I thought I’d tasted all the silver needles in my stash, but then I ran across a sample of this. So I’m taking a minor detour from the taste all the things in my cupboard exercise to taste this and probably another sample. I don’t put samples in my cupboard because it seems sort of a waste of time under ordinary circumstances. Of course, given the sheer magnitude of tea I have at the moment, this may not be true. It takes a while for me to sip down even the samples. Sigh.
I stuck this in the Breville and hit the white tea setting — 185 for 4 minutes. I was surprised when doing that actually got some color out of the tea. The description mentions champagne — mine is slightly less yellow than most champagnes, but it is light yellow and clear nevertheless. In the packet, the leaves smell like slightly pungent, sweet hay.
I don’t know whether it is the power of suggestion or not, but if I stretch out with my feelings, Luke, I can see what the description means by melon. I can get a vaguely honeydew aroma and flavor. As the tea cools the melon seems more like cantaloupe. I also get the creamy thing that everyone else is mentioning, though for me it isn’t so much about flavor as mouth feel.
Now, my taster is seeming a bit off today — I am getting less flavor out of black teas today. But somehow, this one isn’t as disappointing as most white teas are for me. Faint praise, but there you have it.
Flavors: Cantaloupe, Hay, Honeydew
