Red Blossom Tea Company

This is an amazing tea. Very floral, very aromatic, with a silky mouth feel and mellow flavor. I picked this up in San Francisco over the Christmas holiday, and wasn’t letting myself open it until we moved in to the new house.

I’m so glad I decided to treat myself today – this is lovely.

Red Blossom’s Jin Xuan had all the characteristics of a Jin Xuan but was very weak in taste. It’s as if it was picked before it was ripe, like a white strawberry.

Overall, unsatisfying.

This was the last of the Huang Shan Mao Feng from Red Blossom. I had about 5g left. Since the last bit of it had a lot of the tea dust and broken leaves I put the dry leaves into a strainer and gently shook off the small bits. I was left with about 3g of dry tea.

The aroma of the wet tea leaves was reminiscent of yuzu; a citrus fruit that’s woody and refreshing. There was also a bit of toasty-nuttiness to it.

The liquor was easily drunk. The flavour was subtle. I found the mouth feel to be juicy but slightly astringent. In fact the astringency was a very nice compliment to the juiciness.

I like this tea but I feel it’s a delicate brew to make. For me, its not an everyday tea but one that takes some time and dedication to appreciate.

Overall, I think it’s a good green tea. Even though my cup is empty the taste lingers on my tongue.

LOVE IT!!!!!!

This is my afternoon tea choice. I was hoping for something nice and light and this tea delivered.

The tea is so pretty and delicate. The leaves are quite long, mixed with some shorter ones as well. It’s all twisted together and reminds me of confetti all curled around.

165/1.5 min The first scent I’m getting is vegetal and I’m pretty much rolling my eyes as it’s what I always get. I’m hoping not to be on the verge of drinking yet another cup of asparagus tea. It is somewhat vegetal, but I’m disgusted by it. In fact, I think I’m beginning to appreciate vegetal tasting teas now because here I sit, drinking it. I do pick up a slight floral taste as indicated in the description, and yes, I can discern a macadamia nut follow, but I am not picking up any sweetness or grass. Just a tad of asparagus. (Yes, again.) I’m starting to forge a bond with asparagus.

Interesting tea, although not the type of tea I generally like to drink. This tea is very dark and earthy, with a strong aged smokiness. With further steepings some of the darker flavors relaxed and let a bit sweetness come through. A high quality, complex tea….I just generally prefer teas of a lighter, fresher style.

Very nice. I seem to have bad luck with dragonwell. This is only the second one that I’ve even remotely enjoyed. Perhaps because of it’s popularity there’s a lot of low quality stuff on the market.
Regardless of my past experiences, this is fantastic green tea. Light, fresh and refreshingly sweet, with just a hint of darker flavors, nudging on the edges of your subconscious. Although I don’t get a lot of those flavors that I’ve found to be distinctively “dragonwell”. Maybe I’ll pick up on them as I drink this tea more.

Nice! This is one of my favorite styles of tea. This one is fresh and delicious, despite the unforgiving weather of 2010 in China.

Interesting, interesting. I think it’s well described as being right between a black tea and a pu-erh. Flavors and aromas of both come through. Some really cool spice notes too.

Great Stuff. Definitely has a smokiness to it…but with great underlying complexity. It drinks like an expertly crafted cocktail.

This Anxi Silk Oolong from RBTC is an excellent version of the popular milk-flavored oolongs. This tea gives off a wonderful creamy aroma, and brews a nice clear, but milky-tasting brew. The flavor is wonderful, and the quality is good to excellent of the tea they use. This tea definitely ages well. I just finished off my bag which was 3-4 years old, and it nearly the same taste. Of course, with time and with many oolongs, oolong tea ages well, but tends to mellow out the longer it is kept. My tea was kept in its airtight silver RBTC bag which may have preserved the taste somewhat. It would be interesting to find out what someone thinks of a silk oolong that was jar aged. CAUTION: I did not intend to age this tea, I merely forgot in the mass of tea that I have. As milk/silk oolongs sometimes contain dried milk, but usually a shelf-stable/pasteurized variety of milk, I let it go this long, but I cannot say for certain whether all teas will remain unspoiled DO wash tea after a long period of rest (aging), as this is always the key to sanitizing/pulling out flavors of these types of tea. This tea gets at least three quality brews, but use a good deal of it, short steeps, and in a nice sized yixing (or glass if you fear the milk may taint the yixing clay).

If it weren’t for this tea being about 3-4 years old, I would probably have liked it a little more. That being said, the tea had a very herbal fragrance (think traditional chinese medicine store smell), and an obvious sweetness to the brew. My personal feeling is that no tea should come pre-sweetened (I know a great deal of people who would disagree!!). So, I’m going to have to go with my personal and highly subjective (and possibly misinformed due to the tea’s age) opinion, and say this tea was not one I would want to be sipping throughout the day. If I were sick on the other hand, and this was my medicine, I would be happy to take it!

One of the older Sheng Pu’ers that I have ever tasted. This one possesses that old musty sweetness that only pu’ers of this age can. It really is quite a candy-like deliciousness even from the first steeping.

