10:55 am Sunday Indianapolis, IN
Reviewing my first tea from the dark matter group buy.
I seem to be getting into the habit of only reviewing a tea when I find something about it that I don’t prefer. I must like being the bad guy ; ) or I am too picky. Or I don’t want to see you get burned if you buy a tea because you read only good reviews, but then are stuck with something you may not like for a reason no one mentioned.
And this tea is the first one I would not recommend. It’s not that bad, but I tasted a very off putting taste in the first couple steeps, which ruined most of the following steeps for me. It could have just been me (my friend enjoyed the tea) or it could have been my batch, as this can happen.
I started off gongfu-ing this for 4 steeps. Then went into 10 min, 20 min, 30 min steeps. I would recommend brewing with western parameters. It made the weird chemically taste that I have tasted before, but can’t describe, seem less noticeable. It was either the roast (is this tea roasted?) or the high level of oxidation. First rounds very noticeable, last three less noticeable. The off flavor never totally went away.
One thing I did like, the smell towards the end was like real oatmeal raisin cookies. I did like that. I plan to experiment more with oxidized and roasted teas in the future.
