Sticky Rice Pu-erh Tuocha

I love the scent of this!! It’s so much like one of my favorite Filipino desserts called “Buko Pandan” (sweet young coconut with pandan-flavored gelatin, condensed milk and crispy rice topping). It smells deliciously like sweet toasted rice and pandan leaves.

The taste is like toasted, slighty earthy green tea with sweet sticky (aka “glutinous”) rice. So it’s just as described—yum! :)

I really like this tea and I’m glad I chose this as my free sample. This is unique to my tea collection so I will definitely order more. Thanks Chicago Tea Garden!

ETA: I steeped this pretty heavily and did not rinse it like a regular puerh. But it was still pretty tasty. Although, on cooldown, I could detect some astringency and bitterness. So, it’s best to drink it quickly and not let it linger in the cup. I still love it, though!

Steep Information:
Amount: 1 nest ~4.6g
Water: ~16 oz
Tool: ceramic Tea Forte solstice teapot
Steep Time: a little over 1 minute
Served: Hot

Tasting Notes:
Dry Leaf Smell: rice
Steeped Tea Smell: rice
Flavor: bitter, astringent, rice, green tea
Body: Medium
Aftertaste: bitter green tea
Liquor: translucent yellow-green

As an aside this online shop has amazing customer service, packaging, and products. I highly recommend them.

MilitiaJim appreciates that it is what it says, rice tea.

I started with a quick rinse steep to loosen everything up. As the nest unfurled the leaves were smaller than I expected. I ended up needed to strain the tea as I poured into my cup.

I think I was not patient enough in letting the water cool from a boil, or 1 minute was too long to steep the leaves as it was bitter. I could both smell and taste the rice.

I’m intrigued and can’t wait to try this tea again later, I am still new to pu-erh teas so the whole rinse and tiny steep concept is difficult for me to time correctly. To add trouble I also always over heat my whites and greens!

Post-Steep Additives: none

Resteep: same as the first in preparation and taste

This gets extra points just for being different and fun.

Images: http://amazonv.blogspot.com/2010/04/chicago-tea-garden-tuocha-green-pu-erh.html

I was so very very excited to see this wonderful package arrive all thanks to Tony from Chicago Tea Garden. I am so thankful I got to try a very generous selection of their teas. Now that I have some time, I can really get into these teas and see what they have to offer. So far – impressed. Very impressed.
Dry: cute little pu-erh touchas that have a mild smell. Earthy and starchy.
Liquor: 30s Light yellow liquor that smells like buttery rice. It also tastes like buttery rice. Sticky buttery rice. Ooooh yUm!
35s: A darker yellow/toasted color. More intense in the buttery goodness – more of flavour than of feeling. Very very good. I like it. Thick and toasty almost. Buttery roasty toasty.
48s: Sweeter buttery rice. As though a rice wine vinegar and sugar mixture was added, but without the acidity. mmm goodness.
1min: Delicious. Much the same as 3rd steep.
1.15min: Whoa mouth butter. This covers my tongue in that butter sensation.. like a melting pat of butter on my tongue. Slow and warm creep with a touch of a salty sensation (like a tingle almost.. your taste buddies get excited and I picture them dancing for joy – creating the slight tingle/bright sparkle feeling). I think this may be my favourite so far. But that is hard to say as all the steeps were soo very delicious. I do think I will be able to get at least another 4 steeps out of this with strong flavour as it appears the pu-erh was just changing it up a bit for the fourth steep
In the end – absolutely wonderful comfort tea. I am drinking this on a hot sunny day today. Is that crazy? No.. it’s absolutely suiting in an odd way. Personally – I will drink this tea whenever I crave buttery sticky rice…. surprisingly often to be honest. Thank you again Tony for your generosity. I am so happy I got to try this!

Oy, is it ever hot outside. Drinking hot tea in this weather is borderline torture, but since I finally got this in the mail, I just had to try it out and see what the rave is all about.

Normally, I’m not a fan of pu-erh. I know it’s an acquired taste. I’ve tried it several times in the past and I just didn’t care for the earthiness, or even dirtiness, of the flavour. But I guess it goes with the territory since I don’t care for super earthy essential oils too, like patchouli. But green pu-erh! That’s a first for me, and this sounded a lot more promising.

The smell of both the tuocha and the steeped tea doesn’t remind of sticky rice, but more of salted popcorn, like when my grandma would oil pop some, add some salt, throw it in a brown paper bag, and give that to me. I got my mom to smell it too and right away, it reminded her of tortilla chips. So we’re both getting corn rather than rice here.

It tastes saltier to me too. Not as popcorny as the smell, but it’s like a salted starch. It’s way mellower than any other pu-erh I’ve tried. I’m getting a fuller, richer mouthfeel than most other teas that I’ve tried. As the tea cools down, the salt comes out a little more too. It’s like salted butter on my tongue.

Overall, there is something very wholesome about this tea, like drinking a warm bowl of carbs. I’m not rating this yet because I’m not sure what to think of it. I like it, but I’m just not sure how much I like it yet. So glad I’ve been able to snag some before CTG closes its doors.

