Mountain Organic Indonesian Green Tea

Tea At Sea was kind enough to send me a sample of this beautiful tea. The packaging is delightful! It came with a half cork, a toothpick, and little “Tea at Sea” flag that you can turn into a little sailboat to float on top of your tea. Quite unique.
The tea was rolled tightly, and you can tell just by looking at it that it’s a high quality tea. The tea itself is a light green tea – a little too light for my taste. It wasn’t really bitter at all, and had some light flowery notes.

Thanks Tea at Sea for the sample of this! I like it as it’s a pleasant green tea. It has a very green taste but in a way that I like, not in a grassy way. It is mild, or maybe 3 minutes is not long enough but I liked it that way. I can’t believe the weekend is over already :( it’s the most time I get to enjoy doing nothing…

Thanks for the sample, Tea at Sea!

It’s redundant at this point, but I’m going to say it anyway: this is some of the cutest packaging I’ve ever seen. The sample packets are also resealable, which is quite nice.

I went with the company’s suggested steeping parameters: 185f, 2 tsp/16 oz, 6 mins. The brew smells sweet and grassy. It tastes very much like sencha. I’m getting a lot of savory spinach, with a slight drying at the end. For the second steep, I brewed at 195f for 8 mins. It came out smoother somehow. A touch of seaweed flavor peeked out. S’good. A nice, enjoyable cuppa.

By the way, the leaf of this tea expands a lot. If possible, use steeping tools that allow a lot of space for the leaves to unfurl.

It’s worth pointing out that this company had a rocky start on Steepster and has (in my opinion) thoroughly redeemed itself. So props, for taking heed of constructive criticism, being generous with samples, and having a truly good product. Thank you!

This Mountain Organic indonesian Green Tea from Tea at Sea is very good. The flavor is succulent, the liquor pale green, and the leaves unfurl in the manner of oolong, getting better and better with each subsequent infusion!

As this was my final pot, I am now putting this tea—the first I’ve ever tried from Indonesia—on my wishlist. Many thanks to Tea at Sea for the generous samples—you were right: tasting is believing!

second infusion: whoops! I just read at the Tea at Sea website that the first infusion is supposed to be discarded. So that’s why the second infusion is so good—because it’s really the first! ;-)

Backlog:

One of the most impressive teas that I’ve tried from Indonesia.

A very fresh, uplifting flavor. Soft and silky. Buttery taste and texture. Mildly vegetal, reminiscent of freshly steamed spinach, and with the buttery notes, it becomes a steamed spinach that’s been lightly drizzled with butter. Nice.

But this has a nice complexity to it too, with floral mid-notes, and delicate nutty tones and a fruit note in the distance. One of the sweeter green teas I’ve come across in my tea journeys.

I love the two teas that I’ve tried from this company. Here’s my full-length review of this one: http://sororiteasisters.com/2014/02/05/organic-mountain-indonesian-green-tea-tea-sea/

I still love this tea. I received my shipment and it tormented me open me drink me. So I did used 2 tsp in a small tea pot with a long soak and once again it did not disappoint. The liquid is quite pale a very light yellow but the scent and taste are such a deep mix of honey and butter and corn and some fruit, more fruit in subsequent steeping’s. This one is taking me thorugh a logn day of head bashing!

I was trying to find a day I could enjoy many infusions of this tea but that’s not about to happen until the week-end. As soon as I saw the leaves I just knew this was going to be a high quality green tea. The green leaves were curled like an oolong. Even the flavour was a bit like an oolong. Nutty and buttery not grassy. I like grassy but this is very different for a green tea. Didn’t pick up too much fruit notes or seaweed like the others. Maybe with a second infusion. I hope my leaves last until the afternoon. I think I would buy this one from Tea at Sea. It’s a keeper. Thank-you Tea at Sea for the free sample.

I got this as part of Tea at Sea’s free sample promotion in the Steepster discussions area.

Packaging/Instructions: The sample came in a small zip-seal bag with the brewing instructions included on a label attached with a string. According to them, it should be brewed at 85°C, but I did it a bit lower for about 3 minutes.

Dry leaf: The dry leaf looks like little dark green pellets, all curled and twisted up. The smell of the dry leaf is strongly vegetal – I noticed seaweed the most, but I do get why others would smell corn silk.

Liquor: The liquor is a clear yellow-green, and smells less seaweed-y and more oolong-y than the dry leaf. This is borne out when I taste it – it reminds me a lot of the lightly-roasted coconut oolong I had yesterday. Not very astringent, but I can detect a floral hint underneath. Orchid perhaps?

Verdict: This is nice, but I think I prefer my green teas a bit stronger. This is a bit too light for me.

EDIT: I’ve steeped this three times now. The third infusion was a bit hotter and ran a bit longer to get more tea out of the leaf. So far, I like the depth of the third infusion best – it developed a sweet/savoury flavour reminiscent of squash.

internet dropping. highlights = nice green tea, spinach, tasty, refreshing…would get this one again when i want to rotate a green into my cupboard.

This tea is like an object lesson in what a difference a little toasting can make. Not bad, but not nearly as deep as the corresponding oolong and black teas. Ah well, can’t win ’em all!