Adagio Teas - Duplicate

I discovered this tea on the Adagio Tea site and purchased it as I am a Capricorn. The tin it comes in is quite lovely. The appearance of the tea in the tin is earthy as it should be for a Capricorn. The first thing I smelled was the vanilla. One tablespoon, I believe, was enough tea for two and one half infusions. Don’t use more than 1 1/2 teaspoons of sugar, unless you like a very sweet cup of tea.

Another tea opened and down:) this one didn’t have the subtle mess that I expect from a Darjeeling. This one hit me with that nice refreshing “ahhh” that I’ve noticed only Darjeeling has. The steep was the normal amount, the color was good, great for re steeping. Tasted wonderful “black”, although I usually at least add sugar. This one was really pretty impressive, just a nice subtle floral then I think a little nuttiness and darker flavors you get from black tea. A good tea, not the champagne of teas but definitely a good one.

Thanks for sending this my way, RogersCK!

The dry leaf smells like vanilla and something sweet that I can’t quite place my finger on. Almost rosy, but there’s no rose in this blend. Brewed, the tea smells almost like chocolate. The flavor is sweet, creamy, and tart. I’m picking up more strawberry than raspberry, but it’s nice. This has a medium body. Best as a fruity breakfast brew, I think.

Sipdown

This afternoon I brewed a pot of the loose leaf Zhejiang Lung Ching from Adagio. I love the texture of the dried Lung Ching (Long Jing) leaves. I even love the noise they make, as odd as that may sound.

The tea was good: golden with a slight hint of green. The dried leaves were very uniform in size and shape, but with a few smaller broken pieces. Overall this strikes me as a quite decent Long Jing. I tried the sachet version before but prefer brewing this tea loose in a tetsubin.

I tried the Adagio Long Jing a while back in the sachet format, but never brewed loose, so this is a new experience for me (and not a disqualification from the Brave New Rating challenge!).

The leaves are smaller with quite a few broken pieces. They are both shorter and narrower in width. The aroma of the dried tea is relatively strong and darker than for some of the other Long Jings I’ve tested of late.

The liquor is very pale, and because the flavor is also a bit flat, I am wondering whether I may have underleafed? I used 4 grams in 17 ounces of water at 76C for about two minutes. Perhaps I should have used 5 or 6 grams instead, but 4 grams is what I have been using with this size tetsubin with good results for other Long Jings. It will be interesting to see how the second infusion turns out. Perhaps I’ll use less water for that one.

(Blazing New Rating #50)

The Adagio Zhejiang Lung Chung sachet beats today’s competitor, Mighty Leaf Organic Dragonwell, but mainly it’s on a technicality: this seems more like Long Jing than that one does. I like them both, but I’m going to have compare the Mighty Leaf with the Wissotzky Timeless Green, memories of both the scent and the taste of which were evoked during this steep-off.

Both glasses brewed up pale greenish yellow, and the generously stoked sachets appear to contain about the same amount of tea. I’ll be reinfusing them later today for some decaffeinated green.

Today’s glass of Adagio Long Jing (which I guess is the same as Long Jing, which I now believe means Dragonwell!), prepared from a sachet, brewed up light peachy veering brown but also green (as odd as that may sound) and tasted very smooth and Long Jingy! This is a good tea.

I still have the small tin of loose leaf from my Master’s Collection, and I am now looking forward to brewing a few full pots.

second infusion: also good

I’m not sure whether I should be posting this note under Adagio or Zhejiang. I purchased it from Adagio as a part of the Master’s collection containing three different teas in two formats (so six tins), but it clearly came from Zhejiang. Maybe I’ll post it there, since others have written there…

On second thought, there is only one note there, and the packaging is completely different, so here goes. The version I prepared today is in the sachet. The leaves are wholly in tact and in serious abundance. Honestly, they appear to have packed this sachet to capacity, because upon infusion it was completely stuffed—like a plump green pillow! In fact, I worried a bit that the leaves might be stifled in this configuration, trapped like sardines in a can, unable to swim freely and actualize their full potential.

The brew of the first infusion was a light yellow color, a bit more golden than green, and the flavor was veering toward sencha. The scent, too, reminded me a bit of some senchas. This tea, however, is even cleaner and less vegetal. Very smooth and likeable, but not as good as the Lung Ching from Teavivre… I’ll try the loose leaf format and see whether my theory about leaf oppression has any basis in reality.

second infusion: with so many leaves crammed into the sachet, I felt that a follow-up infusion was obligatory, though I actually used the sachet because I was in a hurry and planning not to prepare and drink two cups before leaving.

