Verdant Tea (Special)

This is one of the Verdant Tea of the Month Reserve selections for February! It is a beautiful hand crafted tea, sage green with streaks of tan, with the heady aroma of jasmine…aahhhhh!

Damp it smells of moss & key lime.

The first 2 steepings had me lying in the forest on a bed of moss. The flavor is lightly floral & vegetative, with what I can only describe as a mossy texture, & a lingering jasmine sweetness in the back of the throat.

3 & 4: mmmmmm, creamy & sweet, with a hint of astringency & a fuzzy tongue sensation. These were my favorite.

5 & 6: I steeped the hand-twisted tea in a glass gaiwan (even though it always gets ridiculously hot & burns my fingers) so that I could watch them unfold. At this point they are fully unraveled & beautiful. The tea from these steepings has a taste & mouth-feel of key lime (I actually compared it to one of the limes on my mini-tree), with a clear & bright sensation, a lingering bitterness on the tongue, & sweet jasmine in the back of the throat.

7 & 8: The lime & moss aromas are gone, now I just smell the jasmine in the wet leaf. The flavor is still bright, but the bitterness of lime peel is gone. Now I have a fine, clear jasmine tea.

This is a luxurious treat!

There are two kinds of wood you need for a good fire in a wood-stove, soft wood,like cedar to get the fire going, and hard wood, like oak for the fire to last a long time.

When I lived in the Sierra Mountain town of Paradise, one of the 6 girls that lived in my house was Susan. Her father was a tree feller. (That’s what you call them) Tree felling is a dangerous job, and when he wasn’t felling trees, he was drinking, so Susan stayed with me and her dad paid for her room and board with firewood. We had wood all Winter cut and stacked with bundled kindling. During power outages, we had heat! Cedar and Oak!

Compared with the 5000 foot altitude I live at now, 2000 feet doesn’t seem like much of a mountain, but where I live now is flat and dry. Paradise was mountain forest with tall pine and oak.
In the Fall and Winter, the smell of smoke from many wood fires was delicious wafting through the trees.

I absolutely LOVE the smell of a damp forest and wood smoke!
I LOVE the smell of the smoke early in the morning on a sunny, cold day holding a cup of hot tea in my hands, wrapped in a blanket while sitting on the back porch warm and happy.

Smoke means BBQ and 4th of July (the dumb little houses that smoke and do nothing else, remember them? And punks…those things that come with sparklers?).

So many people have memories of camping or hiking with friends when they drink a smoky tea. My grandkids call Lapsang Souchong ‘Memory Tea’.

This tea is NOT a Souchong! Souchong means: A tea made from the larger older leaves of the shoot. A lower grade of tea leaf.

This smoked tea is a high grade Oolong. Something Very Special!

I had a sampling of this tea before, so I took some of my tea to share with friends who I knew were NOT fond of roasted Oolongs but DID like traditional Lapsang Souchong. What would they think?

Joe prepared the tea according to the Verdant instructions, short 5 second steeps in a Gaiwan.
The flavor was lightly smoky, smooth and sweet. We had some trouble tasting further nuances in the tea with such short steeps so we decided to throw caution to the wind and do a 3 minute steep.

This was more like it we agreed! Longer Steep wins!
Sweet and silky smooth, but with whisper light smokiness.
The honey caramel Oolong base created a fat oozy syrup that coated the inside of my mouth…moving slowly from the back to the front.
I was toying with the idea of fruitiness but couldn’t put my finger on what it was. Maybe Fuji Persimmon. I don’t know, not sure.

I drank some more of this tea this morning, and took a picture. It was a time to reflect alone on wood fires and my life in Paradise. Time there with family and the 6 girls who came to me in High School and are now 40 year old women (including my daughter).
My parents, and grandmother are buried in that town.

You don’t have to be hit over the head with strong smokiness to have sweet memories, and this tea has given me all the gentle beauty I could desire.

I suppose that I’m like an old teapot that needs good tea to keep it well seasoned.

I’ve said this before, I hope this tea (or one like) it becomes available permanently.

http://flic.kr/p/dStjYM

Standard disclaimers apply: dark oolongs are not my jam, and wuyi even less than dan congs. They just don’t make my heart sing, but I can still enjoy my gong fu session with them. I am also not in a super analytical mood today, so maybe not the best time to do a real tasting note, but I wanted to log it anyway.

