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This bright, brisk and elegant tea was my morning cup today. It is a really beautiful tea to look at with a generous scattering of golden cooper downy tips among its dark brown leaves. The tea itself has a nice deep orange red colour after 1tsp was left for a 3 min steep in 225 ml at about 95°C.

This is not a particularly sweet Assam, though it does have some nice bright red fruit and citrus tones in its scent and in its flavour when hot. Also present in the scent were nutmeg and cinnamon, the upper tones fmalt, a hint of biscuit and a very faint note of molasses.

The fruity tones were really only strongly apparent in the hot tea and mixed with malt, nutmeg, cinnamon, the lower tones of malt and a touch of cocoa. It felt light and bright on the tongue, with tannins counterbalancing this by providing a little density in the mouth. As it cools a floral tone mixes with the spice and creates a spicy floral tone like gardenia that mixes with a woody sandalwood like tone. The floral tone keeps the sandalwood from tasting warm and heavy. The tea although tasting a little drier, remains bright and light and a little brisk. These tones come to completely dominate the fruit as it cools. The aftertaste is of spice with the deeper tones of malt. A mild sweetness is provided by the fruit.

The tea resteeps really well with the spice and deeper malt tones intensifying.

Altogether a really nice Assam,with a nice number of subtleties to keep it interesting!

Thanks boychik, this tea has many of the aspects I appreciate in my favourite assam. It is only a little lighter, not as sweet, and the floral spice note is stronger than my favourite. Thanks for sharing this special tea with me.

Currently, I am suffering from allergies and was craving something a little spicy to get the annoying buzzy feeling out of my ears and throat, so spice it is! JustJames sent me a bit of this around Christmas.

I brewed 1.25 TSP in 225 ml for 2.5min.

Hot, I smelled mostly fruit, with the base tea combining with the orange and vanilla to create something almost berryish, cloves and ginger and a hint of cardamon. As it cooled the almond and vanilla notes, as well as the orange became more distinct.

I found the tea to be not as spicy tasting as it smells but the cloves and possibly pepper does create a tingling on the tongue and a cooling in the back of the throat. The fruit is very present in the forefront, with the vanilla becoming more distinct and separate as it cools and the base contributes a cherry note that sweetens the orange. The base contributes a sense of thickness as a result of a mild astringency and its moderate level of tannins. It is quite fruity on its own and contributes a hint of floral, as well as slight malt and bready notes.

Altogether this is what I needed at this moment. Thanks James!

This tea certainly has a breadier, maltier and less sweet base tea than Nina’s other black teas I’ve had. It gives the tea a certain density and takes the tea from being a spring/summer tea to a year round tea. The tea initially smells a lot like other raspberry orange teas I’ve had, but on closer inspection this one is sweeter and more rounded than the other one I currently have. The berry notes are especially noticeable under the two dominant fruits.

The raspberry and orange blended with the bready, faintly leathery base are the first notes present but once these dissipate a warm sweet mixed fruit flavour opens up underneath. The puerh mixes well with the orange raspberry and as it cools, I am tasting a bit of passion fruit between the top notes and berry, and a faint floral note in the raspberry. The tea is warming at first but finishes with a cooling feeling in the mouth. I brewed this tea for Nina’s recommended 3 min and it creates a really good balance between the flavouring and the base tea flavours. An interesting pleasant tea that I like better hot than my current raspberry/orange tea.

Thanks for the opportunity to try this tea go to Laurent at Nina’s!

I’ve had this cupboard for a while. The first few times I had it I think I overleafed or over steeped it as I did not experience the delicious fruitiness and spice that I am getting today.

Today after steeping 1tsp in 225 ml of water at around 94°C for 3 min I have a tea that’s yielding a lovely spicy, fruity tea. This tea has notes of brown sugar, yam, malt,cocoa, blackberry, cinnamon, and a faint floral clover nectar. The second steep remained delicious and smooth even though I rediculously over steeped it.

I would purchase this tea again if Capital Tea restocks it, in the mean time this one is tempting me. http://www.capitaltea.com/shop/product.php?productid=247&cat=3&page=1!

I’ve been sipping on this tea all morning and it’s still going strong. The dry tea scent promises cocoa, a roasted note and a grainy bready note. These notes do appear in the brewed tea but the grainy note does not make a strong appearance until later steeps. A lot of my other Bailin teas have been very fruity, this one is not although it does have some nice plum notes. What it does have are notes of molasses(more than caramel to me), a roasted note, cream, sweet potato , plum, a floral note, a hint of hay, grain notes, a hint of leather(in later steeps), cinnamon and malt. The tea tasted more robust in later steeps, but remained very smooth throughout.

I brewed this tea using 1.25tsp in a 150ml Gaiwan and used a water temperature of 92°C.
I used steeping times of 30,40,50,70, and 120s and will probably get at least one more good steep out of it. The tea brews to a pretty deepening maple shade.

This is a nice mellow tea, that has made a pleasant companion this morning. Thanks Sil for sharing!

