Top Leaf

I decided I was going to try cold brewing some of this last night as an experiment; I always have problems waking up in the morning so figured one less thing to do in the a.m. would be a good idea.

The experiment was a success, it tastes pretty good this way. I don’t know how thrilled I am about drinking cold plain sencha, but it was nice warmed up in the microwave for 60 seconds. I hope I have not offended any tea purists with that statement!

I thought I had rated this before but I guess not… I will do a proper tea brewing and tasting of it soon. For now I can say it is very clean and vegetal tasting.

Thank you TeaEqualsBliss for sending me some of this tea! It’s A-MAZ-ING and I’m glad that I had this opportunity to try it.

This is so good. I love the light grapefruit notes of this tea. The flavor is something like a Gyokuro and a Sencha, but I like it better than either of them. It is so completely delightful.

And, now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to be alone with this tea.

Finally decided to take the plunge and buy this tea. I’m glad I did. I figured it was more or less a sencha and it pretty much is. It’s a little different in that the grassy-spinach taste is a little subdued compared to the in-your-face senchas I’ve had. I was a little disappointing to have found absolutely no umami factor in it though.

Even with that, it is very creamy with a hint of some juicy quality. And I think there was a slight note of pistachio. I got some sort of nut note and while trying to figure it out I kept thinking pistachio. It may not be pistachio but the color of the tea kept making me think of the green nut! Either way…pistachio!

Speaking of color, the dry leaves are a nice dark emerald, wet they become this bright, vivid, vibrant emerald green. It was very pretty. Even the infusion had a greenish cast to it, very cool, kind of like a sencha or genmaicha infused with matcha powder. This is why I think I was coming up with pistachios and not some other nut…so much green!

I found a slight hint of astringency, but it wasn’t the typically blech bitter-astringency I always taste. This was a silky-astringency. It was actually quite pleasant. I never thought I would say astringency in tea being pleasant…I abhor astringency. But this was just a slight drying of the mouth with a bit of a silky mouthfeel. Very pleasant, what I always thought astringency could be but never actually found it to be, at least not in green teas.

This is such a pretty and good tasting tea, definitely worth trying out.

I’m excited to try something from The Mellow Monk. I’ve heard good things about their teas but never had any. Now, thanks to TeaEqualsBliss, I get to try my first one today!

The smell of the wet leaves and the liquid have a crazy warm cinnamon note to them. The taste is just as nuts. More so even. It tastes like a plum spice tea. A mild plum spice tea with a grassy undernote, but still a plum spice tea. It almost makes me think that I didn’t clean my teapot out enough before I brewed this, but I used my kyusu dedicated to sencha so I know that’s not it. Hmm. Maybe this tea absorbed the flavor of another tea because I can’t imagine any sencha actually tasting like that. But maybe I’m wrong and this is just one weird-ass sencha. Regardless, this is too weird and wrong for me to rate.
^3g/6oz

Dry aroma: sweet, toasted notes, hints of spring clover and cut melon
Wet aroma: sweet cream butter, nutty, clover and baby spinach
Appearance: deep green jade hue, folded-slightly twisted leaf and wabi sabi hints of curled leaves and blond threads. Moderate leaf length implying spring pluck and new growth pick.
Cup: Pale, ghostly green luminescent liquor; clear, bright, translucent. Clean, vegetal sweet flavors, creamy mouth feel, with hints of pistachios. A silken astringency slides against an elusive body that seems to call to mind spring clouds. Hints of melon and fruit are ethereally present against the creamy, nutty layers. Wonderfully balanced, in all of its characteristics, dancing somewhere between a gyokuro and quality shinriku sencha.
Brewing: 3g in 8oz porcelain gaiwan, using 168 degree water and steeped for 3 minutes. Managed to get 3 consistent extractions.
This tea won the North American tea championship in the green tea division in 2010. The service was swift, courteous, and enclosed note had a personalized touch. Overall, a very lovely tea.

Thank you for the lovely sample Alphakitty! The leaves have a beautiful deep green color. The aroma is slightly vegetal and sweet with hints of butter. It’s sweet and has a bit of a buttery\vegetal taste to it. I want to say that there is a bit of a light(and I mean LIGHT) citrus flavor in the background. I reeeaalllllyyy enjoyed this tea. It’s been a minute or two since I’ve had a nice green :]
Thanks again!

