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Shnooks posted:Oh drat, that thing says to consume in 3 months. Does anyone take longer to finish their teas? I store them all in mason jars in the back of my cabinet so they're pretty air tight. I've had a couple of teas in tins for about six months and they've been fine, though I'm guessing as they age they probably just lose their flavor a bit unless they're getting moldy or something. I also have a habit of ordering too much tea, and I've come to really appreciate those heavy, opaque ziplock bags Upton uses if you don't select tins. hayden. posted:I'm sort of new to loose leaf tea and want caffeine-free (or low caffeine, like green) recommendations. Upton and presumably other places sell small samples of all their teas for $1-$1.50 (except the really expensive ones) and it's enough to make at least a few cups. I'd go that route. They also sell sampler sets, which are four cute small 35g tins, including a decaf sampler that my wife liked. I liked their green and oolong samplers quite a lot. Also, if you're looking for low/no caffeine drinks, you might want to give rooibos and/or honeybush a try, which naturally have no caffeine but don't have that "flavored water" taste of most "herbal" teas.
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Aug 2, 2013 00:48
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hayden. posted:Does this not affect the taste at all? I don't know, to be honest. I'm the weirdo who drinks decaf coffee and thinks it tastes fine, so I'm probably a bad judge. I haven't tried two of the same teas from the same brand to compare, like regular vs. decaf Earl Grey from the same company.
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Aug 2, 2013 02:12
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I think my favorite caffeine-free tea is the rooibos vanilla chai from Adagio. I'm not a huge fan of the taste of rooibos (it's okay, but eh), and the spices really help it out.
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Aug 2, 2013 05:56
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DontAskKant posted:Didn't your jars develop really high pressure. Mine felt like the cap was going to burst. Yes, a lot of gas is released but they weren't sealed completely, had a surgical tube inserted into a hole drilled in cork. The free tube ends were submerged in water in a spare jar so carbon dioxide goes out but air doesn't get in. It may not even be necessary to water lock like this, just to leave a small opening for excess gas. Pyromancer fucked around with this message at 08:13 on Aug 2, 2013 |
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Aug 2, 2013 08:10
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I have some blackberry and mulberry ones coming up soon and I hope that my airlocks from the brew supply store come. That might work, I think. I don't know. I wish the whole process was documented and analyzed instead of just being something great grandma said once and nobody thinking about it any more than that. What do you guys think of cascara? I've been playing with it for a few years and it's always hard to find, but I do kind of like it, it's just annoying to get a hold of. The only place I've found it in Far East Asia has been Hong Kong.
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Aug 2, 2013 10:17
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Chicago goons, I'm in town for the weekend and have some free time on Monday. I know there's a good tea store here, but I don't know the name or where it is. Any suggestions? For actual helpful content, Someone suggested jasmine green tea a while back and I got some and absolutely love it. I hate flowery-tasting things, but this just adds a beautiful sweetness. It reminds me of the honeysuckle we used to eat from my backyard growing up.
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Aug 2, 2013 15:30
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In the river north/near north neighborhoods close to downtown there's Adagio's retail store and TeaGschwendner. Chinatown, I think the go-to place is Ten Ren, never been there myself. If for some reason you're up north near Evanston, there's a really fantastic traditional tea shop, Dream About Tea, they've got a pretty nice collection of yixing and gaiwan sets there, only place I've seen around here who sells them. I really recommend visiting Adagio's store. Their selection isn't as wide as the online catalogue but the people who work there are very friendly and love to chat all day about tea, and they'll brew you a sample of whatever they have on stock until you're sure you know what to take back with you. hope and vaseline fucked around with this message at 18:48 on Aug 2, 2013 |
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Aug 2, 2013 18:43
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I came to post exactly what hope and vaseline said, except I don't know about Chinatown. If you are in the West 'burbs, Todd & Holland is also pretty good. My favorite is also Adagio especially since they will brew you anything if you want to try before you buy.
