default” and more along the lines of a variation on a Ceylon.

That was a pretty awful tea day, and it’s probably my fault, cause I poured boiling water over my green oolong. Oops.

Anyway, I decided to go with something basic and tasty, and opened up my Decaf from TG! The smell of this is AMAZING. It’s identical to caramel corn. Cracker Jacks. Mmmmm. The dry leaf is sorta small, and interspersed with little caramel pieces. It’s mouthwatering. I promise.

So I steeped this one up and on the pour, the wet smelled just as wonderful as the dry. The infusion is a dark copper color, and the smell coming off of it is creamy and caramelish. On my first sip, I was actually pleasantly surprised. This one tastes like a nice brisk black. There’s only a slight hint of bitterness and astringency, but it’s pretty pleasing. The black flavor gives way to a sweet caramel taste. Not burnt or overdone, just mellow and lingering in the aftertaste. Like when the sugar from caramel corn lingers on your tongue after you’ve eaten a mouthful. It’s less of a cream and caramel taste, and more of a united flavor. It’s pretty subtle overall, which is nice. The black tea base might be a little more watery than normal (due to its decaf nature), but it’s nothing to cry over.

This is a great little tea to calm down with after a stressful day. Which is what I had, with my oolong debacle. Ouch. Here’s hoping tomorrow brings better tea experiences!

First Infusion (2:30, boiling)

So today is Oolong Day! Why? Because I said so. I’ve picked out an oolong and I’m pretty much going to be drinking it all day. This is my first non-flavored oolong in loose leaf, so I’m pretty excited.

So I opened up the little packet for orchid temple, and the smell that comes out of the dry leaf is … toasty. In a black tea sort of way. The leaves here are rolled, in a very schizophrenic, oolong sort of way. Not quite little pellets, very asymmetrical… but a pretty green. When I poured the water over them, there was a bit of a frenzy, and a verifiable forest grew in my pot. I can see why people want to brew oolongs in glass, because the leaves are quite beautiful, and they expand very nicely.

The wet leaves smelled a bit vegetal, but the medium-gold infusion… oh. my. gah. Seriously. It smells delicious. Buttery and warm and a bit bake-y, like shortbread. Or butter cookies. With a bit of a floral undertone. Very, very mouthwatering, indeed.

My first sip, as a result, was very disappointing. This oolong, on first steep, tastes absolutely nothing like it smells. The taste is actually pretty toasty, and vegetal. A similar profile to a Chinese green. There is barely the vaguest hint of the smell (but I’m probably imagining it, because I want it so badly!), and a fair bit of astringency. My mouth feels pretty dry. Even as it cools down, there’s really nothing to write home about. The flavors are very bland and unpronounced. Sad panda face.

But I know that oolongs tend to get better on their second and third infusions, so I’m giving this one the benefit of the doubt. I’ll be drinking lots of it the entire day, and recording the results, right here!

Second Infusion (3:00, boiling)

So I steeped this again, and the infusion was a bit darker this time. The smell from the wet leaves was completely veggie-like, and it had creeped into the smell of the juice this time. There was still a buttery component, but it was balanced by a very cooked green smell.

So the taste has evolved a little bit, but nowhere that I wanted it to go. The aftertaste is now really sweet (the flavor hasn’t left my tongue since I stopped drinking it 10 minutes ago), but the taste on the forefront of the sip is pretty vegetal and slightly bitter. The astringency has definitely smoothed out, but it certainly doesn’t taste like it smells, which is extremely disappointing. Even when I slurp the tea, and run it along the different parts of my tongue for taste sensations, there’s no fireworks. Funnily enough, I swallowed the wrong way and ended up coughing a lot. Only then did I taste buttery goodness. Bah. We’ll keep going, though…

At this point I’m feeling that boiling water might not have been the best idea for this tea. Golden Moon specifically states boiling, but this oolong is definitely on the greener end of the scale. Most of the flavor profile is kind of like a weedy Chinese green. Not the most pleasant taste in the world at all, but we’ll see what happens.