This is one of the nicest Pu’ers I have ever had, and I should have purchased a good half pound when I still had the chance.

Hmm… I’m not certain what to make of this tea. First, let me say that I’m discovering I really love oolong. So, having had a few different silk oolongs, I was really expecting to have my socks knocked off… well, I didn’t. That’s not to say that it’s not a bad cup of tea. It’s simply that I had hoped for more.

First, the scent. I was a bit wary as I’m normally enticed by the aroma of the open bag. That didn’t happen this time. When I opened the bag and sniffed, I actually recoiled because it was so different from what I was expecting.

Okay, so I went with 195/2min steep using the Breville. The color was kind of a light yellow. Lighter than I expected, but I decided to give it a go. Mmm. It is good. I can smell that silk oolong scent that I had been hoping for earlier. It’s very nice, but doesn’t have that creamy heft to it that other silk oolongs seem to have. It does taste creamy, though, but with more earthiness to it. It’s interesting. I’m happy with it, but surprised by the experience all the same.

Dragonwell was my first love among loose leaf teas going on 5 years ago. I don’t get back to San Francisco nearly as often as I used to but I always make it a point to stop by and stock up.

This tea is one of the contemplative teas ones that really kind of make you work to find all the nuances, and this tea has a lot of nuance. My tea sessions are most often at work so really being able to focus on the tea is a rarity. With that said this tea has a way of taking me out of the moment, to reflect on the tender buds, only a 1/2 inch in length. What was the day like when they were plucked… who did it… what artisan did the kill green and the roasting all wonderful questions to consider while dealing with the race of rats I find myself in.

As mentioned the the tea itself it a single bud and two very small leaves, all uniform in size color… a beautiful tea. The flavor is very subtle, and can only be described as clean, and the scent and flavor of a misty early spring morning wandering through an apricot orchard.

But really this tea for me is less about what it tastes like because taste is one of those things are often but not always subjective. Instead I like to focus on how it makes me feel. Considering the craftsmanship and the labor, watching the tender hairs from the leaves float to the top of the gaiwan and the ever so faint yellow color of the tea just makes the day special no matter where.

The cleanest cup of tea (in my opinion). According to Red Blossom, you should pour some hot water over the leaves to “wash” them and throw away the liquid. I usually just brew an initial cup at 180 degrees (which is a light, but definitely nice cup) and then keep brewing subsequent cups using a basket or strainer (as well as adding a bit more leaves).

Sometimes while I’m working, I’ll forget about the brewing cup, and this tea holds up well past the recommended 2 mins to 4-5 mins even longer. I’ve had cups that brewed at 10 minutes and the result is a rich golden, but still very clean and tasty cup.

I like Silver Needle Reserve as my primary tea, and prefer it over green tea. It’s too bad the price for it has tripled in price (it’s been a bad year for food crops) but the leaves go a long way. I have yet to try the regular Silver Needle…

I am so impressed, very very impressed with the Red Blossom Tea Company. I’m in town, visiting relatives, and forced them all to go to tea shops with me. We hiked up Grant street and found the pretty little shop. I mentioned to one of the shop clerks that I found out about them on Steepster. Another (whose name I later learned was Peter (?) mentioned that he’d read the review that Angrboda wrote about the Heritage Ainji. So I got to say – hey – that was me that sent it to her! Peter then let us try 3 or 4 of their oolong teas. And I just have to say, he was wonderful. He really took time to talk to us about the teas and explain a little bit of why they were like they were. (elevation, etc) And they were understaffed, it being the day after Christmas. So I was extra impressed with his time, attention, and care.

This was my favorite of the teas that we tried today. It’s a greener oolong with very floral and bright notes at the start, moving to a creamy and slightly astringent finish at the end. I splurged and got 2 oz of it for special occasions. Lovely brew, great company.

Not much of a pu-erh drinker, really, but trying to learn more. This is only the second real pu-erh that I’ve owned (the last one being a Grand Shou, I think from McNabs). This one seems surprisingly light and creamy, very low on tanins – a nice taste, though I think perhaps I’d prefer something more robust. Wildly dark liquor, though.

Steep Information:
Prepared at Wicked Grounds.

Tasting Notes:
Steeped Tea Smell: Honey, hints of black
Flavor:
AmazonV: Sweet, light black tea, slightly floral
MilitiaJim: vegetal for a black
Body: Medium
Aftertaste: Sweet, wood
Liquor: Translucent dark orange

http://amazonv.blogspot.com/2010/12/red-blossom-tea-company-loose-leaf.html

Picked up half pound on recent trip to SanFran (and usual stop at Red Blossom). Not a black tea guy at all but this one really blew me away. There’s a very subtle milkiness to the brew and no matter how long one steeps the leaves, the tea never turns bitter. This has resulted in a lot of experimentation and I find that I prefer a longer steep time with much lower temperature water.
Very, very nice tea and I would echo Leland’s comment that, as good as this tea is, I can’t wait to sample the competition grade.