Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Teasenz
Tea Description:
A first flush Longjing tea picked in early spring. An exceptional quality rarely seen outside of China.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Nice! This is an exceptionally fresh-tasting Longjing! I’m not surprised, of course, because I can’t recall being disappointed by any of the teas that I’ve tried thus far from Teasenz! This company is one that is committed to offering the very finest (and freshest!) teas. I like that in a tea company.
And I’m finding myself really appreciating the freshness and flavor of this first flush Long Jing (aka Dragon Well). It’s sweet and smooth and delicious. Not a trace of bitterness and a very low astringency level.
This Dragon Well has a light vegetal tone and tastes more of sweet butter with nutty tones than it tastes grassy or vegetative. I also taste notes of fruit and flower in the distance.
The sip starts out sweet, reminiscent of the nutty flavor you might experience with a browned butter. The nutty flavor has a light, toasted taste to it. About mid-sip, I start to pick up on hints of fruit and very delicate whispers of flower in the distance. More sweetness! The sip ends smooth with a slight dry sensation – a very, very slight dry astringency here. If I wasn’t focused in on the sip and really concentrating on everything I’m picking up on … this astringency is so low that it would have escaped my notice.
I love how this tea washes the palate with sweetness with every sip. It’s so enjoyable. It is more sweet than it is savory or brothy, this isn’t one of those “nourishing” type of teas, this is one to drink for the sheer celebration of a superbly beautiful and satisfyingly sweet green tea.
Another AMAZING tea from Teasenz!
Goomtee Grand Reserve Spring Tea First Flush 2014 from Darjeeling Tea Lovers
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Darjeeling Tea Lovers
Tea Description:
Goomtee Grand Reserve is a LIMITED EDITION tea. Not all teas get the prestigious tag of GRAND RESERVE but this tea deserves every bit of this.
The leaves have been plucked from the highest elevated section of this garden which is also called the MUSCATEL VALLEY. Super fine plucking of the leaves and tender processing has resulted with a masterpiece.
High floral notes with distinct JASMINE LIKE flavour will make every tea connoisseur mesmerized. It is only Goomtee that could deliver such a beauty.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
This 2014 Goomtee Grand Reserve Spring Tea First Flush is a lot greener than most of the Darjeeling teas that I’ve encountered lately. In fact, it looks very much like a green tea rather than a black tea.
Taking this into account, I lowered the temperature slightly. Normally, I would steep a Darjeeling tea at 195°F, but for this greener Darjeeling, I lowered the temperature to 185°F, and using my Breville One-Touch tea maker, I set the steep time for 2 minutes.
The result is a delightful cup of tea! The aroma of the brewed cup is crazy floral – it is really beautiful.
And the flavor! Sweet! Floral! There are even hints of muscatel in this cup. The floral notes are profound, and as the description above promises, there is a “distinct jasmine like” flavor. There is a soft, pleasant texture. The astringency sort of tingles on the tongue in the finish, and I find that it accentuates the floral notes of this cup.
I’m mesmerized by the jasmine tones of this cup. I don’t think that this tea was actually *scented* with jasmine, but, it almost tastes as though it has been processed similar to a typical jasmine scented tea. The jasmine essence is a bit more subdued than in a typical jasmine green tea, for example, but, it’s still a rather surprising taste to find in a Darjeeling tea such as this.
I’d recommend this to all those that enjoy drinking tea! Those that love jasmine, as I do, this is an exciting twist on that classic favorite. Those that love Darjeeling, this is one that you should have on your cupboard because it’s a stunning representation of a fine Darjeeling first flush. Those that simply love all teas, this is quite a unique tea and unlike any that I’ve tried thus far (and I’ve tried a lot of tea!) It’s one you should try too!
A truly remarkable and … rather unexpected Darjeeling tea.
Mr. He’s 1st Picking Laoshan Black Tea from Verdant Tea
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Verdant Tea
Tea Description:
Laoshan Black is our most popular tea, and its success has encouraged Mr He of Laoshan Village to keep refining his process to make it better every year. This year, Mr. He has taken leaves normally used for his delicate and subtle early spring green tea and allowed them to roast in the sun for three days before hand processing in small one to two pound batches, yielding this incredible rich, subtle Laoshan Black experience.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
The aroma of the dry leaf knocks my socks off. OK, so I wasn’t wearing socks, but if I was, they’d be blown off. My feet felt the absence of the socks and felt the strong gust of wind that was there to blow the socks off the feet, but, because there was no socks, my feet just got a nice cool breeze for a few minutes, and given that it’s kind of hot outside, I’m glad that the gust wasn’t warm air.