This is from the reserve club, January. The warmed dry leaves smell a little charred and minerally, with definite plum/prune notes in the background. My rinse ended up being longer than usual (maybe 5 seconds), so I drank it and I’m glad I did. Someone posted recently on the discussions about only enjoying the first steeps of teas, and it made me think of how much usually enjoy the rinses of my teas. I feel like I’m throwing out so much flavor if I throw them away. Anyway, the rinse wasn’t super toasty, although there were definitely some of those notes in there, and not minerally at all. More fruity, and a woody.

Later steeps brought out the charred wood flavor more, along with the rocky minerals. A few steeps in I had a nice, lightly sweet one that I enjoyed. Someday I want to go to Minneapolis and have a gong fu session with David on some of these teas, just to really experience them as they should. Although I know the steps well by now, I am still convinced there is some error in my gong fu.

First of all, these past two weeks have been incredibly busy, so I haven’t been posting about the teas that I’ve been drinking. Today I decided that I was going to try this tea. I put a nice ammount in a cast iron teapot, and let it steep for 30 seconds using near-boiling water. Even though I have a bit of a head cold right now, the the roasted aroma of the tea was easy to detect arround the pot.

Anyway, when I first took a sip, was was amazed at the smootht texture of the tea. I’ve found that the first cup of aged Oolongs can be a bit…stale, but this was perfect from the get-go. The initial flavor of the tea is that of a deep, dark roasty flavor, something that I adore, and the middle flavor has a interesting spicy tingling. It’s a bit early to be judging it, since the roasty flavor is dominating the palate right now, but I bet it’s going to be very pleasant later. Finally, the aftertaste lingers forever. I love Wuyis, and this aftertaste is the perfect balance between the roasted flavor and the smooth mineral texture that characterizes these teas, and it’s really a cut above just about everything else I’ve ever had. The only thing that compares was the Big Red Robe that David sold a while back. I went through the pot really quickly, and I’m really anxious to see what the next steeping tastes like.

The second steepign was prepared the same as the first, a little longer than I would have liekd, but I got distra—Oh look, snow! anyway, the falvor has mellowed a bit, yet it retains that smoothness and deep roasty flavor. Teh aftertaste has lightned up, a bit less roasty and a bit more mineral, and the result is pretty much a very pleasant improvement.

Third infusion, 45 seconds, near boiling water. The spice has resolved into something a bit like cinnamon, and I’m actually really liking the taste. The tea starts with a smooth yet balanced roasted flavor, and then the cinnamon starts to dance arround the surfaces of my mouth. The amazing thing is that it’s not overpowering like cinnamon tends to be in food. Finally, the aftertaste linger in my mouth with a gentle mineral taste, starting out very mild but strengthening over time. The third steep is usually the best, but this greatly exceeded my expectations. If this is the type of stuff that the One Word guys drink regularly, I envy them.

Sipdown (Verdant Edition), 225. Today will be drinking almost exclusively Verdant teas, sipping down those that I’ve had for a while, and a few, like this one, that aren’t so old. I am, after all, apparently getting both my Verdant order and March’s reserve club package in the mail today.

I steeped this western style using the instructions for Verdant’s Tong Tian Xiang Phoenix Dancong, which seems to be the non-reserve version of this one. It smells like a roasty toasty dancong oolong, which is not my favorite of course, but still pretty good. Taking a sip, I am surprised by the fruitiness and juiciness; definitely lychee and perhaps some citrus as well. My problem lies with the fact that it is like I am having lychees (yum) and charcoal (blech). I just can never quite get into that minerally, toasted-to-burned taste that dancongs have. Oh well, the rest of this one is earmarked to go to another steepsterite for a sample, so I am counting it as a sipdown.

Thanks to David and the awesome folks at Verdant I got my January Reserve club tea shipment despite the address mix-up. I have been waiting until the weekend so that I could devote some time to these teas, and here it is. I decided to go with this one first.

The dry leaf is long and twisted dark strands, definitely beautiful. I put my 6g into my 6oz teapot and exhaled into it then breathed in to get a good aroma. The smell I have come to associate with dancong was there (roasted grains, wet minerals), but also an intense fruitiness. I thought apricot at first, and then I read David’s description and lychee fits as well. I could smell this for a while! But I did a quick rinse (as fast as I can pour the water in and out) and then a short 4 second steep.