Thank you to Amanda for this interesting tea! It smells exactly like sticky rice. And I love sticky rice! While I was waiting for it to cool I got so hungry smelling it. Well as my luck today would have it… I over steeped it.. But as it’s cooling the bitterness is going away. It tastes like sticky rice with a bit of an earthy note. I will try again later with actually watching the time.. But I really did like this one. It is definitely something different to try.

Brewed this in a gaiwan. It’s amazing how much it really does smell and taste like sticky rice. The first steeping was a bit too astringent but all of the other ones (I think I must have done around 6 or so) were very nice.

I got a few of these in a swap, i like this one it’s really good, thanks Madeline.

Not bad!

This tuocha was a little different from camel (shark) breath. It was much harder and portions needed to be flaked off using a sharp knife. So, a little prep work was required but it was nothing too onerous.

Everyone has been raving about the initial fragrance but I have to admit that, for me, there was none in the dry tea. There was maybe a hint of grass and pasture, but that’s about it.

The prepared tea, however, was full of fragrance and flavor. The tea smelled like clean hay with cooked sushi rice. A rice flavor, however, dominates and has underpinnings of honey, oats and a very slight floral finish.

From second infusion on, this tea took on greater honey-and-oat qualities. I’m beginning to understand how pu-erh, even through its quirkiness, can build such a strong following. Each one truly does have a unique character and it even offers a varied experience during one extended sitting.

WOW this is amazing.
It is a good pu erh in it’s own right but with the sticky rice sweetness the flavors play off of eachother mmmmmmmmmmmm………

Smells like rice and tastes like rice. I brewed it gongfu style so I got to taste it as it evolved. After awhile though it got very tiring. I would like to try it western style just to see if I will end up less annoyed by it that way. overall not bad but not really a favorit.

Before you read this review, you should know that I have only tried a few puerhs and I don’t feel fully qualified to give all the tasting complexities and details.

That being said, this puerh is AWESOME! I mean it smells and tastes like sticky rice. The whole experience is amazing. The taste is just perfect and every sip comes with the initial sticky rice flavor, followed by a very earthy and dirty puerh taste but in a good way, if that makes any sense.

It is hard to describe but I think this may be one of my favorite puerhs for a while and I see it being very hard to beat.
You must try this tea purely for the interesting flavor. But you better hurry! Chicago tea garden is closing and only have a few 500g bags of this left.

I needed something special tonight, and was thirsty so instead of grabbing a glass of orange juice and a cup of rice pudding I grabbed this gem out of the sample drawer. I had opened it before to smell it and tempted to make in last week after Thai food and mango sticky rice, but I thought it was best to let this stand on its own.

The smell is spot on and do is the well I don’t want to say aftertaste as it changes just as you are swallowing. The first taste on the tongue is familiar and spa like and I’m thinking may be my water so I’ll try it next time with spring water, but this can be very easily overlooked as the second taste is the longest and most prominent. Love it! Will reinfuses but for now relaxing with this cup and enjoying the Doctor.

Edit: argh second steep is bitter due to the fine slits on the glass infuser straining ridiculously slow from tiny leaf particles. Will have to use a different strainer.

OH MY GOD
This is love. It takes just like sticky rice – I was afraid to be disappointed.
This is an awesome tea, I shall definitely need more of it some time.

Wow, the herb really smells like rice. Brews nicely, not too bitter, leaves a mild coat – of what I presume to be the herb – behind. First tuocha and first green pu’er; quite liking it.

This is my first “sheng” or “green” pu erh and it’s very nice. Light and minty (due to extra herb) this tea tastes exactly like sticky rice. The color and mouthfeel reminds me of green tea but the taste is completely different, there is a lot more bite. First steep was very light green and the tuocha did not fall completely apart, second steep however the entire thing melted and the tea color is a light amber. The second steeping is much richer with a hint of basil almost.

This tea is like a milk oolong, but instead of milk, put in rice. And then eliminate any aftertaste whatsoever.

This is at the top of the chart for puerh, for me. Drinking it, I feel as if I’m descending into my own private cavern of meditative bliss. I wish I had more of this tea! If anyone would like to trade, please pm me!

My first pu-erh. Yes, it tastes and smells exactly like sticky rice, at least on the first infusion. A fun novelty experience, but I wouldn’t buy more (only got a sample).

1st infusion (45 sec): Tastes just like sweet sticky rice, with a touch of greenness at the end.

2nd infusion (45 sec): Oops, slightly bitter — the pu-erh cake had a chance to loosen up more, and is infusing faster. The rice flavor is still there, but it’s much more grassy and earthy now.

3rd infusion (40 sec): Too earthy for me. Tastes like the smell of fresh, clean dirt. Guess pu-erh isn’t my thing.

A truly magical tea and my new favorite. For those of us who love rice as a culinary ingredient in its own right, rather than just a bland starch, this evokes some of the best heritage rice varieties and hand-crafted mochi. I don’t know how, but the puerh doesn’t overpower this at all, but blends seamlessly to make a soothing and evocative cup of tea.