Wow … so that was a lot “windier” than I expected to be to describe a scent that I can’t remember experiencing with a black tea in the past. It smells like chocolate. Like dark chocolate with a nice roast on those cacao beans. Nice. The chocoholic in me is happy.
This is a very special tea. And since it is so special, I decided to consult the suggested brewing parameters on the Verdant Tea website for how to best brew this tea. Now, this isn’t something I do often. I don’t usually check to see how the company suggests I brew a tea, mostly because I’ve been brewing tea for a long time. I eyeball my measurements using my bamboo scoop (the bamboo scoop that I own looks sort of like this one).
I have kind of a set “temperature” guide in my head: for most black teas, I use boiling water. If I’m brewing Assam, I drop the temperature to 205°F. If I’m brewing Darjeeling, I drop the temperature to 195°F. If I’m brewing herbal teas, including rooibos, honeybush, yerba mate and guayusa, I also set the temperature for 195°F. Most pu-erh teas get 190°F. If’ I’m brewing Green or Oolong teas, I use 175 – 185°F. If I’m brewing a white or yellow tea, I use 170°F. I don’t often stray from this mental temperature guide often. Steep times are also follow a mental steep-time guide.
But because this is a tea that is of very limited quantities, and not one that I want to experiment a lot with because I don’t have a large quantity of this tea to experiment with, nor do I have the resources to secure myself a large quantity of the tea … because of these reasons, I decided to consult with the people who have had more experience with this tea than I. I decided to go with the gongfu brew style (hey, what the heck!) and I now have sitting before me my first cup of this tea – the combined results of the first and second infusions, following an extremely quick 1 second rinse.
Ow! Cup is hot. I’m using my little Chinese teacup with no handle and made of very thin porcelain, so there’s not a lot to insulate and protect my fingers from the heat of the boiling water used to infuse this tea.
Very mellow tasting. These infusions were 15 seconds and 20 seconds, which went a little longer than the suggested 2 – 3 seconds as suggested in the brewing parameters by Verdant. But there is still a lot of flavor to the mellow taste.
The chocolate notes are THERE and I’m loving that. The tasting notes on the Verdant website also suggest notes of cherry and almond, and I do get a slight roasted nut flavor there that is almond-y. A lovely combination of flavors with the prolific chocolate notes. I taste hints of the sweet cherry notes. This first cup is sweet and lovely.
The next two infusions proved to continue with the chocolate-y notes. I love the roasted flavor to this cup and how that enhances the chocolate-y notes. I’m starting to pick up on honey-like flavors and a slight caramel-y note, like a honey caramel. Nice. I love that while this is tea is loaded with sweet notes, it doesn’t taste too sweet. It’s smooth and well-rounded.
Later infusions, I noticed the chocolate notes beginning to wane, replaced with a stronger nutty tone. Imagine toasted nuts that have been drizzled with honey.
The brewing parameters suggest 15 infusions, and I might very well have gotten that many out of this measurement of leaves, but, I was quite satisfied with the eight infusions that I brewed. By the fourth and final cup, while I was still enjoying the tea but I found myself missing the chocolate-y notes of the earlier infusions.
Then I found myself wondering how the flavors would differ if I were to experiment with this tea using the “Western” approach to brewing. So, I decided to do just that!
I think that I actually prefer the western method of brewing for this particular tea. The flavor is richer and more robust from the very first cup. Still deliciously chocolate-y and tasting of roasted almonds with hints of cherry, but the flavor has more muchness to it when I brew it using the teapot rather than the gaiwan.
And brewing this way, I can still get three flavorful infusions out of this tea. The first: chocolate-y, rich with notes of toasted almond and sweet cherry. The second: a little lighter on the chocolate notes, but, still very pleasantly chocolate-y, with more enhanced nutty notes and a touch of honey. And with the third, I was able to actually taste some notes of sarsaparilla.
This tea is awesome! It makes me want to dance the futterwacken!
Pyin Green Tea (2014) from Shan Valley
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Shan Valley
Tea Description:
This tea hails from Pyin Long within Northern Shan, Myanmar. This is also a first flush tea and is an everyday drinking tea. This tea is a reddish color.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
How lovely!
