191 Tasting Notes
Odd. I’m not sure about this one.
Preparation
This is my first rose and first chun mee tea. I’m not sure what I think about it. I like it, with reservations. There is a bitterness, a sharpness of taste that I can’t decide if it is an effect of preparation or of the tea itself (I followed upton’s brew instructions). This is definitely a strong tea at the recommended preparation. This has a heavy floral note to it—don’t go into this one expecting hints of rose, since that isn’t what you’ll get. It sort of smacks you upside the head with rose. Rose isn’t bad, but so far, of the florals, I like the more delicate flavor of jasmine better.
I think 5 minutes might be too long a steep time. I think I’ll go shorter next time with a slightly cooler water temperature.Preparation
The scent of this right out of the bag was vaguely peachy, which is always lovely. This is my first straight up oolong. It had a nice, mild flavor, very pleasant.
The flavor shouldn’t have been quite so mild — it’s because the tea is a few years old. I’ll have to buy a fresh batch at some point…
I’d be curious to try it. Guess what I ordered? Purple tea. Sigh. Should be interesting. I need to stay away from the forums,
Purple tea?
That looks really interesting. You’ll have to let me know how it is.
I love pearl teas. They just look so nice and tidy, all rolled up in little tea-leaf balls. This is good stuff, my friends. The jasmine comes through, and its a nice, well-balanced (to me, at least) blend of jasmine and green tea. Neither one really overpowers the other. I do really like jasmine teas, so I am a bit biased in this. This is a good tea for relaxing and winding down at the end of the day. It whispers, more than it talks.
Preparation
The dry tea smells wonderful. It has a warm, spicy smell, with the cinnamon and cardamom really coming through, but not overpowering the nuttiness. The brewed tea itself is an excellent dessert tea. It smells like a spiced baked apple. It also rather tastes like it—the cinnamon mellows out, and apple is the dominant fruit note. It has a sort of dry mouth feel. The aftertaste is more fruity than spicy.
Preparation
Sounds like that tea was given the wrong name. Apple =/= toasted nut brulee. How odd.
It may also be my inexperienced nose/mouth guiding me astray. I think flavors have to hit me pretty hard to make me notice them. I’m sure I’ll get better as time goes by. I’m already getting better at figuring out what I’m tasting, vs. my usual “yummy” or “meh”. It may also partly be because I’m not sure I can wrap my head around “nutty” tea. Fruity makes more sense than nutty, so I’m probably better at identifying fruity flavors.
Wait until you try honeybush. It’s woody! :)
Still delicious after only a one minute steep. The obvious differences between a one minute and three minute steep—lighter color, flavor, and all around more delicate. I had it with a Fuyu persimmon this morning, which was an excellent choice. It really brought out the sweetness of the tea. Unsweetened, as always. Next time I’ll try a two minute steep, see which I like best.
Preparation
This tea is beautiful. To start with, the dry mix is visually pleasing and the brewed tea is a beautiful purplish-red. It really needs to be consumed from one of my very fancy tea cups. The smell of both the dry tea and the brewed tea is wonderful as well. Very fruity, which I definitely appreciate. I like when tea hits all my senses.
So much for sight and smell, what about the one that really matters? Taste? Less tea-like than I imagined. Well, less green tea. Others are right, the green does get muted by the intensity of the fruit and hibiscus. You do get some hints of the green tea, but hints are really all you get. I’m drinking it hot and unsweetened right now. This would be amazing as an iced tea. I’ll definitely drink it again (and not just because I have a lot of it).
Preparation
You write much better reviews than I do. I’m terrible at it. :)
I just did a second steeping of the tea for one minute, as Teavana recommends. Its less fruity, and I’m trying to decide if its more tea-ish, or just watery. The color is now a light purple and has much less of a fruit scent. I’ll need to try one minute with a first steeping—it might be since its on the second, it needs longer. I’m definitely on the fence about a one minute steep.
Oh, and thanks, btw. Reviews always make me nervous—what if I’m totally off base? What if my writing really does suck? Wavery self-esteem, I has it.
I usually do second steepings for 1minute over the initial steep time. So for this tea I’d do four minutes on the second steep. That’s pretty standard, except for pu-erh and some oolongs where you do steepings in 30 second intervals.
Oh, and on the subject of reviews — apparently a lot of people don’t write reviews when they drink a tea. It’s a log, not a review blog, according to the thread I read in the discussion boards. Some just put stuff like, “I brewed the cup too long but it was good with a little honey.” Or no log text at all, just a rating and steep time/temp. Only one of a user’s tasting notes shows up for each tea, so you can log a tea all you want without spamming the tea’s page. Cool, yes?
