Keemun Mao Feng Black Tea Grade One/AprTea Mall

Keemun is my absolute favorite tea for breakfast. Once upon a time long ago, if you asked for breakfast tea, Keemun was what you were given. These days, even specifically ordering English Breakfast can result in many different types of tea being delivered to you, with Assam or Kenyan tea being the most likely to show up at your table. There are many, many kinds!

But Keemun is gentler on my stomach and still has that “start the day” vibe. Although I rarely add anything to my tea, Keemun can take additions of milk and/or sugar and still shine. The taste is so great as is that I don’t want to dampen it.

This particular Keemun is the middle grade offered by AprTea Mall. I reserve the highest grades for afternoon tea or for drinking by themselves, and I don’t enjoy lower grade Keemun teas nearly as much, but I find a mid-grade to be just what I am looking for in a breakfast tea or to pair with a meal.

The leaves are very dark, long, and lightly twisted. These are whole leaves and not broken bits. The dry leaf aroma is fruity, and the wet leaf aroma is fruity and bright.

It has just enough heft and just enough cocoa or malt flavor to be paired with waffles and syrup and clear the palate without the pucker factor of most breakfast teas. This particular Keemun also has that hint of fruit that earns some of these the designation of a “winey” Keemun, although it is just a hint here and not terribly pronounced.

Overall, I deem this to be a good, serviceable Keemun that I can enjoy as a daily drinker.


Want to Know More About This Tea?

Leaf Type:  Black

Where to Buy:  AprTea Mall

Description

Keemun Mao Feng (祁门毛峰): Keemun Mao Feng is a kind of Keemun Black Tea,has a more refined production process.using one bud and one leaf for full fermentation. the shape is cord tight knot small as eyebrow, the luster is Ukraine; tea aroma lasting fragrance, like fruit orchid fragrance, the aroma has this special name “Qimen fragrant” in the international tea market; tea soup color and leaf color is red and bright, the taste is fresh and thick, and even drink with milk and the sweet sugar, the aroma is not only reduced, but more fragrant.

Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!

Chinese Wuyi Jin Jun Mei Black Tea Grade One / Apr Tea

Took a hiatus from some of the amazing teas I’ve been sampling the past few weeks. Not because I wanted to but because I had a bit of a cold.

Nothing serious but enough to knock my senses out a bit. Hoping against hope that I was better than yesterday I decided to open this 5g packet. Thought it quite odd they would use honey incense in the name but the moment I opened the packet it hit me. Then I had to blow my nose to make sure I was getting every ounce of this incredible aroma.

Honey and incense! The packet still smells like it even with the tea out in my pot. Needless to say I’m excited to try this. Oh wow. Oh man. This is beyond delightful. Everything about this tea is pleasure. Even the way the dry leaves looked before steeping.

Golden leaves mixed in with dark, chocolate-brown. The clear, dark, honey, liquid is a beautiful precursor to the flavor. No astringency, only sweet bits of honey rounded off with light touches of forest floor and hints of nuttiness. The mouth feel is incredibly smooth.

This tea just blows me away. If you enjoy black tea you absolutely have to give this one a try.


Want to Know More About This Tea?

Leaf Type: Black

Where to Buy: Apr Tea

Description:

Wuyi Jin Jun Mei (金骏眉):Every 500g of Jinjun Mei tea needs tens of thousands of fresh shoots of tea buds, picking the fresh tea buds of the mountain original ecological species in Wuyishan Nature Reserve, to be completed through a series of complex withering, shaking, fermentation, rolling and other processing steps. The appearance of Jinjun Mei tea is small and tight. The color is gold, yellow, black and white. Golden for the tea fluff, buds, tight tight knot, round and straight, light body weight, uniform. Open Tang golden color, water with sweet, sweet through the incense, the bottom of the flower fruity display was unable to imitate and beyond the rare quality. Special aroma, dry tea fragrance; hot soup pure and refreshing; warm soup (45 ℃ or so) maturity and delicate; cold soup clear and elegant, high and lasting. Both hot and cold drinks are smooth, with “clear, and, alcohol, thick, fragrant” features. Even brewed 12 times, the mouth is still full of sweet, after the end of the leaves stretch, sprouts fresh, beautiful show.

Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!

Chinese Fenghuang Dancong Oolong Tea Honey Rhyme Mellow Grade One / AprTea

Ready for a tea test?

Have someone pull up this tea before you look at the type and look at a picture -What did you guess?

I chose black. Wrong. This is an oolong.

While a bit confusing in just appearance, it actually makes sense once you take a look at the processing. This is yet another superb tea by AprTea.

No aroma notes to talk about in the dry leaf. Yet it still is a nice tea to look at. Whole leaves, dark chocolate in color. Twisted with care. The best flavor comes between a minute to three and a half minutes.

The aroma cup reveals scents of sweet honeysuckle mixed with other floral hints. Silky mouth-feel with a very slight astringency in the aftertaste if steeped longer than three minutes. If steeped longer then 6 minutes… don’t do that. Just don’t.

Luckily I save a cup from my previous steep the flavor starts sweet with a mix of floral flavors spring floral leads to summer floral the longer you steep it. Longer steeps also lead to introductions with earthy tones.


Want to Know More About This Tea?

Leaf Type: Oolong

Where to Buy: Apr Tea

Description:

Fenghuang (Phoenix) Dancong Tea:The main origin place of Phoenix Dancong tea is Chaozhou Phoenix Mountain, it is rare high flavor famous tea whose natural floral tea is the most lofty, has most diverse floral types with mellow and sweet taste, special charm in our tea resources.

Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!

Glutinous Rice Scent Tea Fossil Pu-erh Cooked Tea from AprTea Mall

I will be the first to admit it.  I am intimidated by Puerh teas.  But each and every time I have one, I love it.  Not sure why I have this apprehension but I’m hoping this is the year I tear that wall down.

This particular puerh was a different bird all together from what I’ve had in the past.  Instead of being tea leaves or a cake, the tea looked to be broken pieces of a cake.  The smell of the tea instantly reminds me of sushi and my mouth starts to water.  To really get all my senses involved with this tea, I went ahead and used my Wall Infuser Mug, scooped some tea into the mug and added some freshly prepped water. Probably not the proper way to enjoy this tea, but I wanted to prepare the tea in a more familiar way this first go.

After a few moments, I couldn’t resist the alluring tea anymore and had to take a sip.  This tea.  This tea is really good. And that is coming from someone that isn’t all that knowledgeable in the matters of darker teas.  The first steeping really delivered this thicker sort of sweet liquid that I eagerly took down.  Really delicious and not at all like the puerhs I’ve had in the past.  The smell was similiar but that the taste. Gotta love a tea that smells like sushi but has a sweeter stonefruit taste.

The second steeping and additional steepings resulted in the same style of flavor.  A sweetness with a thicker feel. Such a complete pleasure and such a wonderful tea to drink.  I actually drank this tea for hours and just never felt that the leaves were fully exhausted of their flavor.  Being the first rice scent puerh I’ve had, I’m hoping I can mimic this result with other varieties later on and even later this week with the remaining puerh I have.


Here’s the scoop!

Leaf Type:  Puerh
Where to Buy:  AprTea Mall
Description

Tea Fossil: the soul of Pu’er tea, Ten years of pure dry storage, named as [broken silver], the aroma is very full, fast and lasting Gan Gan, long-lasting high foam resistance, can bubble more than 40 times, especially the taste: the entrance of thick rice soup incense. Can be described as the essence of tea!

Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!