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Aug 2, 2013 18:54
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On the other side of the coin, which tea has enough caffeine for it to be a coffee-substitute in the morning?
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Aug 3, 2013 07:22
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Archer2338 posted:On the other side of the coin, which tea has enough caffeine for it to be a coffee-substitute in the morning? I don't know that the caffeine content of black tea is the same as coffee but CTC (Cut, Tear, Curl) Assam is pretty much the strongest tea I've found. A cup in the morning leaves me wide awake and ready for the day.
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Aug 3, 2013 07:30
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Archer2338 posted:On the other side of the coin, which tea has enough caffeine for it to be a coffee-substitute in the morning? Regular actual teas aren't going to have all that much compared to coffee. You'd probably have better luck with yerba mate, it's got a hell of a lot more caffeine than tea does--almost as much as a cup of coffee. And the people wondering about the fruit fermentation stuff, you might want to look at the homebrew beer thread, too. They use a lot of the same supplies from the sound of it and might have suggestions on dealing with pressure and sterilizing your stuff. And there are some beers that use fruit anyway, so that probably isn't outside their realm of knowledge. http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3437782
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Aug 3, 2013 08:01
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Thanks for the Chicago tips! I'll try to get to the Adagio store on Monday and post a trip report! Yerba Mate recommendations, I love Mighty Leaf's (bagged) Rainforest Mate. It's mostly dried fruit mixed in with regular mate, so I may experiment with mixing it myself. Since the full leaf Yerba mate is already pretty crushed, I'll happily drink it bagged, but the cost aspect is a good reason to try recreating the recipe.
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Aug 3, 2013 16:59
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I'm drinking Verdant's Laoshan Black and there are just a ton of tasting notes on the website that I'm not getting at all. I followed their instructions to the letter (just boiling water, 3 minutes), but I'm just not getting any of the flavors it mentions. I like the tea a lot but there's no chocolate or malt or whatever. It definitely has a honey smell but nothing's coming through to the actual taste. Is my palette just bad, are their instructions bad, am I loving something else up?
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Aug 4, 2013 07:14
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What kind of water are you using? You might consider using distilled water. Also, their tasting notes could be bullshit. Although it does sound more like the taste of your water is overpowering the taste of the tea.
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Aug 4, 2013 07:20
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It's just tap water filtered through my brita pitcher. If that's enough to taint the taste of the tea, my tea will have to be forever tainted, unfortunately. I really think it's just that my palette is undeveloped, as much as I'm loathe to admit that to myself. We'll see once I try more teas.
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Aug 4, 2013 07:23
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Swagger Dagger posted:I'm drinking Verdant's Laoshan Black and there are just a ton of tasting notes on the website that I'm not getting at all. I followed their instructions to the letter (just boiling water, 3 minutes), but I'm just not getting any of the flavors it mentions. I don't have any advice but I honestly thought the Laoshan Black was absolute poo poo. After trying the amazing incredible wonderful Yunnan white jasmine, it was sort of a shock. And black tea is my favorite, this is the first time I've ever outright disliked a black tea. Maybe I got a bad batch. edit: This came off way more confrontational than I intended, I don't mean to demean your tastes. If anything I'm disappointed in my own taste irt the laoshan black. Hummingbirds fucked around with this message at 07:28 on Aug 4, 2013 |
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Aug 4, 2013 07:25
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I can vouch for yerba mate's ability to replace coffee. I used to need a couple cups just to get going for work, and i would crash pretty hard mid-day. After switching to mate, I have way more energy and just don't get that crash at all. I drink way too much (on average 48oz before work), but even one cup will get me going through to lunch time. I am also in love with the way it tastes. The one i have from Adagio is really grassy and kind of earthy, but only faintly. If you look it up you will probably find a lot of stuff about the traditional method of drinking it with the special cup and straw and everything, but for the morning time I just brew it like normal tea. I can also get a full day's tea out of just one helping of leaves, which is great because I'm
