516 Tasting Notes
Oh my! Spicy is right!
mmm I love it though. My favourite part is the black pepper taste, more than the tellicherry pepper. This is by far the most peppery chai I have ever had! I want to try it with chocolate milk, but right now it’s starting my day (and clearing my sinuses) with milk and honey – paired with my creamy maple syrup rice pudding.
A good way to start the day before work takes over at 12:30! We’re only allowed water bottles at work, but everyone else sneaks in redbull, so I will find a way to drink my tea!
Thank you TeaEqualsBliss for sending this my way! It’s spicy goodness – I LOVE IT
“Oo!”
I said that aloud after taking my first sip. I read the description of the tea and read multiple reviews, sniffed the bag like a mad woman, but I still didn’t know what to expect!
Judging by the smell of the dry leaf, I expected a tea heavy on the spice and very savoury. As usual, this blend is so much more than that. The spice is actually not overpowering at all – the tea is the star! Amazingly crisp and creamy Laoshan green. And the mint! I forgot about the mint – it’s the perfect amount. Oh so refreshing and, may I say, perfectly blended? (Always leaving room for human imperfection of course, but as far as my tastebuds are concerned, every ingredient has its role in this blend, knows its place and plays its part like it was born to play it!)
I want to make a bottle of this, ice it and take it on a hike.
So much more to say about this tea! I’m going to sit and enjoy it right, hope it doesn’t keep me up all night ( ;) ) and come back when the bag is empty to amuse you with tales of our adventures. Until then!
We’re sipping this tea today! It’s so good! These blends make me happy like a cat with a yard full of catnip.
Great tea pals think alike, is that how the saying goes?
Ah what a great analogy! Too true <3
I like this too!
HA! I love smelling my tea. I feel judge when I get a new tea bag and I just sniff it over and over. But some teas just smell delicious.
Whoo! HAd this iced as the tea of the day – it did leave a little to be desired, but I brought some leaves home because I knew I could coax some more flavour out of it.
I was right! Lovely natural pineapple flavour with a delicious oolong base (possibly the same base as banana oolong? either way I’m a fan!) Creamy, yet light and refreshing.
Pineapple is not my favourite flavour, but I can say this was done well! Now, strawberry or mango oolong and I might go bankrupt, I’m just sayin ;)
Same base as banana oolong?! I was really hoping for that. My wallet had other ideas, but oh well. I should have stopped by DT today… I actually was at the mall O.o
Whoa this sounds wonderful. And it is way cheaper than I was expecting it to be!!
I was thinking the same, that the base is very similar! if not a hair more jasmine-like
Wow, when will I ever cease to be amazed by Verdant Tea’s offerings?
This Sheng is one of few teas to bring me to the brink of speechlessness. It’s so sweet and just keeps giving and giving. It’s creamy and silky, with definite bubblegum notes but with a wood aftertaste that refreshes and quenches.
Later steepings become peppery with a silky kick- slight astringency at the back of the tongue. Ever so slight notes of smoke on an earthy base. Gorgeous amber colour. Happiness. Content.
Made hot and poured over ice – I find the honeybush is a little too dominating, but I’m going to coldbrew and come back with the results! Every honeybush I have ever coldbrewed has won my heart, so I think this one will really thrive!
Until then, it’s a refreshing honeybush iced tea – very nutty and a hint smoky, with some of that great blackberry flavour (I love Frank’s blackberry flavouring, it really hits the spot) and a bit of watermelon in the aftertaste.
Can’t wait to coldbrew and hopefully coax a little more watermelon out :D
Edit: As my ice cubes water down the tea, it gets waaaay tastier and the honeybush is toned down! Now I see that I used way too much leaf, and to use a bit less next time for the perfect brew. (I used 2 heaping perfect tablespoons in my Steeper, which probably made it triple strength instead of just double haha)
Sipdown :(
… because I’m going to pick up my Verdant package and I need more room on my special Verdant wall. Also – they taste so much better when they’re fresh, so I need to just suck it up and drink the teas while they are fresh and delicious! So there. :)
Yummy today! I’m starting my job tomorrow, the shift is only 8:30-1 and you have to wear a white shirt. I am going to spill SOMUCH freaking tea on my white shirts! This is not cool.