The flavor was primarily fruity, with the lychee very prominent, with a kind of roasted cinnamon in the background. I got a sense of juiciness, and a slight tingling sensation in my mouth that lingered long afte the sip. The next few steeps were less fruity and more minerally, and with growing florals. A little later some of the fruity notes returned, this time accompanied by hints of cacao.

Definitely a real experience. Did this tea blow my mind? No, but I don’t tend to be super into dancongs. The fact that I enjoyed it as much as I did really says a lot for this tea. I’m glad I got to experience this one!

Story
On rainy days up on Mine Hill, my brother (the other miners kids) and I would go into the big 1870’s Bar in what was left of a ghost town that no longer exists today.
This was once part of a thriving town built on Mercury mining called New Almaden. The mining operation was necessary for processing the Silver which made California rich.

For us, the bar was a good place to set up old liquor bottles and skate around them as though we had our own private skating rink.

Behind the building was a locked map house with maps of the mines on the mountain. (Grandpa Charlie was in charge of the maps and mining)

Past a row of what used to be shops and a Bank was a School.

The School was brick and plaster all crumbling apart.
The worse part were BEES! You had to sneak into the schoolhouse without disturbing those pesky bees or else…you’d better run for your life!
Why would I want to go into the School and chance getting stung you may ask?
Behind the wallpaper, were pictures! Old photographs and drawings!
Students from a century before had somehow stuck little memories of themselves where I could find them later. There were funny black and white pictures of girls in long dresses and hats and boys in knickers. I was young myself so this was all curious.

Grandpa Charlie made a swimming pool out of a wooden water tank on the side of the road to his house. He painted it bright blue.
It filled itself from a spring through a pipe he rigged up and overflowed onto hillside below where deer would gather at night to drink.

Mom would blow a whistle, and the kids from the Austins, Kafka’s and Martinez families would come running to have a swim and some Red Kool-Aid.

When it was hot and the dusty Pine, Oak, Manzanita, Bay, Arbutus, Nettles and Hay would fill our eyes and noses, but a dip in the ‘pool’ refreshed us and the day glistened with light.

Yabao makes me think of this time on the mountain. The scent and taste takes me to this place.

Tea
Today, I went through 15 steeps beginning with 4 seconds and ending at 32 seconds. I could have continued…the leaves were generous.

These ancient tree Yabao leaves were beautiful, long, rose-rust and green colored.
Wet, the aroma was like sea air, a saline spray…savory and alive.

Invigorating!

I ’m not going to give a list of the entire 15 steep series of how the tea tasted.

In the beginning, the flavor was savory and sweet…like artichokes and chicken in butter, with the sweetness of floral olive oil on the finish.
Later the taste became cleaner, less savory but still sweet and mouth watering.
I was puzzled about the honey-aroma mentioned by Master Han until I stuck my nose into my glass cup after it was ‘empty’ and there it was! HONEY!
After 8 steeps the balance of sweetness to savory was even, and a pepper scent appeared. There wasn’t heat, but pepper and salty, savory taste with a buttery mouth-feel lasted all the way until the last steep.

The flavor lingers and reminds me of an extraordinary Sheng that has aged to the proper point and is ready. Everything that can be given by a tea is there. Full color, mouth-feel, smoothness, lingering flavor…everything.
The point is, that I am at a loss as to what to say.

I can tell you about how the tea makes me feel and where it takes me.

Yabao takes me into old dusty buildings, past fragrant bushes and herbs growing wild along the side of the road, into the School and bees buzzing, then cools me with a refreshing pool of spring water.

For a moment I’m in Second Grade.

Memorable

This sipdown is from January 3013 Reserve TOMC.
A nice roasty tea, but that’s about all I have to say at this time.
362

This oolong is from the Reserve TOMC, January.
The leaves of this one are so beautiful, with a rich burgundy cast to them, & of course they are wild looking! The aroma today reminded me of peaches, maybe roasted peaches, & red fleshed plums.

The warm aroma of this one is so heady with fruit & a hint of cinnamon, & the tea itself has such a juicy fruity flavor, again of peaches & plums. My mouth is left with a sweet stone fruit aftertaste, like I just ate a bowl of cobbler. This tea also makes me think of umeboshi plums.

Later the flavors are briefly chocolate & fruit, & then as the leaves wane, more of a mineral taste, but even then there is a lightly salty rich brothiness to it. This has been a beautiful tea, & I only have enough to enjoy it one more time, but enjoy it, I will!