The leaves of this tea are a dark, pine green and look like little bits of chopped-up needles. I’m not quite sure what to expect of this tea, I’ve never tried any of Mellow Monk’s products before – this and one other sample were gifts from TeaEqualsBliss. I’m not even sure what type of tea this is or where it’s from, though my guess from the flavour is that it’s Japanese.

It’s faintly sweet and a bit hay-like at first but then it takes on a savoury, slightly nutty-tasting tone. Then the flavour trails off into a grassy, slightly bitter aftertaste. The touch of bitterness actually seems to work with this tea providing a counterpoint to the initial sweetness that gives this tea balance. It also leaves a nice, fresh, palate-cleansing taste in my mouth.

mmm! sipping on this while carving a pumpkin today! It is really delicious tea, that tastes vegetal and buttery smooth. I am almost out of this tea, and will most definitely have to restock after this sample is finished!

Drinking the last of my Top Leaf sample presently. It’s quite good. I enjoy this more than most of the sencha teas I’ve tried. It’s characteristic smoothness is very appealing. The deep grassy flavor is maximized with with almost zero astringency (at least the way I brew it: < 1 minute). It’s a very refreshing and invigorating tea for early morning drinking. First time I tried this was actually at a tea gathering with friends in the evening, and having been away from Japanese green teas for a while, I found myself at a low tolerance to their higher caffeine levels (relative to whole leaf Chinese teas) and could not get to sleep that night.

Anyway, I find this kind of tea very well suited for the morning, especially when it’s still dark out. Drinking before and during dawn is one of my favorite times for tea. It’s a liminal and contemplative time, when I feel completely free of distractions. And I’m finding the Mellow Monk teas I’ve tried to be apropos in that space. Not just anything will do here. A more astringent sencha would be like the shock of a bad alarm clock, starting your day with a nervous jolt. I can’t have that.

Honestly, I’m generally much more fond of the shaded Japanese greens, as I had indicated in my tasting note of Mellow Monk’s kabusecha (Shaded Leaf). I enjoyed the kabusecha quite thoroughly, and this tea doesn’t fall that far beneath it. I would take this over a standard sencha any morning. Though if I had my way, and money was no concern, I’d be going for the finest gyokuro all the time (which is really my favorite of the Japanese greens, far and away).

For the price, which is less than half of Mellow Monk’s kabusecha, Top Leaf is much more reasonable for the possibility of drinking a good Japanese green tea daily. And it’s certainly a tempting prospect…

A delicious and wonderful sencha. Not-too-intensely vegetal (cooked greens) in the first infusion, slightly less vegetal with a hint of stringency in the second, and pleasantly astringent in the third. A great value indeed for the price!

First infusion – 5 g. per 8 oz. water, 65 deg., 50 sec.

Second infusion – 5 g. per 8 oz. water, 60 deg., 1 min.

Third infusion – 5 g. per 8 oz. water, 55 deg., 10 min.

This is my favorite! I love this like no other. I also love the company. Their customer service is awesome! I love how they use the personal touch. Their shipping is fast, and inexpensive. I especially love how they listen and respond to, not only their own customers, but also the tea drinking community, in general. They are very in-touch. They are also a green certified company, and all of their teas are organic.

Top Leaf is my top choice. It is sweet and berry-like, and has that slightly citrus tangy lip smacking quality. There’s also a hint of sweet butteriness, like corn on the cob. I love the smell of the dry leaf, too. It smells of sweet mellon and honey suckle. The color is quite beautiful. I always order a lot, because I drink it down, fast. It leaves me feeling centered, clean, and relaxed. I crave it all day long.

Thanks to LiberTeas for sending me a sample, especially of a tea she really loves!

I’ve never had guricha (or tamaryokucha) before, so this was a new experience for me and I have been excited to try it. For this first time, I went ahead and followed the exact instructions on Mellow Monk’s website. I hope to experiment a little with the 3g – 5g left or so…

The loose leaf actually gave off an aroma like a freshly plowed garden. Yes, even like soil a little. That didn’t scare me off, because even though that isn’t an aroma that sounds edible, it reminded me of going to a nursery or walking through a garden, and those are good kinds of smells.

