90
drank Songluo Broken by Harney & Sons
257 tasting notes

My tea budget was depleted recently so I’ve been happily focused on my stock of morning rotation black teas in my cabinet. But, as great as they are, it wasn’t long before I started getting the itch to venture out into something new. Again Harney & Sons came to the rescue with a great sale on already very reasonably priced teas.

I found this Songluo Broken tea in their Chinese Teas section. Apparently, this variety with broken leaves comes at a much lower price than the one with non-broken leaves. Since I care more about flavor than appearance, this was fine with me.

When I opened the Harney & Sons bag, an aroma of keemun wafted forth. There also was a sweet attribute to the smell which was quite pronounced. The dark brown leaves were small and appeared…uh…BROKEN. They reminded me of finely ground mulch.

As the folks at Harney & Sons recommend, I brewed the leaves at 212 degrees for five minutes. The color was an orange-brown. The brewed odor was subtle with sweet keemun-like undertones.

My first sip had an astringent attribute but this completely disintegrated with the next sip. The flavor was mild with keemun and sweet characteristics. Harney’s web page likens the sweet attribute to agave. To me, it was more like Sweet’N Low, which I have become very familiar with since I am no longer allowed to drink the South’s traditional sweet tea. I really don’t have any complaints about that flavor (or agave’s for that matter).

The pleasant and moderate flavors were also quite smooth. I had no trouble swallowing my first cup rapidly. The taste levels were certainly sufficient to please my palate. The aftertaste was light and gentle.

This tea is a tremendous bargain with first-rate flavors. I highly recommend it for anyone who enjoys Chinese teas but has a limited tea allowance (like yours truly). I also believe that people with hefty tea budgets will not be disappointed either.

Flavors: Sweet, Tea

Preparation
Boiling 5 min, 0 sec 5 tsp 40 OZ / 1182 ML

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I ventured into the world of serious tea drinking in the Summer of 2011. I started out slowly and gently with bagged tea but climbed to the incredible flavorful heights of loose leaf teas in October of that year. Once you go leaf, you never go bag (except when you get free samples)!

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South Carolina, USA

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