The three-minute brew was weak with only very faint flavor, so I threw the bag back into the glass and pretty much forgot about it for a few minutes. Then the liquor was darker and more brown, and the flavor was more like hoji-cha than sencha. I’ll try again!

These smell floral and delicious, and are great for multiple resteeps. I prefer it hot. I particularly like that it isn’t overpowering jasmine.

Merry Christmas! This is the tea I received for Christmas! :) There is a ton of it in the tin!

I steeped this for about 6 minutes (I really should have done about 4) at boiling.

First sip:
Mmmmmm. Reminds me of Adagio’s popular Tardis blend. A tad different, less sweet, but very similar. Ouch, bitter, but that’s my fault :(. I have to pay attention better.

Finishing off the cup:
That was pretty good. I enjoyed that the flavors were not too strong in this tea. It was not overpowering and was good on my empty stomach. No flavor stood out to me. They all mixed will and the tea felt very cohesive because of that.
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Overall, I really enjoyed this tea and can’t wait to have another cup later tonight! I am glad this tea was an earl grey because I am a sagittarius and it fit my tastes well. I am just a bit disappointed that my Tardis blend from Adagio is almost the exact same. This one had red flowers instead of blue and yellow accents featured in Tardis. :) Note to self: pay attention to steeping time!

This morning was the first morning I had to scrape ice off of my car and I was incredibly cranky about it. I’m not ready to be cold all the time and plus my good ice scraper is who knows where. I was late to work, I forgot a bunch of stuff, and my throat is starting to hurt. Basically, this morning has been garbage. This was the tea I knew I needed to have this morning to deal with that. This is my favorite comforting tea by a mile. It’s got a ton of stuff in it and it’s all balanced. The mint isn’t terribly strong but I feel like it soothes my throat. I don’t know if chamomile is actually calming or if it’s just a placebo effect, but I’ll take it. I also like that it’s got green and white teas in it so it’s not particularly caffeinated; when I’m in the mood for a ton of it the last thing I usually need is a lot of caffeine.

Also, I really like the tin. For some reason the lady with the shell hat and her big pet lobster make me feel less insanely grumpy.

If you asked me to describe this tea’s flavor and didn’t let me look at the description on the tin, I don’t think I would come up with peach right off the bat. I don’t get a specifically peach vibe from this tea, just a sweet, lightly fruity flavor, but that’s why I like it so much. That flavor balances really nicely with the oolong and white base to make a tea that is neither weak nor overpowering. Though I’ve only drank it by itself, I feel like it would go nicely with food (dessert, perhaps) since it’s not punching you in the face with its own flavor.

Bleh. I knew this tea wasn’t going to be good as soon as I took the first whiff. It had a weird artificial coconut-y smell that reminded me of cheap air freshener. Went ahead and brewed it anyways and it tasted like dirty socks. Had to chuck it halfway through because I thought I was going to be sick. There is no detectable pineapple or even white tea flavor to the tea at all since the horrible fake coconut flavor overwhelms everything. Got this as a sample from Adagio with another order. Obviously, not recommended.

The smell is great and the flavor is very subtle. It is not a strong tea and it is sweet. A good flavored tea to drink in the afternoon.

Got this as a sample along with a bulk order I conducted for me and my friends. Smelled suspiciously like strong cheese out of the bag, and though I love coconut teas, there’s far too much of it in this blend. I can barely taste the white.

Ugh. My tap water quality is dismal lately. Seriously, I just want one pot of tea today to turn out right.
So I got another addition to my Adagio horoscope collection! I’m still going to peddle the fact that these are a great deal. The tins are pretty, tea is good, and there is a lot of it.
This one though is a little less stellar to me than the others that I have tried. It is a bit fruity and herbal-esque, but nothing really stands out in it. I’m going to play with steep times and leaf amount to see if I can’t tease some more flavor out of this.

The smell of this tea is intoxicating, it seeps through even when the tin it closed.
Pisces is light, yet very flavorful blend that packs a punch of all different flavors blended together. I can taste the grapefruit, chamomile, rooibos and lemongrass but none of the flavors overwhelms the other.They all come together nicely. What a treat!