Spring Harvest Laoshan Green (2013)

Not feeling 100% today so I wanted something a little lighter this morning. I had a few steepings of this one and I was reminded of why sometimes it’s nice to have a really solid green tea in the house…provided you can drink it before it goes flat :)

After drinking the new Laoshan Green Oolong yesterday and using the spent leaves in my lunch salad (delicious), I had a ‘taste’ for more Laoshan Green Tea and ‘happened’ to have the 2013 Spring Harvest Green. Waddaya know?!

My plan was to brew this tea, then use the leaves (again) in today’s lunch salad. (last night I sauteed leftover Laoshan Green Oolong leaves with fish and butter…so good!)

I saw the $12 cute little glass ‘beeker’ infusers on the Verdant website, I bought one…and I’ve been using it quite often.

Using a little over 1 tsp leaves, I filled the beeker 3/4 full (about 5oz) with 185 degree filtered water. Steep time was 6-8 seconds. (Didn’t cover during steeping per instructions from Verdant)

The flavor was like eating the flesh from the center of fresh, uncooked green beans when you’re sitting with a colander, snapping them in pieces. I always pop a few in my mouth because the flavor is so fresh!
As I sipped the tea, I pictured myself dangling my feet in a pool of water watching dragonflies race by, dust dancing on beams of light. There was a clean smell. Water running over granite rock into the pool, the scent mixed with my sips of fresh beans.

The second steep was thick and coated my mouth as though ate a plate of cooked vegetables (including slightly bitter zucchini). This slightly bitter taste is good!
Wine does this same with tanin in the right amount. It wakes up the taste buds, and suddenly…you’re aware of flavor that’s amazing!

There was a sweetness that I hadn’t tasted on the third steep.
The tea had become smoother, still rich and creamy, but a sweet, subtle,less savory bean taste. Glistening.

Now my head was caving in…felt good…

Spring Harvest Laoshan Green vibrates with awakening life.

I haven’t written a tasting note in ages! It’s been so busy lately with work picnics, seeing old friends and new ones, etc.. But I will log this tea tonight because it’s just so yummy, i also drank a delicious verdant puerh today but I will log it later when I make note of flavors lol. Anyways, back to my beloved laoshan green.. This harvest seems more sweet and a bit lighter and nuttier than the previous one I had, I think it was a summer one. Regardless, the delicious taste is still here, although I’d say it’s more like snap peas this time around! Probably one of my favorite green teas, if not my favorite, is laoshan green. So happy I found verdant last year for this unique green!

One of the best things about Verdant’s TOMC Classic is that we get to sample the newest teas. I’m really grateful that they started making a note of telling us what they are sending, because I had the habit of ordering teas as they become available, only to end up getting more of the tea I just ordered. Sometimes that can be a good thing, but in the case of green teas, a little goes a long way (for me, at least). I have to be careful drinking green teas, as I tend to get a stomach ache if I drink too much. These very short steepings help, but I rarely make it to the 6th round. Not all greens have this effect on me, but they tend to, & of course, I can never drink them on an empty stomach ever.

This is a lovely spring green that brews into a pale cup, very mild in flavor, but somehow bright & lively on the tongue. I totally get the oats & soymilk essence, and the ‘green-ness’ of the flavor is like peas or some other spring veggie, always so familiar & yet hard for me to place.

This is my first Verdant tea ever. I feel there is so much pressure associated with it – like a movie everyone is crazy about – that it makes me uncomfortable. It can’t possibly live up to the hype.

I used my press and 175 F water being careful not to pour the water directly over the crinkly leaf. I wish I had added the leaf after the water for more of a dance. The wet leaf has a very strong aroma of artichoke/stew beef. The liquor is very clear and yellow.

The first cup is really creamy and tastes like Cheerios. There is a bite late in the sip that reminds me of Dragonwell. The aftertaste is really sweet and lingers. As nice as this already tastes, I was intrigued even more by the cup as it cooled. It takes on notes of creamed corn.

Cups two and three lose the creamy oats and replace it with a more green (not grassy) cup with a light but good metallic bitterness. That doesn’t sound tasty but it is. The aftertaste remains very sweet.

A very good tea indeed!

I do love me a cup of vegetal tea. ♡

I went to the grocery store and got my dogs from the groomer. I came home to see some dude with a clipboard at the door. I expected it to be some door-to-door spammer of sorts (as they often are) and hoped he’d just go away. But no, it was the utilities man. He needed to do something with my water meter and also go under the crawl-space. Well, in an effort to keep our escape-artist dogs contained in the back yard, my husband bolted a board across the back gate which meant that letting the utility guy come and go was a matter of constant attention through a little finished room in the garage. Gee, and all I wanted to do was get something to eat and make some tea (and go to the bathroom) when I got home. At least he’s gone now. And I have my tea. I’m still hungry though. . .

My son Rowan and I enjoyed this steeped up in my new gaiwan set that arrived today: http://verdanttea.com/teas/crystalline-glaze-gaiwan-tea-set/

Beautiful set, beautiful tea. At first I thought my water was too hot, but now that I see the soy milk description, it really is spot on. It doesn’t taste quite as vegetal as some of the previous harvests, it was softer all around but it still has the signature bean quality and a lovely sweet aftertaste that surprised me when it first hit my tongue.

Very grateful Verdant included this generous sample as I await another order of just tea which I think is on hold for, well this tea… it still says pre-order on the website. Patience, I have plenty of tea to tide me over.

I’m drinking this delicious one today. I am almost out of it but looking forward to opening the summer harvest very soon :)

How lucky am I to still have a bit of this left?

Sweet snap pea, buttery spinach, creamy corn deliciousness! I get a faint vanilla bean note also. This green tea is one of a kind!

Don’t really know how it compares to the other harvests, I’ve been buying spring harvest for two years in a row. The first year, I thought next year, I’m gonna wait for the summer harvest. But then I get an email from Verdant announcing spring 2013 has arrived and I just can’t wait for the summer harvest cause I crave this tea right now!

Let’s see what happens with 2014 harvest :-)

OK. I have been holding off on doing a legitimate review of this tea because I was convinced I was doing something wrong. Every time I try to make it, I feel like I oversteep it. I take one sip, and then can’t even finish the cup. So this evening after work, I decided to make this one my inaugural gaiwan tea.

I’m still on a learning curve with the gaiwan, but I’ll get there. I think I have the gist of it though?

I’m going to rain on the Steepster parade with a brutally honest account of my personal experience. I don’t know what the issue is with me and this tea. I don’t know if I got a weird batch, or if I’m still making it wrong – or if this particular flavor profile just doesn’t sit with me. Dry leaf smells like fake chocolate flavoring on top of a green base, and the two aromas do NOT jive together for me. It’s the same fake chocolate flavoring I tasted in the Laoshan black, but unlike black tea, it does not go well with green. When I make it – even with a gaiwan, with water that is even cooler than what Verdant’s website calls for – it always tastes like I overdid it. The thing is, I’ve done it so many times now, and the taste so resembles the smell, that I’m doubting it’s my error, I think it’s the tea. The wet leaf aroma and flavor are completely unappealing to me. There’s a light vegetal taste, which is fine until it’s overpowered by a burnt, sickly sweetness that legitimately makes my stomach turn.

Suggestions?!?!? My gaiwan steeping was ~1 tsp of tea at 170 degrees for 10 seconds (although I may accidentally have gone a little over, which may partly account for the burnt quality.) Am I doing it wrong or do I just have an aversion to this particular flavor profile?