Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Della Terra Teas
Tea Description:
Strawberries and cream. So creamy, so fruity, filled with berry deliciousness! Just like the classic dessert, this green tea will cover your tastebuds in all the classic flavor you know… Delicious!
Ingredients: Green tea, Lung Ching, Pai Mu Tan, strawberry flavor and bits, cream flavor
Suggested brewing tips:
Serving Size: 1 level tsp./6oz serving
Water Temp: 158-167°F
Steep Time: 1-3 minutes
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
The aroma of this Strawberries and Cream Green Tea from Della Terra Teas is best described as Mmmmmmmmmmmmm. Both in the steeped and dry form the smell is nothing short of perfection. Not only the strawberry and the cream scents, but the tea leaves themselves smell amazing!
Now I already knew going in that Della Terra has some of the best flavored teas on the market. For me they are right up top with Butiki Teas, and a handful of other places. This tea, is just indulgent, lovely, delightful, and about another twenty or so adjectives all adding up to bliss!
To be honest, I really am not even focusing on this review right now, this cup is that good! I keep getting sidetracked by the cup, sitting back inhaling in the sweet creamy aromas, enjoying the aroma of the tea leaves caressing my senses with their delicate, but attention grabbing nature. If they made a perfume that smelled like this I wold wear it. People may say I am too old to wear a scent that smells like a carnival, but put me in a pink tutu and parade me around the ring, I am all in with this tea! It reminds me of the fair, or a circus, and all of the sticky sweet smells that go along with it from spun sugar cotton candy, to kids blowing giant bubble gum bubbles, or the smell of funnel cake filling the air. Yet, it is not really all that sweet at all! The flavor of this tea is nothing close to sticky sweet! Its so natural, so pleasing with the grassy buttery tones of the tea, that while I may be taken into this sweet intoxicating world in my imagination, I am not putting that junk into my body! What could be better!?
Sorry I must end my review here and really sit back and lavish in the rest of my cup.
Chiran Sencha from O5 Tea
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Amoda
Tea Description:
Sweet, thick and full-bodied. A grassy and vegetal green tea with
refreshing astringency and light cream aroma.From grower Furuichi Shoji. It is grown in the old Samurai town Chiran, in Kagoshima prefecture, Japan. Here, the climate is ideal for tea – warm air mixed with cool breezes from the Bay of Kagoshima.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Chiran Sencha from O5 Tea brings us something slightly different in a sencha. My SororiTea Sister Anne reviewd this tea here.
The reason I am pointing out her review is so that you can understand this is in fact a really good sencha, but I am not as in love with it as my sister is. Its good, its very grassy, but for me, I always appreciate the buttery note that is lacking in this one. I suppose I’m stuck in my ways but I say “bring on the butter” okay confession time… I’m a butter addict. I love butter, I’d eat a whole stick of the stuff if I knew it would not be terrible for me, but I digress, the only think truly lacking in this sencha is the butter note. So with that said, this is a really great sencha! It is in fact one of the greenest, freshest tasting sencha I have ever tried with the longest lingering after taste.
I will say this however, for those of you like myself who want that buttery sensation, wait for it. Really, wait for it, the buttery comes out when this tea gets to be around room temperature, depending on how cool you keep your home anyway. This would be a lovely iced sencha and I typically do not like sencha iced!
Be sure you have a really fine strainer when brewing this as I had quite a bit of bits in the bottom of my cup, but I really do need to invest in a new strainer. The color of the liquor is really pretty, a light almost limey colored green. It is not murky at all though even with the particles laying on the bottom of the cup, I can see them all. Hummm this is inspiring of a tea leaf reading when the tea is gone!
Organic Gyokuro from Aiya
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Aiya
Tea Description:
Organic Gyokuro is one of the rarest teas in the world. Aiya has exclusive experience working with Japanese farmers to achieve this high-level of Gyokuro which meets international organic standards. Fresh shade grown leaves are carefully handpicked to maximize Gyokuro’s natural sweetness.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Organic Gyokuro from Aiya tea is truly a tea to experience. There is a velvety feel in the mouth when sipping this Gyokuro from Aiya. I love grassy teas, this is a true vegetal delight without being too heavy, yet its not so light that you need to search for the flavors.
The vegetal notes are similar to steamed spinach, a little on the sea-weed side, I get kelp in that aspect. It is lightly buttery, but more creamy than buttery. It has a soothing quality that reminds me of the feeling I get when I eat oatmeal, but it tastes nothing like oatmeal. It just has that warm feeling, like a comfort food, this is a comfort tea.
