Ceylon

Hmmm, is it me or does Ceylon taste very sweet when you don’t brew it for the full four minutes? It could just be my thermo leeching, but honestly it’s stainless steel and I haven’t had an issue ever since I stopped drinking tea from the lid. I actually brewed this up this morning when I was in a rush to leave for work, but I left it in my thermos for a good ten hours. Drinking it now and it’s really sweet, still a bit luke warm. Hopefully this tea doesn’t keep me awake until 4am like yesterday. Not cool when I had to wake up a few hours afterward.

I’m going to have to try and under steep Golden Moon’s Sinharaja, maybe that’s how I can get the sweet nectar like flavor again.

Now who could resist the elephant on the label of this tin? I certainly couldn’t even though I really wanted to try Dragonwell first. I wasn’t particularly fond of Ceylon after trying Adagio’s version. I mean I got quite sick of it actually from all the Ceylon based flavored teas they offered. This one was a refreshing change. I made a cup yesterday and decided to have a second cup before I posted a review. I came to the same conclusions, this cup of tea is incredibly light compared to Adagios. Adagio’s Ceylon has a strong malty taste and the tannins are noticeable. I can’t drink Adagio’s version for too long without feeling really sick. Now A&D’s Ceylon is completely different, while it’s really light, the taste is still there. It’s incredible light and smooth. I guess since it isn’t as strong as Adagio’s the tannin / taste is weaker. Regardless, I think A&D’s tea has a better taste to it and I could probably drink a few cups of this. I think it would be a great tea to blend others with, but I think this Ceylon would quickly be over powered, so I guess it wouldn’t be so great. Conclusion… good cup of Ceylon tea, but nothing exceptional that stands out.

Slightly sick for the past few day, I’ve had a bit of an upset stomach in addition to the dry, scratchy throat and the runny, sniffy nose. I haven’t wanted to eat much and haven’t had any tea.

Today marks my return to tea. A nice, simple cup of Ceylon. (2nd steep: 5 min. Pinch of fresh leaves.)

A&D Ceylon won the Battle of the Black Teas today. The Ceylon is complimenting my turkey wheat wrap with red onion, tomato, cumber, spring mix, feta, red pepper white bean spread, and balsamic vinaigrette. Will I win the Battle of Bathroom Cleaning after lunch though?

Somehow this has become one of my morning teas on those mornings when I drink tea. Several tealogs suggest this is better as an afternoon tea. I need to try it during the day (again – I think I did when I first had it). I like it in the morning cause it’s a simple tea to drink and not too strong. I steep with 30 sec less this time. Still good.

2nd steep: +1/2 tsp fresh leaves. 6 min.
I added a bit more fresh leaves this time thinking that it would increase the strength and let me decrease the steeping time, however even with the steeping time decreased by 2 min, the tea was a bit too strong. Next time 2nd steep will be less fresh leaves at 6 min.

I drank the 1st steep while reading online and getting organized for the day. The 2nd steep while studying.

This is a second steeping from a cup I had earlier this afternoon. I added about a 1/4 tsp of fresh leaves to see if it would make the steeping a bit stronger and steeped it for about 10 min. It’s still too hot to sip much into my mouth right now since I burned my mouth on too hot food yesterday, but I think the addition of fresh leaves helped. This tea is an enjoyable cup.

I have steeped the Ceylon leaves again. The wet leaves smell more strongly of dusty cinnamon when I removed them from the tea as well as of dried old paper. The tea smelled of dust, paper, and old under its natural tea-y smell. It still tastes good, but much weaker. I will steep it longer the second time next time. I don’t think it will manage a third steep.

This morning I moved on to the next tea in my A&D DFT Series 1 set – the Ceylon. The leaves are dark chocolate colored with hints of red tones on some. They are medium in length and cylindrical in shape. The smell is rich, sweet, and dusky when I put my nose above the open tin. The tea is a medium golden brown. It smells warm and tea-y, not strongly though. The leaves have unfurled to a consistently medium chocolate shade and smell like light cinnamon dust with a hint of fresh artichoke hearts. I know, odd, but I’m new to tasting notes and I keep sniffing and thinking what does this smell like, how can I describe it. I’m better with colors than smell and taste. This tea was a smooth, enjoyable black to drink. It had a slightly drying in a good way mouth feel, much like the Dragonwell from the set. I can see how these two teas were picked by the same people. This tea is another hit for Series 1.

Two steeps of Ceylon during a slightly stressed out morning makes for a short Tealog and tea drank a little bit warmer than lukewarm but still needed. Steep #2: 5 min.

A cup of Ceylon after breakfast this morning and another cup after that. The 2nd steep was rather weak as I forgot to add a bit of fresh leaves like I usually do. 2nd steep: 5 min.

Backlogging
Yesterday morning. Mellow with milk for my first steep. Plain for my second steep. Second steep: 5 min.

Two things:
1 – I have only tried two Ceylons straight before, neither of which I’ve been a big fan of. One was good but had very strong raspberry notes and so I wasn’t in love. The other just wasn’t a great quality one so it just tasted of teaplz’s ‘default tea’ and was therefore unimpressive.
2 – I’m tired and my head hurts. I will not go into detail as to why my head hurts, but let us just say it makes me feel old but at least I didn’t break a hip, right? Anyway, it makes me pretty incapable of really studying this tea.

The leaves are really pretty. I love the leaves. Smell nice, too. Like something. Don’t know what. Brewing it up, I walked away and didn’t smell them. So I’ve got nothing there. Drinking time. Mmm. There’s some chocolaty or cocoa-like taste. Some starchy taste (just a hint – like Assam light and doesn’t go to the point of cardboard, so no malty I don’t think). Anyway, I really like it. It’s good. Will have it again when I’m not hurting and give it a more in depth review.

Had it with a little sugar and milk because I wanted to give it a try. Very nice – light cardboardy taste that worked well for morning but not too thick or overly aggressive. The leaves look so lovely and really smell nice and fruity. I wish some of that smell would show up in the tea (with or without additives) because then I’d enjoy this a little more, but overall this is a very nice tea.