I was a little surprised when I first opened the pouch of tea and took a good look at the tea inside. It looks like a black tea … or at the very least a well-oxidized Oolong, but the label said that it was a green tea.
And even though it looked like a black tea, the dry leaf possesses the aroma of a green tea! A very strong vegetal scent, much like the smell that fills the kitchen when I’m steaming green veggies. The leaves produce a fairly dark liquid (darker than what I usually see with a green tea) with a vegetative scent.
The flavor is not quite as vegetal as I would have expected, given all the veggie smells I was picking up in both the dry leaf and the brewed tea. Yes, I do taste a grassy/vegetative flavor, but that’s not all I taste, nor is it the strongest flavor that I taste.
I taste notes of flower and fruit (somewhere between apple and melon), and a lovely buttery overtone. The vegetal notes taste very fresh and invigorating – it’s a very refreshing and satisfying beverage. It has a well-rounded flavor and while it is a thick, broth-like tea (in both taste and texture) and the buttery notes are strong, it doesn’t feel heavy as I sip it, nor does it leave the palate feeling coated with that buttery sensation. It is very easy to drink, with a pleasant flavor that is sweet – but not too sweet – and savory.
Another GREAT tea from Shan Valley!
Kyaukme Black Tea (2014) from Shan Valley
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Shan Valley
Tea Description:
This is a first flush black tea, and is the highest quality black tea that Shan Valley offers. It is from the Kyaukme Northern Shan state. The tea leaves are evenly grinded and have a strong flavor. It has a coffee-like look.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
When I opened the pouch of this Kyaukme Black Tea from Shan Valley (a 2014 Spring Flush!), the first thing I noticed was the grind to the black tea leaves. This CTC tea has a very fine chop, resembling some of the finest ground coffee I’ve ever seen. But don’t let that dissuade you! I find that with fine CTC teas like this, the flavor is more robust – like a good kick in the pants for the days when you need that sort of thing!
But one thing to be aware of when you have a finely chopped tea leaf like this one is that the brew time should be adjusted. There is more surface area that is exposed to the boiling water, and therefore it releases more of it’s flavor quicker than a whole tea leaf would. It also releases more tannins into the liquid, which means that if you steep this tea too long, you could wind up with a bitter tasting cuppa. So, cut the brew time here, I wouldn’t recommend a longer brew time than 2 1/2 minutes, especially to start out. After you’ve tried it, you can adjust the time to your own particular tastes.
The aroma of the dry leaf reminds me a little bit of coffee – like the earthy background notes of coffee. There are notes of earth, wood, and even hints of grass and flower to the dry leaf. The fragrance of the brewed tea is very similar to the dry leaf, except that it smells more unified. I smell fewer distinct ‘earthy’ or ‘grassy’ notes to the brewed liquid, and more of a melded scent that is composed of many less distinguished notes. It is a very satisfying aroma, though, like the kind of scent that you want to experience first thing in the morning: like a wake up call in the morning.
The flavor is strong! Like I said in a previous paragraph, the fine CTC chop means a good, strong brew, and this tea proves that statement. This is a BOLD tasting tea. This tea will give you that much needed kick to help shake the sleep that you’re still feeling when you first wake up.
It’s rich and satisfying with a very pleasing flavor. Robust and earthy, with notes of fruit (reminds me of something between plums and raisins), with a nice, molasses-y sweetness. It’s not bitter (although, as I said before, if I had oversteeped this, it would definitely be bitter … so watch your steep time with this one!)
The sip starts out with a sweet note that builds into an earthy note. There are wisps of smoke and tones of wood in the distance. I taste notes of grass to this too, but not in a green tea sort of way. It tastes more like what I’d imagine some fresh grass that had been roasted might taste. Still barely insinuating a vegetal note without actually admitting it outright. It has sweet undertones with dry fruit notes.
As I near mid-sip, these flavors I’ve mention develop. I taste very distant floral notes, most of which are hidden behind the more forward earthy notes. As the sip approaches the finish, a dryness is introduced, similar to what you might experience with a dry wine. The finish is dry and the aftertaste is clean. The astringency here is dry, clean and I feel a slight puckery sensation across my palate well into the aftertaste. It’s not unpleasant … it feels very clean and refreshing, actually.
A really rewarding cup of tea. It’s quite unlike any other black tea that I can remember, but at the same time, it has similar qualities to those familiar favorites. I’m enjoying this.