I feel very centered and balanced when I sip this tea, and it makes me feel like I am doing something really wonderful for my body, and mind. Gyokuro is known for its balance of sweet and bitter, even when steeped properly there is a slight astringency in the sip. Yet, it is sweet as well, which brings this perfect harmony to the cup. Its the perfect balance indeed.
Interestingly there is a long lingering flavor left on the palate that is reminiscent of roses. Overall it is very green tasting, but I do love this lasting floral note.
There is just something special about Japanese Green Tea, something that only high quality companies that have high standards can bring us as tea lovers. Aiya brings us some of the best examples of excellent Japanese Green Tea.
Organic Sencha from Aiya
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Aiya
Tea Description:
Organic Sencha is one of the highest in quality in the Japanese internationally certfied organic Sencha category. This grade of Organic Sencha is rare even in the Japanese market. This tea is grown to meet strict organic regulations while maintaining a light refreshing flavor and aroma with a clear green appearance.
Preparation:
Bring the water to a boil and allow it to cool to 80°C/176°F. Steep 1 heaping teaspoon (3g) of Organic Sencha for 1.5 minutes in 1 cup (240 ml/8 oz) of hot water. With this tea, one can pour more hot water over the tea leaves and enjoy another cup.
Ingredients:
Organic Japanese Green Tea – Organic Sencha
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Organic Sencha from Aiya provides a clear, clean, flavorful cup. Aiya’s sencha is organic, which is always a plus in my book.
Steeped correctly, (175 degrees, or 80c, for 1.5 minutes), you will find no astringency or bitterness in Aiya’s Sencha.
I found this cup to have a nutty appeal, grassy of course, and just a slight seaweed flavor. While also vegetal, I find the vegetal notes to be somewhat tame.
Sencha is the most popular tea in Japan from what I have learned, and I can see why. It is light, clear, refreshing, flavorful, and thirst quenching.
Sencha can be enjoyed both hot and cold.
This sencha also leaves a lovely floral essence on the palate. It is a surprising and delicious experience.
Aiya’s website is truly a sight to behold. The flash site has a cool viewing and user experience, although it takes a little time to learn proper navigation, I did enjoy it and I am not one who is usually partial to flash sites.
Aiya sells their Organic Sencha for 25.80 USD excluding any applicable taxes in an 80 gram size and I do believe that it comes in its own tin, which is always a plus.
I have also found some useful and fun information on their blog, which is mostly dedicated to matcha. You can find Aiya’s blog here.
Sencha Superior Uji from Zen Tea Life
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green, Sencha
Where to Buy: Zen Tea Life
Tea Description:
Sencha is the most commonly enjoyed variety of Japanese green tea. Sencha contains more of the beneficial nutrient Catechin than other green teas, because it is grown in full sunlight, thus it becomes yellow-green in color. Sencha tastes gently astringent and smells wonderfully fresh. Sencha is harvested three or four times a year. But with each harvest, the tea becomes slightly lower in quality. This is why the first flush, or Ichiban Cha, is the best. All of our Sencha products are made exclusively from Ichiban Cha. You will certainly be delighted with the fine and generously harmonized flavor of our Sencha.
Ingredients: Sencha, Matcha, Brown Rice, Puffed Corn.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
The cup steeps into a clear, nearly neon green color. Its bright and cheery, and just what the doctor ordered on a foggy dreary day!
The flavor of this tea is deliciously green, vegetal, sweet, nutty, and fresh.
As described there is a light astringency to the cup but it does not become bitter if brewed correctly.
The directions say to use 1 to 2 teaspoons so I split the difference going 1.5 teaspoons however I am feeling I could have saved some leaf and went with just one. It is a strong tasting tea, not too strong, just strong enough that you don’t need as much leaf as you could use unless you want your sencha to really punch you in the face.
There is a wonderful fresh cut grass after taste that I adore! It lingers just like beautiful clean crisp blades of summer grass from a full lush lawn.
There is a nuttiness to the tea as well which is another of my favorite flavor notes. The matcha in the tea is noticeable in flavor but does not leave matcha “dust” in the bottom of your cup. This brings me to the following: One thing that does confuse me is that on the ingredients listing it says there is puffed rice, matcha, sencha of course, and brown rice, yet in the leaf itself I see none of this so it must be somehow mixed in here perfectly so it is not detected in the dry leaf. To the naked eye it looks simply like a beautiful deep green sencha. Or the labeling on my sample may be incorrect. Regardless, I can taste the flavor notes listed on the ingredients, I just can’t see them. What the label infers to me is a genmaicha.
What one can’t be confused about however is that this particular tea, is delicious.