I’ve come to see Tan Yang teas as kind of a geographical designation like VQA with wine, with most of the teas grown in the area named that way except for the Lapsang Souchong, the teas grown from the guanyin varietal, and most of the really tippy teas which are labeled either as Jing Pin or Jinjunmei depending on the wholesaler. Some of the sites refer to a Tan Agar varietal of the tea plant as well, but I haven’t found much information on that as of yet.

This tea is from Fuan, and is a lower grade of the golden monkey tea, it is sometimes referred to yin Mao hou. The sources I found on this tea said that it is often fruitier and sweeter than golden monkey so I was curious to try it.

This tea was harvested on April 28,2014. It has dark loosely curled leaves with scattered copper toned golden tips. The dry leaf smells very sweet and chocolatey with an undertone of roasted grain/malt tones.

I brewed this tea both western and gongfu styles and found similar tones in both. Styles.

I brewed 1tsp/20Oml/at@92°C. And ended up with a golden, orangey,brown broth with a golden ring.

The scent of this tea was of cocoa, with a touch of longan and a lighter peach/mandarin scent, with a buttery tone and cane sugar.

The tea presents a light bright first impression with the fruit up front with longan, a sweeter citrus mandarin note and a sweeter creamy peach like tone during some steeps especially in western style.

The fruit tones are separated from the deeper tones underneath by a cane sugar note.

The deeper tones include cocoa, butter, a hint of salt, a slight hint of something floral, and a faint roasted note.

Later steeps had a deeper richer flavour and introduced a clover nectar tone, and more distinct malt. Some steeps had a creamy texture and were almost syrupy. The tea had a light sweet aftertaste.

The western style steeps still had the bright fruity flavours on top, but had a deeper, heavier flavour underneath.

Altogether this tea was smooth, sweet, creamy and bright, with a good balance between the flavours. A very nice tea and great for summer.

In mid summer, while I worked in the Chapleau Crown Game Preserve tracking Black Bears, we would reach a point where half the bears would dissapear from their home ranges as they left in search of food. That population is basically dependant on the success of the blueberry crop for survival. Once they started to leave their home ranges we would spend part of the day tracking/searching for our wandering bears, and part of the day sampling blueberry plots among other duties. After which we had tons of berries to freeze, eat and turn into many baked goods. At the study site we had two species of blueberries; Vaccinium angustafolium, which had smaller tarter berries and smooth leaved shorter plants, and V. Myrtilloides which had furry leaved taller plants and big sweet berries that tasted a little like blueberry bubble gum. This tea reminds me of the latter, with a rich sweet syrupy scent and flavour that reminds me a little of a blueberry pancake breakfast drank with a hearty rich tea.

This tea does a really nice job of balancing the flavours between the base tea and the flavouring. The scent and the taste are of those large bubble gun tinged blueberries I picked in the field up near Chapleau, with a nice sweet slightly syrupy notes, all over a malty and slightly biscuit noted base that has a slightly tart fruit reference. The sweetness of the flavouring is tempered by both the tannins in the tea and the blackberry leaf. The base tea is only slightly astringent, but has enough texture and tannins to give it a nice density in the mouth. Despite the flavouring and scent being quite distinct they do not overpower the base and the tea does not require sweetners for the flavouring to pop. Well done Tea Brewery At the moment this is my favourite blueberry tea in my cupboard.

Not really a detailed note, but more a reminder to myself. Short steeps really bring out the fruity notes of this tea, I think I prefer it this way.

At one point last year I had a tea moment with this sample from an aliexpress dealer. The tea tasted like a chocolate caramel oolong and was incredibly smooth. Since then I’ve been on a search for that tea or a tea like it. It can be difficult because tea packaging is sometimes used regionally and may not be specific to a brand. Anyways after my last attempt boychik offered to send me some of this tea as part of my quest to find that tea, and you know, it comes quite close. This one is more malty, not quite as smooth and has much stronger caramel notes, but it is really good. It makes a nice dessert tea.

I steeped 1 TSP in 200ml and used a water temperature of around 92°C and did 4 steeps of this tea (60,90,120,210s).

This teas warm honey broth had a scent of light longan cocoa, butter caramel, and something slightly nutty.

The first sip was quite sweet with caramel coming to the forefront, with ccocoa, yam, and nutty tones with a hint of molasses. As it cools the longan becomes apparent between the butter caramel and other tones. The tea is buttery but slightly more astringent than my fantasy lapsang but really good and very close to the one I am looking for. This one has more caramel and longan and less cocoa, but it is a really nice flavour. As it cools the malt becomes apparent under the other flavours and the tea taste slightly less sweet. The aftertaste of hot chocolate with a little bit of longan.

In future steeps a malt tone became apparent and the caramel became more of a butter note with a mild sweetness. Longan was more apparent in the second steep and then faded. Whereas cocoa remain relatively constant.

Altogether a very good tea which I would consider buying once I get through some of my existing Lapsang Souchong collection. Thanks boychik It really is close!