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Honey! A delicate honey smell and flavor. It seems pretty balanced with only the slightest hint of toasty. The 3rd steep turned a red gold color that may just be one of the prettiest cups of tea I’ve seen (alas, no pictures!). I brewed this in a gaiwan but there wasn’t much of a change until the very end steeps where a bit of mineral came out. It was pleasant but I’m not sure how often I would want to come back to it as opposed to a bolder tea.

From dark matter 2016

Brewed this western style. Didn’t see the instructions for 194 F water until after I poured the boiling in. Steeped 5 minutes and wondered if I may have a bitter cup. But it looks like this tea is about foolproof. Completely smooth, dark fruit like raisins, and a bit of malt and the finish. I even got two more steeps a at five minutes and then a fourth one that sat awhile. The last was a bit light but also had a bit of cocoa which was nice. No bitterness or astringency here, but still brighter in flavor than some Yunnan blacks.

It was great for yet another cold rainy day.

From dark matter 2016:

Of all the Dark Matter teas I’ve tried so far this has been possibly the most enjoyable and of course it’s the one with only 2 grams, little to now information on it, and no way of buying more. That’s what I get for not sticking with tea bags I guess. This tea smelled a little strange when I opened it like some type of candy (havlah maybe?). Brewed, it smelled a little like toasted sesame oil. There was a noticeable light toasty flavor without the char I’ve been getting in the roasted oolongs I’ve tried recently. It was floral and a little fruity and the end of the sip was a dry creamy flavored finish. I steeped this about 7 or so times with good results then continued to steep very weak steeps after that refusing to let go.

From 2016 Dark Matter

Gaiwan brewed, 1 rinse, gradually increasing infusions starting with a few seconds.

I was applying for jobs while drinking this so I powered through it…this is why I split my samples in two. So no great notes but man did I enjoy this. Leaf smells briney, but only a bit of this comes out in the beginning. Good full initial steeps. Lots of mineral flavor throughout. Brown sugar coming out in the end, although a little more unrefined like jaggery or picondillo. Nothing intimidating here.

From Dark Matter 2016

It’s suddenly changed to being cold and dreary today so I thought it would be a good time to try this tea. I saw a few recommendations to brew this western style and upon opening the package I see the tea is small broken leaves so I definately wanted to use my For Life brew mug. The tea itself is dark and uniform, nothing appeared to be added. The smell was sweet and spicy and reminded me of either a pastry or spice mix I had once. I can’t quite place the memory, isn’t that infuriating?

To prevent bitterness I only brewed 3 minutes. The tea itself is rich and malty with a bit of chocolate and chestnuts. There’s a bit of spice at the beginning and also an end note much like the smell. I imagine that’s the rum? I have no idea what that tastes like…but it’s very good. I ended up with almost no bitterness or astringency, it was very smooth. I guess you really need to watch your brewing times with this one.

From Dark Matter 2016

Brewed in a gaiwan. Just under boiling water.
This smelled amazing like tobacco and dark chocolate. And unfurls into whole crinkled leaves. But I let the first steep go too long (30 sec?) and ended up with just char and tobacco. This might date me but getting through that first steep made me keep thinking about that “kissing a smoker is like licking an ashtray” ad (or was it a poster?). Later steeps continued with the tobacco, did no one else get this? I’ve never smoked as I’m super repelled by the taste and smell but I grew up around smokers and this taste very much reminds me of cigarettes. At some later steep this flavor fades to the background and becomes pleasant. It also starts becoming floral and has an inorganic earth finish. So a bit of a rough start for me but worth it for the later steeps. Not sure how many I got, I started to let it go 10-15 min infusions at the end while cooking dinner.

Next time I’m definitely using less tea or being stricter about keeping my initial steeping times short. Maybe even rinsing this?

From Dark Matter 2016:

I’ve been looking forward to this one! The leaves are latge whole, and brittle. They have a mottled appearance and honestly look more like something you would find outside on the ground than processed tea. The smell is tart and very much like umeboshi. I used the second set of brewing parameters on the package.

The tea isnt sour but does have just a hint of tartness. The umeboshi flavor is there and a bit of a briney taste. It’s defiantly a savory tea, and goes down smooth. I grew a shiso plant once and preserved the leaves in salt, and this tastes much like those leaves once they were rinsed. I got two good steps out of this. When I first saw this added to the group buy I assumed this was a Japanese take on the shou pu erh, but instead this tastes very much like an anaerobic lactic acid fermentation.

This was about the most unique tea I’ve gotten recently. I can see myself getting this again just to have occasionally. This would be lovely in ochazuke. I might pick up some rice and use the rest of my sample to make it.

Had a friend try this. Their verdict: olives!

From 2016 Dark Matter:

Had this in a gaiwan, eyeballed amount, boiling to slightly under boiling water, 1 rinse.

This tea came as a nice large flake. The leaves seem to be in larger pieces. This brewed up with a dark red/orange hue like a red tea and not the dark tea sort of compost brown.

1st couple of steeps was pretty much standard earth flavor I expect from shou with no outstanding funk that I could tell. There’s some brine there as well. Later steeps continue to be mellow and have a bit of mineral bite at the end. The ending steeps once they started to get pale actually had a sweet flavor along with the minerals.

This was pleasant. Lots of flavor without being weak and nothing objectionable. It would make a good everyday baseline ripe.

From 2016 Dark matter group buy:

Tried this again, this time with a gaiwan much to the annoyance of my cat. She can’t sit on my lap while I fumble with my thermos and pouring and whatnot so she sat in another chair and glared at me until it was time to hold her again. Oh well

Used just under boiling water in a thermos so it gradually cooled as I went along. I lost count of the steeps but it was upwards of 10 to be sure. 1st steep was the same toasty flavor as last time. On the 2nd one I got a lot of char flavor and it was actually rather unpleasant. 3rd steep started to open up with the malty black tea flavor with the toast at the end. Subsequent steeps were similar with the toasty end becoming slightly astringent as well. At the end I was brewing multiple minutes and getting light yellow infusions. The toast was gone and it was now smooth and warm and sweet.

Well it’s probably a little too heavy on the roast for my tastes. The ending was a great experience however.

When I first reviewed this tea I was a little perplexed because I really enjoyed it….and yet I didn’t really feel like drinking any more. A hour after I posted the review I found out why…caffeine! I assumed it was because I had a couple of teas that day and overdid it. So I waited for a day when I could have this after I woke up. Same thing: headache starting with the second steep then jitters later. I looked up if the tea flowers were adding caffeine but it turns out they only have a little caffeine.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12568558
Sorry, behind a paywall. I didn’t get to look at anything but the abstract myself so I don’t know their methods or what they mean by “various teas”.

I even found a site that was selling tea flowers as “the only non-caffeinated tea truely from Camilla sinensis”… Of course later in the same page it also mentions containing “very little caffeine”. Not exactly the same thing :/ But when your selling that much BS I guess it doesn’t matter.

So it’s not the flowers but at 1 bud + leaf it’s a bit tippier than most of the blacks I’m used to. I guess I’ll find out when I branch out more, I guess I’ll be sure when I try a golden tipped tea to take it easy. This one I guess I’ll only be having in moderation.