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Aug 4, 2013 14:33
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One thing with tasting notes is that different things taste different to different people. I used to be heavy into whiskies, which offer a huge range of potential flavors per dram, but the tasting notes were always mainly loose guidelines of the blatantly obvious things (by Jove, this sherry cask whisky tastes like sherry!) and really bizarre obscure things (and there is a subtle hint of Corinthian leather and jelly babies). Things like "chocolate and malt" usually mean in that context a kind of heady dirtiness, like cocoa rather than like what we think of when we think of chocolate. When I detect a chocolatiness, and I'm not eating chocolate, it's usually the darker, bitterer qualities of chocolate that make me think chocolate - else it could be something else sweet, like sugar or honey or somesuch. But in general, it's not just the tasting notes that differ, but the expression the person uses. Humans have a weird way of honing in on flavors, smells, and sensations that is eerily accurate from person to person, (abdominal aortic aneurysm is invariably reported as a "tearing" sensation because there are only stretch receptors in the abdominal aorta, but still, it's funny that a person who has never been torn asunder would know what that feels like to recognize it), but they still differ in things like taste because people have different acuity to different specific flavors. Some people can "detect" bitter (or whatever) better than others, due to specific configurations of taste receptors. So basically, don't get caught up too much in looking for what other people taste, they're really only there for a guideline to help people who are looking for a specific set of flavors. Lapsang souchong is reported as "smoky, like campfire and cigars" and I honed in on it because that reminds me of my favorite Scotch from my drinking days, but I don't get the same smoke as that, maybe because I have too much exposure to different varieties of smoke flavor, or maybe because the guy who wrote that description doesn't have the same exposure, or whatever. Basically look at tasting notes as guides to help you decide what you want to try, but not as definitive metrics to meet. It's been shown in testing that wine tasters have panned one glass and praised another despite the wine being from the same exact bottle, just based on presentation. There's just not much objectivity to tasting notes. Paramemetic fucked around with this message at 16:47 on Aug 4, 2013 |
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Aug 4, 2013 16:44
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I got several teas from Verdant during their sale and the Laoshan Black is my least favorite so far. I really wanted it to taste like cookies, but it was just malty and weird. I'm more of a green tea person anyway, and I, too, am bad at pulling out the listed "tastes", so maybe those has something to do with it. The ones I like the best from them so far are the Laoshan Green, the Zhu Rong Yunnan Black, and the Sun Dried Jingshan Green. The Silver Buds Yabao tastes like almost nothing to me - very faintly tea-flavored tap water. I like the Yunnan White Jasmine too, but I could only steep it once and get any flavor out of it. It's a white tea, and I'm not experienced with those, so maybe that's why? I followed the directions on the website, heating the water it until the small bubbles came up in the electric kettle and steeping it for 2 minutes, but I brewed it an extra 30 seconds for the second infusion at the same temperature and it just tasted like weak tea. What did I do wrong?
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Aug 4, 2013 18:08
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I can never get more than one or two infusions of white teas, but I haven't had them very much.
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Aug 4, 2013 18:14
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Lady Truck Driver posted:I got several teas from Verdant during their sale and the Laoshan Black is my least favorite so far. I really wanted it to taste like cookies, but it was just malty and weird. I'm more of a green tea person anyway, and I, too, am bad at pulling out the listed "tastes", so maybe those has something to do with it. The ones I like the best from them so far are the Laoshan Green, the Zhu Rong Yunnan Black, and the Sun Dried Jingshan Green. The Silver Buds Yabao tastes like almost nothing to me - very faintly tea-flavored tap water. I can get 3 infusions out of the yunnan white jasmine. Have you tried using a thermometer to see what temp the kettle actually is when you pour the water? I have one of those Cuisinart heaters, its "white" setting is at 185 F. If your water is significantly less than that I could see there being a problem.
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Aug 4, 2013 18:22
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Recently my fiancee and I have gotten into Chai tea. Where are all of you guys getting your favorites? We currently mix ours, half and half with half from Atlantic Spice Company because it's very good and REALLY cheap and the other half from Teavana because it's amazing, but crazy expensive. Mixed with Vanilla Almond milk Silk it's really good.