But what is cool? This tea. Aw, now that I think of it, I never did get to try it iced! But hot it’s so good, so I’m not complaining ;)
Rich and smooth, yet textured and grainy. Savoury and sweet – I could stare into the cup and be taken away for hours.
You’re going to need a tea bib
What a lightbulb moment! I DO need a tea bib! haha!
It can have a lobster on it, sipping tea.
Are you working in a tea shop?
Sadly not, it’s a PR type job/customer service desk! But there’s a David’s nearby so I should always have tea on me – probably literally. I get the white shirt thing from my mom – she loves to wear white but whatever food is in hand inevitably ends up on shirt!
Get one of those portable Tide To Go stick things to do clean-up’s of tea on the white shirt. I’m a spiller who know tricks!
Ah great idea, thank you Bonnie! I’ll definitely need one – its home can be my purse :)
Loved this tea. Its like having a more liquid chocolate fudge. Or that drop of chocolate ice cream that is about to fall off the cone.
@ unfurl – definitely! I can’t wait to taste the subtle differences of next season’s Laoshan Black – maybe even more chocolatey flavour is in store? ;)
Um, wow. This is more than amazing. TeaEqualsBills ,how did you know?! This has been on my mind since the very first tasting note popped up. It got me insanely excited about puerh, and then here it is, right in front of me. I can hardly believe my eyes! I’m in love and I haven’t even sipped it yet! THANK YOU!!!
I’m going to go into detail on my blog, and the post should be up Friday. Until then – there are some unmistakable sweet and light notes on the first steepings. Angel food cake for reals! I’m even imagining notes of small, colourful sprinkles – it’s just so rock sugar sweet! Yum!
A truly changing tea, each steep unlocks another layer of goodness and new flavours. An amazing tea that anyone afraid of puerh simply MUST try.
I have got to try this again, because I remember thinking it was completely unremarkable.
You know that I love this shu too!
I used super awesome water – I always save my special filtered water for Verdant ;)
Mostly because I’m too lazy to filter all of my water for all of my teas, but also because Verdant deserves teh special treatment <3
yummy!
I wanted a gentle and sweet wake up this morning – this tea was just the thing! (Thank you TeaEqualsBliss ! I got hit by this tea ammo!)
Suuuper nutty, and the base is so smooth. It reminds me of Florence, but I’m not missing the chocolate notes. Sweet and perfect all on it’s own – but I was naughty and added a splash of vanilla creamer for a treat. Ah, yum.
On a search for a minty tea to add to my re-steep of Luscious Watermelon – I couldn’t find anything! Except … Wintergreen Woods (both by DavidsTea).
I was kind of wanting a watermelon mint julep kind of flavour… but wow. This was SO GOOD. So refreshing!~ It was 3 tsp LW to 2 large pinches of Wintergreen Woods. Wow. Sweet and minty with full watermelon flavour, almost like a real watermelon puree. With a splash of bourbon and lots of ice – I was surprised!
This is one of the first blends I have ever successfully tried. Freaking yummy. Something to remember when I blend a few teas for public consumption ;)
sounds quite tasty :D
Only water bottles? Seems to me that caffeine is an essential part of keeping employees happy :P
Agreed! And I wore blue shoes yesterday but got chastised – they have to be black you see. And I’m not allowed to wear headbands. Lest I not look like anyone else .. which no one else could really tell anyways, because I work alone.
Luckily (?) they can’t tell me not to wear my neon green glasses – I need them to see! haha
Get an opaque water bottle and put tea in it! Some of them even are insulated. I think they are intended to keep water cold, but the stainless steel ones can no doubt handle hot tea if are careful about drinking out of it.
I definitely need to find me one of those :)
Oh dear where do you work? (We get a “latte guy” once a month at my work, But there was a big line before our last staff meeting of the year, and we basically all ignored the principal when he told us the meeting was about to start and we had to sit down. There was almost a revolt! SO we wrote our orders on a napkin and gave them all to the wonderful guy and snuck out to pick them up Haha :D)
That sounds yummy. I like Chai that is heavy on the pepper. I will have to put this on my shopping list. :)