Jasmine Green Tea

Five down, four to go! Yup, I have been christmas present shopping. These were all the easy presents, to the people who are usually difficult to buy for. But this year I have actually been supplied with wish lists. For! The! Win!!! I guess my grandfather wasn’t about to risk a repeat performance of last year where he got three copies of the same book.

When I was about halfway done I passed a cafe and sat down for a cup of tea and a yummy yummy chocolate orange cake. If ever there was a spongecake rating website, I’d give that one at least a 95.

This tea was a bad choice though. Oh the TEA was just nice. Very jasmine-y aroma and a surprisingly light brew. I thought it tasted pretty good, and was for once pleasantly surprised by Kusmi. They’re better than your average teabags for sure, but I’ve always felt that Kusmi was generally just the teensiest bit overrated. I liked this one, though. It could have had a better balance between tea and jasmine as the majority of the flavour was jasmine, but it could definitely have been so much worse too.

It’s just a shame that it was a far too delicate tea to go with the cake I had chosen. :/

Not bad, but my sample was a little weak. I’d love to try this a little fresher. It had a nice color and good aroma.

Steep Information:
Amount: 7
Water: 1200ml at 175°F
Tool: Breville One-Touch Tea Maker BTM800XL
Steep Time: 3 minutes
Served: Hot

Tasting Notes:
Dry Leaf Smell: toast, floral, jasmine
Steeped Tea Smell: floral (jasmine), vegetal
Flavor: minty, vegetal, bitter
Body: Medium
Aftertaste: bitter, burnt
Liquor: Translucent yellow-orange-green

mint? where did the mint come from? needed less leaf or less time, was going with 1.5tsp/8oz

Rating: 2/4 leaves

Blog: http://amazonv.teatra.de/2013/01/08/kusmi-tea-loose-leaf-green-tea-jasmine-green-tea/

Just realized that I never ogged this tea yet, how bad of me. To not share this wonderful tea with anyone. My apologies. Well this tea is just a treat for me. I don’t have a kusmi store near me so I have to ration these lovely teas. Jasmine Green has got to be my favorite kusmi tea. It is just perfect for leaving the bag in, it doesn’t overpower or get too strong. I had this yesturday while relaxing by the fire.

Usually when I buy Kusmi Tea, I buy their more special blends, their Russians, their flavored etc., and why I do that seems clearly in this tea, because it’s not very flavorful. Combine that with my preference about jasmine, and you have a slightly disappointing tea. The dry tea smells of course of jasmine flowers, but the green tea itself also shines through as an aromatic, grassy smell. The green tea base is, as i can see, a chun mee tea, which isn’t my preferred green tea. I prefer sencha and gunpowder over chun mee. The chun mees from Kusmi Tea I have tasted were all lightly anstringent. The brewed tea smells pretty much like the dry tea, but here the jasmine is even more subtle, which is positive to me. The color in the cup is orangey-yellow, and the taste is okay, I would say, but the aftertaste is slightly tannic, it’s not much, it’s just a hint of tannin, but what’s worse, is that the tea itself is boring. Kusmi did a slightly disappointing job here, and I don’t think it’s a tea, that I’m going to buy in big amounts.

Pretty average for a Jasmine Green tea (which I am not usually fond of to begin with) but this isn’t bad. I like and appreciate the fact that there isn’t that Jasmine aftertaste that lingers…it’s sweeter at the end instead…Thank you for that Kusmi.

I love Jasmine tea and I love Kusmi, so my hopes were high for this tea. The fragrance was lovely — I could smell it as soon as I opened the bag. The smell of the tea as it steeped was also beautiful, but I found myself slightly disappointed by the taste. Maybe it’s that I recently tried a wonderful Jasmine tea at Samovar (the one in Yerba Buena gardens in SF) and that spoiled me. This is a quality tea, but it did not knock my socks off. I am undecided on whether or not I would buy it again!

The taste of this tea is a little weak, but regardless it is relaxing, perfect on a lonely afternoon. The jasmine comes through quite well, giving it a floral and somewhat sweet smell and taste.

Another review my lovely computer got rid of when my browser “quit unexpectedly.” It’s not like these reviews are priceless high art or something, but having to rethink them still makes me want to throw my computer at a wall, especially when I’m not drinking the tea at the moment.

I don’t have much experience with jasmine teas, but this was beautifully fragrant and it was a lovely, calming experience drinking it. I enjoyed it a lot and wish I could say more about it now, but will update this when I drink my other bag of it. I drank it unsweetened and without milk or anything else and I think that’s the best way because of how precious that fragrance is. However, I did have something in the Lebanese restaurants in Paris that tasted like jasmine tea with a bit of sweetener and orange blossom water. It was delicious.

For a type of tea as traditional as jasmine, I’m inclined to think that better quality or fuller flavour might be found in teas from a brand specialising in Asian teas. I like Kusmi a lot, but I don’t think this is the best jasmine I could be drinking. I never thought it would be, it was just one component of the sampler I got. This tea doesn’t taste like it’s not good quality or anything, though. Side note: you can’t effectively re-steep these leaves.

I’ll try more jasmine teas in future, and it might be interesting to see how the jasmine tastes alongside green teas with slightly different flavours.