Third Infusion (3:30, boiling)

Here we go again… I’m seriously starting to get more and more disappointed. This steep was around the same color as the other two. The smell, however, was almost completely green. And there was a metallic tang of an undertone that made me wrinkle my nose.

The taste… the taste is bizarre. I think I might be getting a bit more of a creamy taste now, but it’s mixed with a very oceanic, briny taste. Like it’s been steeped in water where crustaceans have been frolicking. So strange. As it cooled, the marine component became more pronounced. The sweetness is still there in the aftertaste, but it’s a bit muted, and the astringency is back. I threw out around 3/4 of the cup. Now I’m just curious to see what subsequent steeps will taste like. If this is oolong in general, then I don’t think I’m a fan, and I’m starting to get discouraged. :(

Fourth Infusion (4:00, boiling)

Last steep for me. Just dumped the leaves, because I’m really sick of this, and it’s not getting any better. At all. I want to give a shout out to the leaves here, because they’re beautiful and complete once unfurled. If only the taste matched it!

So on this last steep, the leaves actually smelled buttery again! And when the tea was piping hot, it too shared that buttery quality! I was pretty surprised, so I was excited to try it. Annnnd… the taste is really strong bitter. I thought I might have tasted that butter for a second, but it was completely gone once the tea cooled. Not good. So these leaves are being dumped.

Overall, I’m really disappointed with this, and I’m sad that my first oolong had to go this badly. Hopefully my next one will be better!

This is one of those teas that falls into the “eh” category. A take it or leave it kind of tea.

But frankly, right now, I’m pretty happy to be drinking tea. I really haven’t had ANY since January 1st.

I actually have three different kinds of Jasmine Pearls in the house, thanks to takgoti! I figured I’d try the Golden Moon one first, before I try some high-quality takgoti versions.

The look of this tea is gorgeous! Pretty little pearls, a beautiful blue-green with yellow strings interspersed. So soft and silky to the touch. The pearls smell like a juicy, floral jasmine. They’re extremely fragrant. Each pearl has jasmine seeped right into it. I couldn’t wait to see what these leaves would do in the water!

They unfurl beautifully once the hot water touches them. I was a bit disappointed that they didn’t unfurl more than I thought they would. Most of them were still somewhat rolled by the time my timer rang.

So I poured, and the wet leaves smell like a milder version of the dry. And the infusion smelled delicious, with a rich, heady jasmine scent. A sweet green smell underlying it as well. And such a pretty light yellow! Similar more to a white tea than a green, actually.

The light color should have tipped me off to the taste of this tea. Because it’s very light, especially when hot. The jasmine doesn’t really come through until the aftertaste, and the forefront of the flavor is definitely a Chinese green taste: a bit bitter and vegetal, maybe a bit mineral-like.

The problem is just that the tea is just too flavorless and unexciting. It’s not that it’s a bad tea, perse. It’s just I wanted a fuller tea taste, and more body. Not necessarily bold and brisk and strong, like a black. Just more rounded and interesting, especially on the jasmine front.

In short, the tea is weakness. Maybe a good introduction to jasmine, but I don’t see it winning any awards. I’m sure that there are better jasmine pearl teas out there.

Second Steep

So I decided to steep this a second time, at 3:30 minutes, and the same water temperature. The leaves opened up a little bit more, but still didn’t completely unfurl. Odd. The juice was around the same color as the first time, except with a bit more of a honey tone. The tea had a bit of a thicker mouthfeel, and much more sweetness. The sweetness became a bit overbearing after a while, though, with the jasmine only appearing as an aftertaste. After the tea cooled, it seriously began to taste like Juicy Fruit gum. I don’t know why, or how. But it was bizarre. More of like an aftertaste of Juicy Fruit. Like you’ve chewed it for too long and you spit it out, and then your whole mouth feels like it.

Really odd.

Happy New Year, Steepsters!

So, I said that my first tea of the new year would be Marco Polo by Mariage Freres, and I lived up to my word. takgoti sent me some in her amazing box of wonders, and I’ve been dying to try it since I first smelled it. I don’t know how she held out for so long.

