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Sil was nice enough to share some of this with me. It’s a pretty nice CTC. A bit of maltiness in a fairly moderate strength tea. Steeps quickly of course. On the wishlist it goes to remind me to get some at some point. :)

Hm. I’m not really sure what to say about this. It smelled like smoke in the package. I was extremely hesitant about trying it. I was going to give the whole sample to my mom since she likes smoky teas. But, since this was a free sample from Nannoushan, I knew I had to try it and review it. I’m not going to give it a rating, though, since smoky teas are truly not my bag.

The smoke flavor is much less pronounced than the smell leads one to expect. I get some maltiness but a whole ton of savory, brothy notes. Almost like smoky beef broth. I feel like I should have carrots and other veggies in this for a soup! This is the only tea I’ve ever had that reminds me so much of soup.

I would not reach for this, but I will finish this cup. It’s… interesting.

Not sure how I missed logging this. I have been having it every other morning. Such a mellow and deep taste to start the day with. Malty, yeasty pastries with fruit and honey. /drool

This is another I’m going to be stuck between wanting to drink it all the time and hoarding it because I can’t get any more of it!

Oh, I am going to regret not having more than a sample of this. Sweet and smooth, this has notes of chocolate and sweet, ripe fruit. With extreme oversteeping (like 15 minutes or so of having to be on the phone with the mother), it gets hints of a bite but not unpleasantly so. Not sure if this is the first Hong Cha I’ve had or not. I am a fan of this at any rate. :)

I started out with just cooled from boiling water in a little glass pot, tasted at about 15 & 45 seconds (after it cooled off a bit) and it had more caramel notes in the first 2 cups than in the subsequent.

And thanks to cookies for ordering! :)

Caramel, honey, silky, smooth, malty. Those leafhoppers are geniuses, I tell ya.

There may have to be yet another order before the dreaded end time.

This is so yum. I didn’t put this in with my last order but it was included as a sample – such a lovely reminder that I really liked this tea! I did this steeping in my little glass pot. 30 seconds, 60 seconds, 2 minutes… I don’t notice any different flavors coming to the fore with the longer steeps but they definitely intensify. This time around I’m getting more savory notes with tobacco overtones. Goes really well with dried honeycrisp apples. :)

Mom picked this one up at the festival. Herbals are not usually my choice. This steeps up a lovely deep pink color. I don’t get tons of that sour hibiscus type of flavor, which is good. It is basically like a fruit juice. I think cold it might be quite good.

Well, the teas went over swimmingly at the work tea party! Honey Black by Green Terrace Teas was practically an empty pot – which rarely happens! Strawberry Green by Kusmi was much praised for being able to actually identify strawberry in the flavor. Hawaiian Paradise by Zen Zeu was remarked upon for the lovely deep pink color but thought it might benefit from being chilled. Least popular was Earl Grey Baroness by Annabelle’s – a random tea brought back to me by a friend.

Pictures: http://tinyurl.com/q8bnfv8

I think from looking on Perennial’s website that this is actually from Silk Road but since my tasting experience was so different from the one I had with the Silk Road sample I thought maybe I should enter it is another tea.

The first thing I thought of when smelling this freshly steeped brew was “funnel cake.” It smells like a county fair – hot oil and fried dough. There is a dryness at the tail end of the sip but the overall flavor is very mild. It’s buttery fried dough until the dry hits. A nice tea, but not one that I’d keep around. My tasting of this was so different from my Silk Road sample tasting I’d wonder if they were the same batch of tea. At least I have a good bit of it to experiment with steeping parameters. :)

I have been so busy that while I have been drinking plenty of tea I haven’t been logging much of it. Plus, a lot of what I’m drinking is simply repeats of things I’ve logged before. So I’m still here and reading all your notes – sometimes the likes stick and sometimes they don’t. Still working on some tea news for you – should be after mid-November and it will be ready for public announcement. :)

This is a lovely tea! Huge, wiry leaves.

It smells very strongly of wild rice! But the flavor is very light with honey notes. It’s actually very unusual. Very good.