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After reading the rave reviews of this tea, I picked up 25 grams of it this summer. I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 195F for 7, 9, 12, 16, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.

The dry aroma of these huge, curly leaves is of blackberries, grapes, honey, and malt. The first steep is amazingly complex, with notes of grapes, plums, blackberries, strawberries, malt, honey, fruit leather, and baked bread. The second steep adds notes of cherry, brown sugar, and raisins. There’s no astringency and wow, this tea is good. The fruit explosion continues through the next few steeps, with lots of plum, cherry, grape, and blackberry flavours. By steep six, sweet potato, orange, baked bread, brown sugar, malt, and honey take over, with the fruit in the background. The final steeps have flavours of peanuts, sweet potatoes, malt, wood, and minerals.

Like everyone else who has reviewed this tea, I was incredibly impressed. It’s simultaneously mind-bogglingly complex and very accessible. There’s no astringency and the fruity flavours jump out at you. (Unlike Eastkyteaguy, I didn’t get any menthol.) This is definitely a special occasion tea that repays careful attention. What-Cha really knocked it out of the park with this one.