Anji Green (Organic)

(DavidsTea 22)

Picked this up as a frequent steeper freebie in one of my recent orders, because I like to use those points on expensive teas. And this sounded like it was worth trying.

I don’t really have anything to say beyond the fact that it’s a nice, flavourful, fresh green tea. The leaves are kind of pine-needly, and no astringency at all. Has some beany umami flavours and sweetness. I don’t know that it’s particularly special, but I’m also a little out of the loop in drinking a lot of straight teas, so my frame of reference for comparisons is a bit off.

Would recommend if you have points to use on a tea, otherwise you could probably get a better price on an unflavoured green from a seller like Teavivre or Verdant (I’m assuming, anyhow).

Another new tea from DT that quietly launched in select stores and that will also be online!

This is a tea that’s a bit tricky for me to talk about just because I’m not a green tea person at all and I’ve only had it once or twice – but it’s an absolute favourite of everyone else who works in the tea department, most of whom drink it basically daily. To be fair, I am the only tea department employee who dislikes green tea. Even still, I actually don’t mind this one but I find it more average than amazing. Which, on my own personal straight green tea scale does mean a great deal/put it higher than the majority of greens…

So, for people who might not have the straight tea familiarity to infer from the name, this is an Anji Bai Cha – which is a Chinese green tea that is kind of sometimes classed as a white tea?! But only in China, really. It’s a weird one for sure, and there’s a lot you could dig into to discuss that further – but the point is that this is a pretty traditional and established tea type.

I actually think this one is an AMAZING quality one as well – like, the leaf quality is OUTSTANDING and I say that as someone who is generally really skeptical of the straight/traditional teas that DT often selects. It’s very much a straight tea for straight tea drinkers, and something that deserves care, attention, and deep appreciation. I know a lot of the DT customer base (though certainly not all) doesn’t really do Gongfu style brewing, but this is the kind of tea that would just be amazing prepared that way and really well situated for it. Add to that the fact we got that awesome quality green tea and it’s organic!? Like, wow.

I genuinely mean it when I say that I think this is the highest quality green tea that DT has ever carried. Nicest in terms of flavour is definitely subjective because people’s tastes can be so different. However, this is good quality tea.

As for flavour!? Well, I actually really agree almost perfectly with the little tasting note blurb/description used for the tea’s web page:

“Fresh, buttery and invigorating, with vegetal notes of artichoke, asparagus and a hint of roasted corn.”

How often does that happen!? (Not often.)

Honestly, I mostly just wish that this tea was getting the fanfare and promotion that I think it warrants. Quietly releasing it is just kind of sad in my opinion. It’s also a bit nitpicky of me, but I wish we’d just called this “Anji Bai Cha” instead of Anji Green. It’s a really good quality, traditional/straight green tea and for the price tag associated with it I think that the primary purchaser for this is going to be the kind of person who already has the knowledge base to appreciate the traditional name. Why are we playing it down by simplifying the name!? We found something awesome that I think straight tea drinkers will love – so use language that speaks more strongly to them!

But that’s just my two cents. The tldr is that I don’t love this one myself but I recognize the quality and how amazing it is that DT is even carrying something of this quality at all…

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts regarding the teas, and not the company’s.