As for the tea itself — this is definitely different than regular sencha! There is no hint of that fresh bitterness, or grassy/vegetal flavor. Instead there is a bit of flavorful earthiness, it is definitely fruity, with a mix of mint and pine in the background. Perhaps its more like the smell of pine needles, but very muted, with mint in there somewhere.

I hope to compare it to some other gurichas, too, to see if this is a pretty unique tea, or if it’s typical of guricha. Either way, it’s delicious! There’s a good chance it could go on my shopping list in the future.

First tea from Mellow Monk. They had a promotion going on after Top Leaf won an award.

Smelled very…. green, similar to fresh cut grass. Its a good smell, but not at the top of my list. With the first steeping it was shockingly smooth yet the flavor was distinct and noticeable, not in an overpowering way. The flavor demands and holds your attention. The second steeping, while having a fainter flavor is remarkably similar in quality to the first.
Verdict: Beautiful and delightful, this tea is under-priced. No reason you shouldn’t treat yourself to top notch, award winning tea.

Interesting stuff. Hmm. Need to spend more time before rating.

This is extremely light in scent and flavor but does NOT have an after taste, thankfully. Next time I am going to over infuse. It’s very light green in color. The leaves – both dry and wet – have a brilliant color tho!

I got this tea as a birthday gift, and I couldn’t wait to try it out. I saw that a lot of people had a lot of good things to say about it, so I must admit that I was rather excited.

After the first steeping, which was 2 mins. long, I found it interesting how it smelled grassier (is that even a word?) than my Yamakai Sencha. It also tasted a bit grassier, but that was restricted to being an undertone which enhanced the vegetative flavors. What was really nice about the flavor was the it was subtle, and I couldn’t identify the exact flavors (with the exception of the grass and a vague sense of “vegetable”), and it made for a nice tea to sip while stuck inside due to weather. All in all, I’m rather glad that I have a whole bag of this, as it is officially my new favorite tea.

While it may be intense for some on the foretaste, it settles into a grassy, berry-sweet middle ground unlike any sencha I’ve ever tried.

Full Review: http://www.teaviews.com/2010/08/07/review-mellow-monk-top-leaf-green-tea/

Been on a bit of a Japanese green kick and I have tried a handful of senchas, gyokuros and a highly touted shincha over the past few months — I must say Top Leaf is the cream of the crop. For my tastes, and wallet this is the best sencha I have found yet!

Everything about this tea is very well rounded, without a single glaring flaw or characteristic dominating the flavor profile or aroma. Top Leaf brings the entire gambit of Japanese flavors together seamlessly into a full bodied and near perfectly balanced cuppa creamy green greatness: sweet, creamy, savory, nutty, vegetal, mildly oceanic with a forgiving faint citrus-like astringency. Really I can’t emphasize enough how well balanced these elements are in this particular tea, its certainly an accomplishment!

Another high point, Top Leaf is relatively flexible and forgiving with regards to brew temp and time which is not a characteristic shared with many other senchas I have encountered. It brews wonderfully mellow and sweet at gyokuro-like temperatures ~ 120 and can tolerate a full minute of 180 for the savory 2nd steep without getting overly bitter. Anything in-between is great too of course! Really, you have to completely blow it (in sencha standards!) to muck this one up.

Overall a great great sencha and certainly worthy of a spot amongst one of my favorite teas. Its exceptionally well balanced bordering on exquisite! I have gone through 3.5 oz and recently ordered more! In my opinion, you’d be hard pressed to find a better quality japanese green for the price.

I agree with TeaEqualsBliss – this tea has a buttered veggies kind of taste which I personally enjoy quite a bit. Delicious.

I really enjoy green teas, and I’ve been meaning to try this for a while now. I was pleased with the light flavor of the tea. In the family of green teas, the lighter ones are definitely my favorites. I am a little curious about why the leaves from this pot seem so broken up, but it could be because I’ve had the tea for a while and it’s moved around a bit.