I sort of feel like I’ve become the official secretary for the Reserve Club: taking & uploading photos of tea, typing in David’s comments. I’m been placing them in the Verdant (Special) folder. I didn’t create that folder, but it seems like the right place to put them.

This tea has large & full, irregularly twisted leaves in colors of mahogany, brown, & Black. It looks wild & appealing.
The dry aroma was a little tart & reminded me of pickled plums (Umeboshi). I heated my Gaiwan, put the dry tea in there to warm up, smelled it again, & it was of tart plums & carob. After the rinse, it smelled of grape peels, & a toasty earthy wine.

The early steepings of this were tart, like a plum wine with a little smoke added. A nice fruity taste lingers after you swallow it!
In successive steepings the flavors continued to develop: Rich, warming, sweet, a little toasty.

The later steepings included a rock taste & a hint of chocolate.

I have a ton of things to do: replace a broken string on my electric harp & check the other strings to see if any are worn; restring a Troubadour harp for one of my students (she’s 74, & in Italy for the month on vacay!); pick the last of the head lettuces before they get bitter, pick the first of the leaf lettuces, & wash & spin them all; start learning the music for the wedding I’m playing this saturday (another “no classical” wedding); start prepping my front porch for paint!
That’s a start! It’s almost noon, & I haven’t really done anything yet today.

This tea…from the January reserve TOMC of 16 months ago. It is still delicious, & I’ve reviewed it several times, so not much else to say except the warmed leaf smells amazingly awesome, the flavors of this tea are delightfully complex, & I’ve got an amazing tea-buzz going on right now, the kind of headspace that is only appropriate for mindful zen-like activities. I think I’ll start with the lettuces…
288

Yesterday after drinking several steepings of this, I followed Bonnie’s pattern & put them in a jar of water in the fridge, & now I’m enjoying a nice cold brew with my lunch! Not as potent as ice tea, but definitely a step up from water!

I’m enjoying another round with this oolong, which was part of the January Reserve TOMC. I went through the process:
smell dry leaf
preheat gaiwan
drop leaf into hot gaiwan & cover
smell again – ahhh…the best fruit loops ever, kind of tropical! Plus a really heady fruity incense.

The early steepings are tropical & floral, mouthwatering the there is that incense sensation, tickling my sinuses.
Next I started noticing a tongue & sinus kind of tingly numbly sensation, & cooling too…kind of like mint or camphor.

I’m suppose to be practicing right now. I have a performance with an ensemble tomorrow at webster U: guitar, harp, bass, cello, viola, 2 voices, drum set & mallets/hand percussion. I’ll get to it in a minute.

Now after each sip there is a meaty umami kind of flavor & sensation down the center of my tongue, followed by a wash of salivation around the sides, & that sparkly sensation.

I had some free time this afternoon, & spent part of it partaking of this yummy oolong! I can see why it has won awards, it’s amazing!
The dry smell is sweet & fruity & there is a bit of a caramelized aroma too.

Garret (Mandala Tea) suggested preheating a Gaiwan, then dumping out the hot water, putting the tea in, cover briefly, and then smell. He was talking about puer at the time, but I decided to try it with this tea. Thank you Garret :)
Oh my!! The aromas were intensified, so that now I’m smelling fruit loops, only the best fruit loops you’ve ever had, or maybe a tropical smoothie. Yummmmmmm!

I can’t tell you how many rounds of steeping I went through, but they were so good. The early ones were especially sweet, tropical, & floral. Gradually a rocky taste & a light roasted flavor crept in as well. There was a little astringency in a few rounds, but mostly this was a mouth watering, tongue tingling delight! I also got some nice 3rd eye opening sensations, & interesting sensations in my ears, neck, sinuses, & shoulder blades.

Thank you to David & Verdant for this wonderful offering. I will savor every cup!

From January of 2013’s Reserve TOMC, this is somewhere between a Sheng & a white tea, as far as it’s flavor & qualities. It starts out lightly tart & citrus like, gradually gets a creaminess to it, with a growing evergreen essence. It features a decent tea-buzz, both savory & sweet, bringing to mind Pine & Eucalyptus.
Sipdown – 365

I’m having an all day gongfu session, it seems. As one tea begins to wane in flavor, I’m just starting up another one. So now we have this.

This tea is from the January Reserve TOMC. In my efforts to really drink ALL the TEAS, I’m gradually working my way through the TOMC bundles. I have the ‘reserve’ teas in one box, the ‘classic’ club teas in another. I’ve cut the flaps off several Verdant boxes, & I use them for dividers. So this week I’ve been working my way through January in the Reserve Box & March in the Classic.