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Aug 4, 2013 20:21
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Rooibos chai from upton tea. It's what I drink when I want tea at night.
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Aug 4, 2013 20:25
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I like Adagio's plain chai blend a lot and it's pretty cheap iirc. I know there's a goon that sells chai in SA Mart which I would definitely recommend checking out, I've never heard anything bad about it.
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Aug 4, 2013 20:30
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Swagger Dagger posted:I'm drinking Verdant's Laoshan Black and there are just a ton of tasting notes on the website that I'm not getting at all. I followed their instructions to the letter (just boiling water, 3 minutes), but I'm just not getting any of the flavors it mentions. I really like this post from a tea blog I started reading when someone linked it earlier in this thread. It discusses tasting notes a bit and also has a link to a youtube video on a guy talking about tasting notes in whiskey which is really interesting as well and can be compared to tea in many ways. It also made me feel a lot better about my own experiences with drinking tea and what I would taste when compared to what I would read in reviews, where some people have these insane lists of sometimes bizarre things they pick up in teas, like passionfruit or tree bark or apricot preserve or calfskin or other weirdly specific things. Then again, I probably just don't have a well enough developed palette.
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Aug 5, 2013 01:54
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I got Verdant's Laoshan Black in the sampler and it tastes oddly similar to Japanese roasted barley tea to me. I like it a lot.
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Aug 5, 2013 02:37
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chunkles posted:Rooibos chai from upton tea. It's what I drink when I want tea at night. Thanks, I'll have to grab some and check it out! I am also pretty sensitive to caffeine so I can't drink tea after like 6 unless I want to be up all night. Having something I could drink late would be awesome. My fiancée, on the other hand, is immune to caffeine, she could take a pair if no-dose and go to bed.
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Aug 5, 2013 12:19
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Looks like the current batch of Verdant's Laoshan Black is a lot more roasted than the previous ones according to its description. I haven't had it before but I thought it was alright, kinda like toasted pumpernickel the first steep, but I wasn't getting most of those hints at all. Maybe a little bit of the cinnamon and very mild caramel on the resteep. I thought it was decent but not something I'd buy more of, particularly because it was pretty weak. I wouldn't even put a drop of milk into that stuff (I know that's not very proper in general, but I love everything about black teas except for the harsh tannins (too sensitive to bitter stuff), and just a touch gets rid of them.) As for getting through large quantities of tea that's not thaaaat great and/or not thaaaat fresh anymore (but not bad enough to throw out), iced tea is the bomb. I'm a big fan of the Takeya pitcher (the ~2L one, I don't get the point of the midget version) for that, it's super convenient. You can go through 5-8 tablespoons at a time with some teas, and if it's too strong just add more water. Or lemonade/nice fruit juice/whatever works.
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Aug 6, 2013 08:22
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Hawkgirl posted:What kind of water are you using? You might consider using distilled water. Also, their tasting notes could be bullshit. Although it does sound more like the taste of your water is overpowering the taste of the tea. I'm all for changing variables and experimenting, but as a general rule, distilled water is not recommended for brewing tea. The natural mineral content in water is necessary so that the tea compounds have something to attach themselves to. Maybe try using spring water, or putting bamboo charcoal in your water to leech out any weird tastes. Here are some more thoughts about the importance of water from the Tea Masters blog.
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Aug 7, 2013 01:47
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I didn't know that, thanks!