Let me tell you, this has to be the most delicious smelling tea I’ve ever stuck my nose in. Seriously, amazingly delicious-smelling. Sweet strawberries bursting with a juicy and full aroma, layered with creamy vanilla and subtle hints of black tea. It is an experience for the nose, let me tell you. Once you smell this, you may never come up for air again. Unless it smells like Marco Polo, that is.

So I dumped this in the pot, nearly jumping up and down with excitement. The leaves are fairly small, although there are some wiry pieces mixed in, and each single leaf has the intoxicating aroma I’ve been describing. How do I know this? I picked one up and took a big sniff. Yep. Marco Polo.

The tea juice that arrived in my cup on the pour was rich and decadent smelling. The wet leaves smelled very similar to the infusion, so I’ll just skip that. A lighter version of the dry scent, with the vanilla battling the strawberry-ish tones in a symphony of amazing. First sip… and I’m happy surprised! No, this tea does not taste as it smells. But would you want it to? That’d probably be ridiculously cloying and overwhelming.

The taste is a rich, slightly bitter and astringent black tea, layered with a hint of creaminess (without the taste of vanilla). There’s a bit of a floral soapiness. And I mean this in the best way possible, although that sounds a bit bizarre now that I’ve typed it out. Unless there was soap in my cup/IngenuiTEA, which would then be pretty interesting. Then the tea opens up in pure berry goodness. It’s not a strong, domineering flavor, so if you’re expecting to be assaulted by berry, then you’re thinking of the wrong tea. It’s almost entirely in the aftertaste, a sweet-tart combination of strawberry-ish bliss. Very full and red and rich. It’s a sweetness and specifically strawberry taste that lingers on the tongue long after you’ve swallowed.

I definitely did hit the temperature point that takgoti mentioned. There’s this magical point when the berry comes to the forefront of the cup. It doesn’t last for very long, but it does indicate that there’s a lot more going on beneath the surface than what you first might think.

This tea tastes distinctly French. I have no idea why. It just does. And it’s completely a tea for the senses. You should be smelling and sniffing this as much as you’re tasting it and allowing it to roll around on your tongue. I highly recommend that you aerate the tea on your tongue. Slurp some sips, that way the full body can be tasted. Sort of like what you do with wine.

I finished this about 5 minutes ago and the sweet berry and cream components are still lingering in my mouth, in a wonderful fashion.

Yes, Mariage Freres is expensive, but it’s so worth it. One of the better flavored teas I’ve experienced!

It’s nearly the New Year here on the East Coast, so I decided to relax a little bit before the party I have to attend and have some caffeine-free stuff. So I pulled out more TG stuff, specifically, Strawberry Pepper.

When I heard that they had a strawberry pepper tea, I leapt at the chance to try it! I love it when sweet blends with savory (an aside: if you’ve ever had Moroccan food, they do a great job of blending the two), so I couldn’t pass this up. The leaves smell pretty much entirely of strawberry. It’s a very juicy-tart strawberry. Not particularly overly sweet, like a vanilla-strawberry. Just a plain strawberry. There’s a bit of a rooibos smell underlying the tea. Not very strong, but it’s present.

It steeps up to a very pretty strawberry-red, and the smell coming off the cup is a deep, juicy strawberry. So if you like strawberries, this will definitely get you pumped to taste it. The taste… is interesting! It’s actually a bit more watery than I expected it to be. I wanted a more robust strawberry taste. I might need to steep this a bit longer, even though I steeped it at the amount that TG suggested. The rooibos flavor is completely overwhelmed by the strawberryness. There’s flashes of subtle woodsy sweet, but it’s really just a base to hold up the strawberry flavor.

As for the pepper… it didn’t really come out strong in this cup. There was a slight tingling sensation on my tongue, but it wasn’t a flavor. It was more of a feeling. Maybe my peppercorns all dipped to the bottom of the bag, but I made sure to shake it. Maybe I just didn’t get enough of the peppercorn in there. Anyway, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t manifest itself as a full flavor, but rather as a bit of heat.