I am a fan of Master Han. As far as I’m concerned, he is one of the Jedi Knights of tea, with Master Bi being another. Their teas inspire me in a way that Thich Nhat Hanh inspires me.

This tea is very gentle. It is gently sweet. It is a comfort tea, like a soothing bowl of cream of wheat, with a drizzle of honey. There is also a drizzle of olive oil, a trait that all of his teas tend to share. And a nice new-age style buzz, which I’m thoroughly enjoying. I’m still tired, & still feel out of sorts, but I’m breathing deeply & slowly, sipping deeply & slowly, & the next stop will be my garden, because although I’m feeling anti-social where people are concerned, I have a deep desire to commune with plants. Here I go.

Verdant Tea of the Month Reserve Club – January

I opened this package thinking I’d see something along the lines of Silver Buds Yabao, but this tea doesn’t look anything like that! Instead it is beautiful roasty looking leaves in shades of mahogany, olive, & cocao. I can’t quite describe the aroma. I want to say vanilla, but it is not vanilla. It is almost a ‘cereal’ kind of scent.

I followed the verdant instructions: 5G + 4oz (rinse) X 3-4 secs.

It kind of reminds of of cream of buckwheat cereal. A creamy vanilla like texture, a mild sweetness. Not something I would get excited about, but a pleasant departure from the norm.

Thanks to my family who gifted this to me!
The instruction said to set aside an hour to enjoy this tea (which I did). I set aside my whole morning! (I recommend at least that much time)
This tea swept me off my feet. Not only did the cosmos shift but I felt it physically. Bravo!

I kept my steep time short (8-10 sec.) after one test which was just on the verge of becoming bitter.

Having time to properly enjoy tea feeds my spirit.
We tea people have learned to step back from the World and relax.
No frenzy. It’s why the people here on Steepster are so nice!

I remembered learning from someone here to warm my Gaiwan first, place in the dry Oolong leaves then put on the lid and smell the aroma.
The feeling is like hugging fresh warm linen plucked from a clothes line on a Summer day. When I smelled the tea, it was soft and floral with a hint of forest under the covers. There were very long, brown leaves like fingers of tea.

One quick rinse and the leaves smelled like light smoke and buttery gardenia.

The liquor was light champagne yellow, glistening in my glass cup.
This color never changed.

I sipped the tea and there was a strong floral aroma. My first flavor impression wasn’t flowers at all, but pineapple. The taste was clean, lightly sweet and not astringent or dry but still, pineapple was what I thought of and nothing else.

I continued to enjoy the scent of gardenia and brown sugar in the wet leaves, and the flavor began to taste like that aroma with a texture that was smooth but not buttery.

As the steeps continued, a background savory taste appeared…not associated with any vegetable in particular, just savory.

There was soon a complete Umami flavor. Sweet, sour, savory, and bitter in all the right proportions, that came together and caused a puckery feeling in my nose.

Sometimes, certain really good tea’s hit me hard. I get a very intense feeling in my sinus between my eyes…BAM!
I think this happens because we taste flavor with our nose not just with our mouths.
When the mouth gets hit with Umami and the L-Theanine hits the brain too…oh my goodness…it’s wonderful, but later on, I need a NAP!

What I thought of when I was drinking this tea was my parents home in the Sierra foothills. (I took care of them for several years)

The house was nestled in a forest of Pine trees with flowering pink Dogwood in the front yard. The property had a hedge of Camellia around the front that bloomed in Winter, and a Gardenia bush that did it’s best to produce fragrant flowers under the dappled shade of the trees.

When you’ve lived in a forest community, you don’t forget the sound of leaf blowers and chainsaws, the smell of wood-smoke and rain on leafy soil, the sweetness of pine and bark or flowering jasmine and gardenia wafting powdery perfume on a sunny day.

It was our Summer garden that I remembered when I was drinking this Oolong.

I’d sit at the old redwood picnic table with my dad Bill, under a tall pine tree with the warm sun at my back. My friend the chipmunk chattered at me from the fence to give him walnuts (I had trained the little thing to take them from my hand).
At noon I would bring my mother Pat’s wheelchair out the front door of the house and down the wheelchair ramp first, then dad’s wheelchair came next. Both were brought through the garage and into the backyard so that we could have our lunch in the fresh air. Dad would read the paper and mom would nod off to sleep.

