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Wuyi yancha of the uncommon Que She (Sparrow Tongue) varietal. A first for me! This is a sweet, smooth and subtle rock oolong that Old Ways Tea calls ‘elusive’ and I have to agree. It’s different.

The dry leaf gives sweet and milky notes, caramel with darker notes of black currant and oak wood, a minty undertone. First impression from the warmed leaf is a very dark and strong mocha coffee with trails of caramel as I pull away. When I go back in for more, I notice dark brown toast and cardboard. Rinsing brings out the gentler characteristics of the tea: herbal, orange blossom, woodiness, wet vegetation, eucalyptus. I still notice coffee. It’s all so complex.

I gave it some intuitive brewing because that’s what it asked of me after the first short steep.

The flavor and aroma components are very active but the tea is overall very soothing. It’s at first a little alkaline I think from the roast, then opens up into a milky-woody-floral profile, a little caramel. It’s soft and somehow the deep and dark Wuyi minerality does not overplay. Balance. It travels in a minty cool stream down my throat and lingers there but not in my mouth.

With the next few cups, I notice the rich and sweet aroma that carries the same floral, milky character. The brew has more of a sunflower seed nuttiness to it. It’s interesting to breath the tea out of my nose – it seems to stick to every receptor and every hair. Aftertaste develops into a kind of incense, more sweet herbal than woody. My sinuses open completely. I notice cannabis. A few cups later and my throat is very warm, my body feels like a furnace yet my neck feels like ice in the sun. Hints of unripe apricot in the aftertaste.

I did many short steeps in the beginning and it was just this amazing tea. Once I started getting into late steepings, it became rather citrus-acidic and bitter. Drank the rinse this morning, cold. Despite sitting all night, it was fantastic, rich and sweet. No char or lingering roast notes at all.

It has this medium-oxidized/medium-roasted character but then it also seems like low-roasted. I would need several more sessions of this tea to figure out its nuances and understand its nature better. The subtleties of the tea don’t require your attention to appreciate it, though. It’s clearly a high quality tea.

How many times have I had a tea with moringa? Once? And I don’t remember that blend highlighting the moringa profile. This Tulsi Moringa is also a blend, containing moringa, 3 types of tulsi and lemongrass. I still don’t have a good grasp on the moringa flavor but I think it’s highlighted enough in this blend to say it tastes kinda like nettle in that it has a nutritious taste and is predominantly herbaceous-vegetal. I also pick up a touch of an earthy smokey-roasted tone. The tulsi leans more heavily into sweet clove than the Sweet Tulsi Rose I had yesterday. Lemongrass gives a bit of a green, citrusy vibe but I don’t taste it distinctly. One thing I wasn’t expecting from this tea is that it has a juicy swallow. It was a great cup to start the morning and awaken the senses. Bright, clean, fresh, grounding, aromatic.

Not dranking for benefits, just dranking to drank. Brews pretty light in color with moderately strong taste. Nectary sweet body with a richer honey note that pops out. Drying but fresh and sweet and ultimately very pleasant. This reminds me so much of the sweet floral meadow note I get in some younger sheng pu’er.

Looks like this is Tazo’s “Refresh” renamed, both teas containing peppermint, spearmint and tarragon.

Surprise, surprise, it’s refreshing. But not overly so. The taste is muddied earth underneath the high, sweet peppermint. Spearmint more prevalent in the aroma than in the taste. A tiny uprising of tarragon after I swallow, otherwise it’s not noticeable. I do wish the tarragon were stronger since I’ve gained an appreciation of it in culinary use.

Refresh Mint is an average mint tea to me. Good enough to buy in a pinch, but something that can be created easily, and perhaps made even better, with a well stocked pantry.

This is ultimately a rose tea from first breath of opening the bag to last sip. It’s perfumey in the sense that it smells so strongly rose-pink and a little peppery, but it’s not a tea that only sits high and lofty. Golden chamomile works in the midground filling out the yellow-brown tone and underneath it all is the brown-green-purple tone of tulsi — herbal, herbaceous and basil/clove/licorice-like. I notice the lemon myrtle (in my opinion, the queen of lemony herbs) when I swallow as a bright, rising, citrusy-green finish. This tea is saturated colors. I don’t get any sweetness at all from the stevia leaf, hurrah.

I don’t think I’d have this often, but wow is it good <3

Woof! The smell of the teabag is heaven! There is only bergamot oil in Stash’s Earl Grey but it’s this really intense lemon scent with that deeper, peppery bergamot tone. Steeped up, it has a lightly biting, balanced bitter tannins, earthy-woodsy flavor and moderate bergamot. I added just a splash of almond milk to counter that whole made-with-fannings deal. It actually ended up tasting and smelling much like orange, maybe like orange pulp but again, deeper, kind of sparkly. I know that doesn’t make sense so maybe like the smell of candying orange slices but not sweet. No complaints here, but it’s a rare occasion for me to indulge in highly caffeinated black tea bags.

Not dranking to detox, just dranking to drank. Sometimes I crave nettle tea.

Tastes very much like nettle — nutritious-herbaceous-earthy. Hibiscus body and tang actually rounds out that taste nicely. A hint of berry. No licorice root. I think I like it.

I wish I could actually taste the fennel seed here. It’s all chamomile and sweet licorice root, softened by vanilla flavor and honey flavor. Too much of tastes I’m picky about (chamomile, licorice, honey).

:(

Steeps darker than any mint tea I’ve had. When it was still very hot, I thought the flavor muddled and muddy. As it cools, it’s a subtle blend of mints, fresh from the peppermint, some light spearmint (moreso in the aroma), a touch dried cut grass and quite mineral. I don’t know what field mint is so can’t comment on its contribution. Like the flavor clearing up as the tea cools, I notice some body coming out, especially as I swallow. Sweetness in the back of the mouth and throat develops over several minutes.

While it’s not something I’d seek out since I prefer pure peppermint teas, this was a nice change of pace for a bagged mint blend.

Having had this tea a few times now, I’m getting a better sense of it. It’s youthful and loud yet subtle and deep. Complex fruity and astringent herbal flavors with balanced bitterness. Within that complexity, I get peeks of other tastes like clean, white fish meat and crackers. A mouth-filling, oily body and my throat feels full. Very cooling and with a moderate returning sweetness by the time later steeps come around. I really like the energy of this one — it’s centering and focusing with a feeling of oneness experienced in conjunction with the forceful outwardness of teas from the Menghai region. I was as comfortable standing erect as I was in a motherly position on the ground brushing mats out of the dog’s fur for an hour. I guess you could call the balanced effects of this tea ‘adaptive.’

This isn’t an oolong-y sheng despite the long list of impressions below, nor is it processed too green but I do think maybe I need to expose the rest of the sample to some humidity. If this weren’t sold out I’d probably buy a cake.