I’m not the biggest fan of strawberries, and I tend to like them somewhat on the sweeter side, or mixed with something creamy (like vanilla-ish things. So if you like tart-ripe strawberries, you’d probably like this. This one would probably be pretty interesting iced as well. And maybe even sweetened a little bit, if you want it to have more of a sweeter strawberry flavor.

Overall, though, I think this is a great herbal to relax with and sip. I actually feel like it’s more of a daytime tea than a nighttime one, and it tastes very summary. It’s not particularly a favorite of mine, but I could see someone else really liking this one and getting into its unique flavor profile. It’s a bit fruity and one-note for me. I prefer a bit more body and oomph to my tea-drinking experience.

I am making audible happy noises as I’m drinking this. Thanks to takgoti, of course. MY GOD.

This is probably the most delicious cup of tea I’ve had in a few days. Seriously. SO. GOOD.

I felt like a white tea this afternoon, and I began rummaging around. I almost tried the Adagio Jasmine Silver Needle that Auggy sent me, but then the thought of this popped into my mind, so I decided to steep some up.

This doesn’t really smell like much dry, but the leaves are so pretty! Like real leaves. And downy tips. So pretty. Everything pretty much looks nearly whole. The infusion is a very light honey color. Beautiful to look at. And the smell is sweet like corn, with woodsy highlights.

On my first sip, I literally made an audible “MMMM” noise. It was very loud. And then I gave a little gasp on the swallow, because this baby has depth. It’s very light tasting, but actually pretty heavy on the flavor department. There’s a lot of complex layers going on here. I feel like I can get lost in this. So unexpected and deep, yet so completely sippable and drinkable!

So let’s try to explain this. I’m a bit incoherent right now cause I’m so excited about the taste of this, and I’m still in awe over the flavors that are packed in here, but we’re going to try. There’s deepness here. Toasty notes, as well as pure sweet and floral notes. I’m definitely getting the sweet corn that takgoti mentioned, kissed with a light bit of butter. Delicious and rich. There’s also the feeling of cocoa. I can’t explain this one… not the flavor of it, but the overall end feeling of taking a sip of that drink. I’m getting some sort of nutty flavor, maybe a bit of walnut?

There’s a mouthfeel here too. I think that’s the first time I’ve noticed it. A thickness, a deliciousness that cannot be described. No astringency whatsoever. This is a tea that just keeps on giving. I love the lingering feeling on my tongue of nectar and honey and goodness. I am just finding that I love white tea in general. How something light could be so deep… it’s almost like the Caribbean waters.

The flavors here are so round and pronounced, yet so different, distinct, and enjoyable. I really can’t even begin to properly describe this cup. I’d just suggest getting some for yourself. THANK YOU TAK-TAK FOR AMAZINGNESS, as usual!

If you know me, you know that I love bananas. LOVE them. I think they’re probably the best fruit ever. Extremely sweet and creamy, perfectly portable (moreso than any other fruit, since they don’t even need to be washed!), and delicious in desserts. Bananas and chocolate is probably the best combination ever. And a frozen banana, dipped in chocolate and then sprinkled with nuts? Heaven!

So I was really excited to try this tea, since I’m a huge banana fan. But fake banana stuff tastes bad. You can’t extract an oil or an essence from a banana. It just doesn’t work. They don’t have that. So I’d imagine banana-flavored tea is a difficult thing to accomplish.

Anyway, when I opened the bag from TG, I was immediately hit with the smell of a somewhat artificial banana. Maybe a Laffy Taffy-style smell? It was actually a lot more authentic than I’ve smelled before. There was also a nutty scent of walnuts. I was nervous.

The leaves are fairly smallish, and there are walnut leaves and tiny banana pieces mixed in. It’s all very pretty. So I threw it into my pot, and let it steep up. The resulting infusion smelled a bit better than the try leaves. A bit more buttery and creamy, with more walnut accents. A bit less fake.

On my first sip, I was midly surprised! The tea actually tastes like tea. The flavoring is sort of an afternote. You start with a fairly brisk black, and then it evolves a bit into a walnut taste. It’s a combination of that specific astringency that comes along with eating walnuts, and an overall nutty taste. It’s very subtle, but it’s there if you concentrate. The aftertaste is a creamy banana-ish flavor. Sort of like bananas in cream. Or maybe banana candy. It’s sweet, but not cloying, and definitely not overwhelming. If it was, I think this tea would be dead in the water.