It smelled wonderful out there, like life and hope.

Sometimes I can’t describe the flavor of a tea very well, but I say instead where it took me in my heart or memory.

This has been a memorable tea for me and for all those who drink it, take your time.

Sipdown No. 95 was a reserve TOMC tea from about a year ago. I made the final cup of it this evening, & then I remembered that I had planned to compare it to the Zheng Shan Xiao Zhong that Verdant currently is offering. Oh well, that won’t be happening, cuz I’m at Tony’s.

This is a delicious rich smoky cup, with a natural sweetness, like caramelized brown sugar. It would be wonderful with Maple Syrup added, but I drank it plain, & it was wonderful anyways.

This was one of the January reserved TOMC offerings. I loved it then, & I’m loving it now. I’ve never had creme brulee, but I imagine it being like this tea: creamy mouthfeel with a sweet brown sugar topping.

As far as Lapsangs go, this one is very refined. The smoke quality is there, but not so intensely as many others. It’s really lovely. Other images that come to mind while sipping:
canned condensed milk
kettle corn
A fine pipe tobacco

I’ll keep sipping :)

The January tea of the month reserve club package arrived last week. Part of me feels that being a member is perhaps more money than I should be spending, but so far I have not been disappointed!

When I opened this first one, I was immediately caught up in the aroma of the dry leaves. Smokey & sweet, it brought up images of kettle corn, being made in large kettles the old fashioned way. The smokiness made me thing of a fine pipe tobacco as well. There are other faintly familiar aromas that I’m having a hard time placing. Like canned condensed milk (crazy, I know, but there is a hint of it) This is a very complex & interesting tea!

5G of tea + 4 oz Gaiwan (rinse) X 4 secs (+ 2 secs each steeping)

I’d like to say at this point that I have not always been all that into Lapsang Souchong. Having said that, I’ve been sitting here, sipping cup after cup. I’ve never steeped Lapsang this way, & I was missing out!
The smokey flavor is there, especially in the initial steepings, but not in your face.
There is a real nice sweetness that expands with each steeping. It brings to mind the aforementioned kettle corn, with it’s caramelized brown sugar.
I lost count, but after several steepings there is a creamy mouthfeel & the sweetness lingers, making me think of some kind of vanilla pudding topped with brown sugar that’s been given the flambe treatment. The smoke is still there, but in a very pleasant subtle way.
In the later steepings the sweetness gradually dissipated, giving way to a ‘rocky’ taste, a bright feeling on the tip of my tongue, & yet there were still sprinkles of sugar on top.
I actually made it through 15 courses, although admittedly I only drank about half of some of the cups, combining the 2nd half into a jar, which is in the freezer to chill. I’ll report on that in a little while.
A very yummy tea! Thank you David & Wang Shilin! I will savor it!

This was from the Reserve TOMC, Dec of 2012.
It came in little cubes, & featured a cream kind of flavor, very enjoyable. I hoarded the last cube for a long time, but today was the day. And now it’s gone.
373

This is from last December’s Reserve TOMC. I forgot that I was supposed to only use half a cube. The first couple of steeps were really nice: cream, honey, & a vanilla feel. But then it got really strong. I tried shortening the steeps, but I feel that I kind of ruined this one, plus my guts started hurting. Oh well…I still have enough for 2 more sessions.

About a year ago I joined the Verdant Reserve Tea of the Month club. This was among the first offerings. I can’t believe I still have some of this. I’m trying to make an effort to drink through more of these teas, as there is no point having them if I’m not going to drink them. I followed the same parameters as in previous sippings of this (see previous notes), & the results is a soothing cup. I suppose it could be considered a white sheng, & does have a really pleasant energy about it. The dry aroma reminds me of fresh goats milk, while the wet aroma is more like canned condensed milk with a little malt thrown in. The tea itself has a mild maltiness & creamy vanilla like texture. As I continued through the cups, my tongue developed a tingle, my brain got a little buzz on, & gradually the flavor became sweeter, reminding me of sorghum, only a diluted lighter sorghum.

I played a gig this afternoon, the monthly tea at the retirement home. Just for fun, I did a full hour of Beatles music, & the residents loved it. It was fun! For some reason, by the time I got home I was exhausted, just really really tired (I suspect it’s the mold level in the air). I started drinking cups of this about an hour ago, & now, on the 10th & final cup, I am feeling quite revived!