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Aug 7, 2013 01:49
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Death Vomit Wizard posted:Here are some more thoughts about the importance of water from the Tea Masters blog. They may be "thoughts" about the importance of water, but they should perhaps not be seen as recommendations, given the level of pseudoscience and self-contradiction. Tea Masters posted:Lu Yu had already realized that the best water for a tea comes from the region where the tea originates. While it makes some degree of sense that teas have "evolved" in association with local water (through the tea-makers picking the best combination of plants, leaves and tea style to match local water), the chemical variation between water sources on opposite sides of a valley, or at different times of year, even from one year to the next, or depending what chemicals were added to the soil that season, could be greater than the variation between one local water source and one on the other side of the world. And, realistically, even if the local tea did evolve to suit the water that the tea-makers happened to use (or had no choice but to use), that does not mean that there is not a better water to be found elsewhere. Tea Masters posted:Water must come to a boil to become alive or 'open' as the Chinese say. But overboiling water will make it 'old', deplete of oxygen. To achieve a good hot water, I recommend to heat at a slow/medium speed. So, to retain the most oxygen in the water, you should not bring it immediately to the desired temperature, but instead draw out the oxygen-loss process through slow heating to the desired temperature. Ok. Makes sense. Tea Masters posted:To keep your boiling water 'fresh', you can add cold water to the boiled water and bring it to a boil again. This helps to have a more or less constant level of freshness for your boiled water. Contradicts the previous quote by recommending reboiling water, rather than using new water, with no benefit (unless you're making tea in a drought). Yet no mention of the damage that [naturally or artificially] chlorinated or fluorinated water may cause to the flavour, for example.
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Aug 7, 2013 03:28
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Stephane has definitely got a rather spiritual or romantic view of tea (and the world in general, as far as I can tell). A lot of his reasoning for things will drive you up the wall if you read with a skeptical eye or have more of scientific or rational approach. He really knows his tea, though, and I do think it's worthwhile to try out his various instructions as far as preparation, regardless of the many valid criticisms one can level at his rationale. As far as water goes, the most important thing is to use something that tastes good by itself! If there is a tea you drink a lot and you are in an experimental mood, trying different waters can be interesting, especially if you can get a few that range from very soft to rather hard.
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Aug 7, 2013 04:59
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Hummingbirds posted:I can get 3 infusions out of the yunnan white jasmine. Have you tried using a thermometer to see what temp the kettle actually is when you pour the water? I have one of those Cuisinart heaters, its "white" setting is at 185 F. If your water is significantly less than that I could see there being a problem. I have the adagio tea kettle with the unspecific temp settings, just green and black, and I chose the space between those two. Next time I'll actually use my thermometer. The posts about notes have been very helpful. I usually just get general thoughts like "this is fruity" or "why does this taste like moth balls smell", so it's good to know I'm not doing something horribly wrong. Tried the Laoshan Black again with less tea than the website recommended (1 1/2 teaspoons instead of a tablespoon) and it was much better. I can appreciate the malty quality now, even if I don't taste coconut milk or caramel like I was hoping. I'm still not very used to it, because I'm not used to black teas, but it's good. Apparently I just like it weaker 'cause I'm I puss. I tried some iced Guayaki guayusa and it was not tasty at all. Maybe I should try giving it another chance? Is it better hot? I was also under the impression up til now that guayusa and mate were the same thing, for some reason.
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Aug 7, 2013 11:02
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Placid Marmot posted:They may be "thoughts" about the importance of water, but they should perhaps not be seen as recommendations, given the level of pseudoscience and self-contradiction. A bit off topic, but yeah, that article is pretty bad outside of its central point of "water matters when making tea." In addition to all the things you pointed out, it has a general floofy tone that focuses on "feelings" rather than reality. For example, he goes into all sorts of detail on why the water in Crete felt different to him than that of Taiwan, but totally glossed over the fact that his tea may have seemed less enjoyable because he was drinking it in the hottest weather on record in Crete at the time. A big pet peeve of mine regarding tea is just how much bullshitty illogical pseudoscience stuff there is out there, particularly from appeals to antiquity and common sense fallacies. The whole "don't reboil because it removes dissolved oxygen" is one of these things. Oxygen solubility in water at 100 degrees C is 0 mg/l. (http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/air-solubility-water-d_639.html) Freshly boiled water has negligible dissolved oxygen. It's entirely possible that repeated boiling does do something that makes the tea less tasty or brew improperly or something, but who the hell knows what it is since people seem to be determined to rely on silly traditional ideas with no basis in fact. (The anti-microwave crap is often based on the same sort of thing).
