865 Tasting Notes
Ugh… craaappp… sigh… I was gonna make a double cup according to premium sencha parameters, but totally spaced and made it a double cup according to flavored sencha parameters… I hate when I do that. It makes me so mad I almost don’t want to make tea for the rest of the day. It’s ok… but not nearly as good as it could or should have been…
Preparation
Had this w/ lunch (breakfast food- a chocolate chip waffle and breakfast sausages). Decided to make my own variation of maple bacon tea by adding 1tsp of maple syrup to my cuppa. Pretty good. It didn’t really sweeten it, but changed it from HOLY CRAP- IT’S BACON!!! to Mmmm… It’s bacon!
Preparation
I’ve been wondering about this tea…I may have to give it a whirl. it certainly is a Mad blend
Breakfast sounds so tasty! Bacon tea? Lapsang?
Yep, lapsang souchong w/ bacon bits. Regular lapsang souchong tastes like campfire to me, this tastes more like beef jerky to me.
My 1st TeaGshwendner tea! Got this one from teaplz. =D
The raw leaf smells sooo good! Like liquid chocolate w/ just a hint of spice. I was quite shocked at the steeping time, but decided to follow it. The resulting cuppa was much more red in color than brown and the perfect combo of chocolate, chili, and black tea.
In spite of the short steeping time, the flavor is just like the scent. The chili is much less potent than in 52teas Mayan Chocolate Chai, bit it is definitely there. It rounds out the other 2 flavors and warms the mouth. So good!
Preparation
2nd infusion, 2 min 40 sec. Slightly darker liquor, more brown. Same aroma. Same flavor, but a bit less chili.
3rd infusion, 3 1/2 min. The liquor is similar to the 1st infusion only less bright. A bit lighter aroma than the last infusion, but similar taste.
Hmmm- which tea do u prefer? Mayan Chocolate or this one? Both sound very good and I have been dying to try either one…
Lori, DON’T MAKE ME PICK! MCC by a close margin, but that is NOT saying that this is ABSOLUTELY fantastic! TRY BOTH!
Glad you enjoyed it more than I did!
Easily in my top 2 for favorite non chai black tea:)
What a morning! Got up, showered right away, talked to my someone special, then made lunch. I’m just now having my matcha! I made it thicker (1 scoop matcha, 3oz water). It seems more spinachy today which went great w/ my salad. Odd that I don’t like spinach, isn’t it?
Preparation
3rd infusion, 1min 40sec. Lighter liquor- less green, more yellow like a white or raw pu erh. Stronger flavor though, clean, crisp, smooth mouth feel and sweet.
Preparation
4th infusion, 2min. The liquor is back to being more green, but it’s a darker more olive green instead of lime green. Flavor is much like infusion 3.
5th infusion, 2 min 40 sec. The liquor is more brown now, and dingey. Virtually no aroma. Slighty more… substantal flavor, not necessarily stronger. Sweet, crisp, and clean.
6th infusion, 3 min. VERY light, but not unexpected, liquor. The flavor is stronger than expected based on the liquor. Very sweet.
7th infusion, 4 min. Almost non existant liquor. The flavor, while light, is not weak.
In honor of St. Patrick’s Day and today’s Steepster Select, I decided today was the day to try this sample I got from Emeric.
The leaves are finely chopped and look like parsley… and they smell just like matcha.
The back of the bag says Japanese greens are to be steeped ~1min. While this isn’t exactly true and all Japanese teas are different, it’s a heck of a lot better than the even more general “3min @ 180” so I’ll give it a shot. I have no water or leaf volume instructions so I guess at 1tsp/6oz water @ 160 degrees.
The liquor is a very light lime green and smells sweet. While extremely light, the flavor is sweet, vegetal, and clean. It’s very good, but I’ll hold off on rating it til I get more authentic steeping parameters.
Preparation
try it a bit cooler around 150 and for a bit longer- more like gyokuro!- u may even like that better!
May try that, the 2 gyokuros Den’s carries are 2g steeped in 2oz at 140 degrees F for 2.5min and 2g steeped in 3oz at 160 degrees F for 1.5min respectively.
2nd cuppa, 1 min 20 sec. I liked Networld’s suggestions, but noticing the water volumes suggested for gyokuro and the light liquor of the 1st infusion I decided a lower temperature would risk an even weaker flavor so I kept it at 160. The result was a nearly identical infusion in every way.
Did you chop it even more? =] At first I thought this was Samovar’s Tencha, then I’m like wait, no , H&S.
Chop it?
Woaps, grind =]
Oh heavens no! The leaves are tiny as it is and will be absolutely slimy and disgusting when I remove them from my ingenuiTEA.
Grounded tencha = matcha
ru06, I knew that. I was surprised at the taste difference though- but then again I think I used too much water for the amount of leaf I used.
I’m surprised too. In general, 2.2g of tea per 6-8 oz. of water is what I use across the board. Obviously it won’t have the same taste as actual matcha. Matcha will be stronger bc the leaves are more finely ground resulting in a greater surface area for which the water has to react with. Seems strange. Try different water. Sometimes if the water has a high mineral content, the amino acids etc. in the tea has a hard time being taken up by the water.
ru06, that general rule (I use 2.25 per 6oz, 3g/8oz) does not apply to a lot of teas- Japanese greens or pu erhs for example. For info on Japanese Greens, check out this link http://www.denstea.com/index.php?main_page=perfect_brewing for pu erhs, I use a 1:1 ratio- 1g of tea per oz of water.
Thanks for the link… very informative and interesting.
Matcha is as green as you can get for St. Patrick’s day so does it surprise anyone that I made some since I do every day anyway? And I love flavoring matcha so does it surprise anyone I made a matcha Irish Creme cappuccino? It shouldn’t… well, maybe just because I’m not the least bit Irish:)
6oz water, 3 level TB instant Irish Creme cappuccino mix, 2 scoops matcha.
The Irish Creme is definitely stronger than the matcha, but it’s still there. I would have put more matcha in, but I didn’t want to overload myself on caffeine lol. A perfect morning wake up for St. Patrick’s Day!
