I have had this sample approximately forever. So with wanting to try my new tea cup, but not wanting a puerh, I decided to try this tea. Finally.
Dry, it smells sweet. Honey-sweet-potato, almost. I did a quick pour-through rinse of the leaves. They’re still carby, but there’s a bit of a spice, or pepper note.
Steeped ~ 20 seconds, it smells really floral. But it’s bitter as heck.
Ok, let’s try 5 seconds. (My new cup is the perfect size, BTW. Loving it!) That’s a bit better. Still, it smells quite sweet and floral, with lots of carby notes, but it isn’t really. It’s still bitter, but not undrinkably so. I am using hot water on this, as I’m doing shorter steeps. I would have expected the tea to hold up better for this (my options are 208F or 140F…).
This tea is a miss for me. There is some potential in the carby floral sweet notes, but it doesn’t come through. Oh well.