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Aug 7, 2013 12:48
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Lady Truck Driver posted:Tried the Laoshan Black again with less tea than the website recommended (1 1/2 teaspoons instead of a tablespoon) and it was much better. I can appreciate the malty quality now, even if I don't taste coconut milk or caramel like I was hoping. I'm still not very used to it, because I'm not used to black teas, but it's good. Apparently I just like it weaker 'cause I'm I puss. If you don't have much of a palate for black teas, it can take a while to notice some of those other flavors. You'd basically just have to drink lots and lots of different black teas to notice those kinds of things, and even then, like other people said, some of those flavors are subjective. If you like greens or something else better, don't feel like you have to develop a palate for blacks. Drink what tastes good to you  And apparently guayasa comes from a slightly different species of holly plant than yerba mate does. I think I've had both of the Guayaki cold drink versions of those (you mean the bottled ones, right?) and they taste almost nothing like hot yerba mate does. It's not as nearly bad as say, Brisk canned tea compared to real tea, but you can draw some parallels. The hot stuff is REALLY earthy and takes a little getting used to, at least for me it did.
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Aug 7, 2013 14:55
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So I got my IngenuiTEA from Amazon this afternoon. I'm on Amazon again right now buying one for work. This thing is pretty great, it's way easier to clean than I expected.
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Aug 8, 2013 04:39
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Got a new tea package from China recently, this time I went with Shanghai-based "Dragon Tea House" ("ldllu"). A great thing they had was a sampler of 10 green teas. I'd been wondering about green tea recently. Longjing is my working-horse solid green tea for every day, but surely there had to be others that were just as good? Well, now it has been scientifically proven that there are. In the end, I didn't care for half of those samples, but I still had a fun experience testing everything. I introduced "Tea of the day" at the office for people who are into this kind of poo poo, where we'd rip open one of the packets, taste and read up on the brand. (First two syllables in the tea's name are usually the region this particular brand comes from, and the last two are the actual name) Liu An Gua Pian (Melon Seed) "Unlike most green teas which utilize the new buds in making tea, Liu An Gua Pian uses the second leaf on the branch. Each leaf's central vein is removed and the leaves are pan fried and shaped to stop oxidizing enzymes and dry the tea." -Leaves slightly bigger than the usual deal, bunched up into wads. More mature leaves mean less bitterness, it's a mellow and smooth tea. Liked it a lot. Zhu Ye Qing (Green Bamboo) "Emei Zhu Ye Qing tea is roasted green tea. Emei Zhu Ye Qing tea picks a bud and a leaf or a bud and two leaves, main rocesses: fixing, rolling, drying, and then rolled, fried dried, and then drying seven processes." -It's one of those things where leaves float vertically, sometimes rising slowly from bottom to the top in a pretty fashion. The leaves smell hella intense, and when put into water give off this tanin-like warning hint before you even have a chance to oversteep it. And if you dare brew it to hot or for too long (which doesn't take much at all) the bitterness will melt your face off. So that was its most prominent quality. This pre-bitterness. Xinyang Maojian (Hairy Tips) "Comparing it with other famous types of green tea, Mao Jian leaves are relatively small. After brewing Mao Jiang and pouring the water into a teacup, the aroma will flow into the air and create a peaceful atmosphere." -Tiny thin leaves that just sit at the bottom when you steep. Makes water opaque, kinda like in a pond. At the same time it tasted like nothing at all. I tried more and more aggressive brewing methods, until I finally used boiling water, at which point the tea turned out bitter, but even that was a kinda lazy bitterness you can still drink. Really weird tea, perhaps it was just old? Meng Ding Gan Lu (Sweet Dew) "Meng Ding Mountain in southwestern China is famous not only as the hometown of panda bears but also as where tea was first cultivated at Gan Lu Si (Sweet Dew Temple). This tea uses mostly tender tea buds picked in early spring, which are then carefully