I would have liked it if the bananas had tasted a bit more natural, but I realize that that’s pretty much impossible to create in a banana tea. I did finish my cup, but it’s not a tea that I can imagine drinking regularly. It definitely is balanced, and entirely drinkable, but it would get tiring every single day if you had to drink this over and over again.

So overall, not a huge disappointment. I didn’t expect this to be a perfect 10. After all, banana is hard to replicate. Passable.

Color me unimpressed. :(

I read Auggy’s review of this, so I went into this with a bit of trepidation. My first sencha, and it’s very disappointing!

Anyway, the leaves look pretty! Very needle-like. I haven’t seen anything like this yet (no Japanese greens for me so far). It… doesn’t really smell like anything. If I breathe hot air onto it, I get somewhat of a buttery note, but other than that… nothing.

So I steeped this one up, and I was really surprised at how light the infusion was! It’s such a ridiculously pale yellow that I did a double-take. Lighter than a lot of the white tea I’ve tried.

And the taste… well, it’s a bit non-existent. It’s like hot water, with some bitterness at the end, as well as some astringency. The smell is a bit buttery and grassy, but I’m not getting anything remotely like that in the taste. At all. There’s the faintest taste of sweet, but I’m really having to search for it like crazy. It just tastes like really odd, hot water. I don’t even really feel like I’m drinking tea, which sort of makes me upset.

I didn’t have tea all day, as I was out, traipsing about in the mall. And I went to Teavana for the first time! The store was packed out, and no one bothered me… but I tried their sample tea and nearly gagged. It was Jasmine Pearl mixed with Rooibos Tropical. Not only did the tea taste awful, but it was so ridiculously over-sweetened that it was a nightmare. DISGUSTING.

A disappointing tea day! Let’s hope tomorrow will be better!

First Harney from the loose leaf order! I threw this sample in as a kind of throwaway to meet free shipping, and to have some more caffeine-free/decaf options in my house. I wanted to cry when I steeped this up, as I picked up the sample packet upside-down, open, and dropped about 3/4 of it all over the place.

:(

:( :( :(

But I managed to salvage most of it, and it’s back in the bag. Anyway, the tea smells delicious. Like cranberry and orange, with a little woodsy flair. It also looks pretty rooibos-ish, with little bits of orange things and whatnot. I used Adagio’s tea filters for the first time, since rooibos doesn’t need to expand, and I think it was a smart choice. The last time I made rooibos in the pot it got all stuck in the filter and was incredibly annoying to clean out.

So while cleaning the rooibos off my floor, I steeped this up for myself and the boyfriend. The resulting infusion is a very beautiful red color, rich and pretty. The boyfriend thinks this looks like cough syrup. WHATEVER.

Anyway, the wet leaves and the tea itself doesn’t smell as strongly as the dry. On the first sip, I was midly pleased. I could taste cranberry and orange, and under it all, as an aftertaste, that woodsy sweet rooibos taste that I’m really growing to like. But as my cup cooled down, things took a turn for the south.

I’m tasting hibiscus. I’m not sure if it’s really hibiscus, and it’s just my head playing tricks with me, or my tastebuds revolting, but it’s got that tart hibiscus taste that’s pretty different than cranberries. And now I can’t get that thought out of my head, and all this tea makes me this of is an upscale Celestial Seasonings Zinger. A type of tea that I’m definitely not a fan of.

I think there’s a lot of subtle nuances of flavor in there that elevate it above a typical Zinger, but the forefront of the flavor is pretty much that dreaded flower. Followed by some orange notes, and finished with rooibos goodness. It’s a bit tart for me, overall… this might actually be better iced, or gasp even finished with a bit of sugar to round it out.

Is it a bad tea? Not at all! I just don’t think it’s stellar, and I couldn’t imagine ordering more once this little sample packet is done. The boyfriend says that it’s good. “Very tart. Not a favorite, not very smooth. I can’t see drinking this all the time.”