34 Tasting Notes

91

Yummy :) On the sweeter side out of all the silver needle teas I’ve had. I love silver needle because it’s (nearly) impossible to ruin it – I just steep the leaves straight in a cup, either while working or on the go, and there is always a 50/50 chance I will get distracted with something and come back to my tea a while later. This one never lets me down.

Preparation
200 °F / 93 °C 4 min, 0 sec

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87

I haven’t quite yet figured out how to steep Chun Mei in a way that I really like. Haven’t figured out yet if it’s that I am not a Chun Mei fan or if I just haven’t found the right steeping parameters. For a Chun Mei this is good, it just keeps coming out a bit too dull and bitter for me. I’ve reached the end of my sample so it might be a while before I figure this one out.

Preparation
200 °F / 93 °C 2 min, 0 sec

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88

So I made this one gongfu style because, well, actually I don’t know why, I just did. It was pretty good; kind of had this sweet/peppery thing going on and a roasty bakey goodness. I liked it.

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96

Wow, this was sweet – almost candy-like. One of the things that I always like about jasmine pearls is that you never need as much leaf as most other green teas to get a good flavor. It’s also one of the things that I forget the most and usually end up with super jasmine-y tea. Which in this case is yummy. This is probably a tie with the Bailin Gongfu for my favorite of the TeaVivre samples.

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89

So I kind of have a completely neutral relationship with white tea so far. The last one I had was a silver needle, that — while I’m sure it could have been a great silver needle — didn’t really do it for me.

I think this one is better, but I didn’t really get much of a delicate floral taste. Probably due to my “throw it in a cup and add hot water” style of drinking tea at work, it tasted a little more “bakey” or “bready”. Those don’t really sound like the most appetizing words to describe tea, but it’s not in a bad way, I promise. Another aspect that I repeatedly fail to consider is that some of the little leaf pieces don’t sink to the bottom and it’s kind of tricky to drink straight out of the cup (and a bit awkward during meetings). But overall it’s a solid bai mu dan.

gmathis

Sounds pretty tasty. I have trouble with the “un-flavor” of most white teas.

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94

Finished the last of this today, and I’m a little sad it’s gone. It was a really good Tie Guan Yin. My office just got a new water dispenser as part of a switch to a new vending company, and it has a hot water spigot that dispenses clean, hot, and not funny-tasting water on a consistent basis. Yay! This means I get to take teas to work that are better than I would have normally taken, since I’m hesitant to waste good tea on “office water”. Before this I don’t think the hot water dispenser was properly maintained – it always tasted like some cleaning product. 0_o

This was a good work tea since it didn’t get bitter with extended steeping (I tend to throw the leaves in the cup and wing it) and it lasted for more steepings than I expected.

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96

Thanks Angel for the sample!

I just love it when a tea is good enough to outsmart the questionable water in my office. We had this hot water spigot which was already shady enough, but lately the water has come out smelling of unknown chemicals….so I have been using my trusty old Zarafina. It’s good but it generally handles black/dark teas better than green or white.

On to the tea itself….this one has a full-bodied bakey goodness that I love in a morning tea. I used the entire little bag (~7g?) for 16 oz of water and it was really good. It really caters to my need to have pastry-ish things in the morning without actually needing to consume a pastry. Also, as I accidentally found out, quite good cool/cold as well. Forgot a bit in my cup and when I came back and took a sip my first thought was “heh…cookie”, although I would have to go with a generic cookie as it didn’t taste like a cookie long enough to make a distinction. :P

Overall, quite tasty. I will probably end up bringing most of the rest to work. Part I will keep at home to test different steeping conditions.

Preparation
195 °F / 90 °C 3 min, 15 sec

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94

Om nom nom…I think I might have found our household breakfast tea. This really is full-bodied and malty (I think I finally understand what malty is..or maybe not..meh). It’s also suitable for members of the household that might not be as tea-crazed as this one is (i.e my husband). There have been only a handful of teas that he has tried and liked. When on a whim I asked him to try this one as I was impressed by the first sip, he actually really liked it. It always makes me happy to share good tea :)

Bonus note about Silk Road Teas – I had a small teapot in my order and the lid arrived broken. I called to ask for a replacement and they apologized and were really nice about it, and asked about the packaging so it wouldn’t happen in the future…all in all a great customer service experience (part of me always expects hassles when dealing with stuff like that). It was my second order with them and I will probably order again. The only thing that bugs me a little is that they only do 4oz increments of tea, which is more than I usually like to order at once of a tea I haven’t tried (although the price per oz. ends up pretty good).

Preparation
195 °F / 90 °C 3 min, 30 sec

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85
drank Grapefruit Green by Lupicia
34 tasting notes

If you like grapefruits, you will like this tea. If you don’t like grapefruits, you still might like this tea. I’m not personally a huge fan of grapefruits. I can’t stand them actually – I kind of like the way they smell but I won’t eat them. This tea has a nice citrus-y flavor that seems like a hybrid between grapefruit and generic citrus-y goodness. Bonus points for grapefruit peel pieces.

Preparation
180 °F / 82 °C 2 min, 45 sec

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Profile

Bio

I’m a 25 year old software developer working from home in (mostly) sunny Southern California. The best part of it all is being able to use my zojirushi for an endless supply of tea…mwahahaha….

I drink mostly pure green, oolong and black tea – but I have been known to fall in love with the occasional flavored tea (I’m looking at you, Lupica Melon Oolong).

My rating scale is rather arbitrary, since I find it kind of hard to compare teas on a numerical scale. The text part is much more useful…provided I can figure out how to describe the tea.

The rest of my time I spend in yoga, zumba, hanging out with my beagle and husband, cooking, reading, trying to learn to draw, and attempting to not play Skyrim. I’m never going to finish that one.

The only teas I stay away from are rooibos, since that gives me a weird headache thing. Other than that, I’ll try anything once.

Location

Aliso Viejo, CA

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