curled during processing. While the tea buds are very tiny, the unique character of the tea bush creates a bright green tea color, fresh rich flavor and highly nutritious tea, even while using a small quantity of tea." -Tender, fuzzy leaves that crumble into dust very easily. It was kind of a hard tea to get right as well, but the result was nothing to write home about. Kinda herbal-tasting, I guess. Huang Shan Mao Feng (Fur Peak) "The tea is one of the most famous teas in China and can almost always be found on the China Famous Tea list. When picking the tea, only the new tea buds and the leaf next to the bud are picked. It is said by local tea farmers that the leaves resemble orchid buds.The special processing technique produces a special tea that is strong, yet very refreshing." -A no-nonsense green tea that tastes pretty great. When you drink it, the smell hits you twice as hard as the taste, and both are fresh and sweet and amazing. Bi Luo Chun (Snail Shell) "Dong Ting Bi Luo Chun is one of China’s Ten Famous tea and regarded by many as second only to Xihu Long Jing. The tea is known for its strong fragrance and so was originally called "Scary Fragrance Tea". The tea is known for its delicate appearance, fruity taste, and lingering floral aroma. The leaves used are very small so that one Kilogram of finished tea leaves requires over 14,000 tea buds." -Curled leaves coveded in some kind of pollen, smell strongly of chocolate and/or brandy, which, I guess, was scaring the Chinese. Smooth and pleasant. Not a sweet tea, and has a kind of bitterish aftertaste, but in a nice way. Pearl Jasmine "After the tea has been scented, the leaves are hand rolled into pearl shaped balls which gives this tea its name. When steeped, these leaves unroll and produce a tea with a pronounced floral and fresh green tea scent, a full-bodied refreshing sweet taste, and a pleasing long lasting floral aftertaste." -"Hand-rolled" fuzzy balls that unravel into pretty nice-looking leaves. Nothing to say about it really, jasmine tea has an unmistakable, overpowering smell, it's all about whether you like it or not. Kai Hua Long Ding (Dragon's Pick) "Many believe it should be listed as one of China's ten famous tea. Kai Hua Long Ding Green Tea is interesting as with different brewing methods give different level of taste and flavor." -Thick fat needles that smell strongly of tomato paste. The brew smells almost like smoked sardines. When I finally managed to make a cup without it turning immediately into bitter poison, it seemed I could only taste two things: water, and, on top of it, this vile chemical tinge that Lapsang Souchong usually has. Not getting much out of it. An Ji Bai Pian (White Slice) "When processed the leaves are half baked and half fired. An Ji white slice tea, grown nowhere else in the country, sells for a price higher than the famous Dragon Well tea. The folks call it as “Fairy Grass Tea” and local people treat the spring tea as “Holy Ghost”, often adopted to cure illness." -Leaves rolled into needles, with light cocoa smell. This tea is soft and reserved without a hint of bitterness even if you brew it hot; really enjoyable. (There was also Longjing (Dragon Well) in the 10th packet, but I have two open bags of it already, so I decided to keep it sealed for now) I'll definitely pick Melon seed, Fur peak, Snail Shell or White Slice next time I make an order. I remember purchasing Huang Shan Mao Feng locally at some point, and it was terrible, proving that suppliers close to me are poo poo, and ordering from China is the only way.
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Aug 9, 2013 11:49
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Anyone know of a good online source for like kukicha(sp?). I just discovered it a bit too late to be able to buy it locally.
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Aug 9, 2013 14:13
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woodenchicken posted:ldllu Good to know that they're legit and provide samples. I've always window-shopped on their ebay store but never committed to picking anything up, but maybe that may change in the next month or so!
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Aug 9, 2013 19:41
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aldantefax posted:Good to know that they're legit and provide samples. I've always window-shopped on their ebay store but never committed to picking anything up, but maybe that may change in the next month or so!
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Aug 9, 2013 21:35
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