Golden Moon Tea

Missy decided we were going to have a darjeeling face off today. We have a little bit left of the ones we bought from Upton, and the one from Golden Moon.

I evidently never reviewed this one before, silly me. Golden Moon refers to this as an ‘Autumnul’ darjeeling from the Makaibari estate. As far as I can tell, Autumnul is a third flush, which is kind of amusing to me for whatever crazy reason. Of the three darjeelings today, this one was the darkest, looks more like standard black tea.

The flavor of this tea is good. If you really like that grape flavor of darjeelings, but don’t want it to overpower (I’m looking at you, TD28!), then this is probably the tea for you. The fruity flavor is prominent, but is a little bit earthier, and co-exists with the tea flavors quite well. It still tastes like I’m drinking a black tea, which makes me happy!

There’s also a sweetness to this tea, actually to most Golden Moon teas that I’ve tried seem inexplicably sweet. Supposedly this is a straight darjeeling, but it wouldn’t surprise me if part of their blending process involved sweetening their teas. Or, as an alternative, they only source teas that are naturally a bit sweeter than others. It’s totally possible (and probably an excellent business strategy, really, since you’re catering to all of us pre-diabetic americans).

Of the eight teas I’ve tried from GM, this is easily the best. It is definitely a solid tea that I would enjoy having around.

The TD60 from Upton gets the nod for darjeeling-I’ll-keep-in-stock. Though, they are distinctly different enough that both could fill out a well rounded tea cabinet. I just happen to want a lot of other teas from Upton kept around, so including the TD60 seems the easier route.

Backlog. Thank you to TheDJBooth for sending me this one!

This had been in my “Try” basket for a while and I finally got around to making it the other day. This one was iced by pouring over ice. Is “Dragon Eye fruit” supposed to be dragonfruit…..? I can’t tell….. Anyways, I love dragonfruit. It’s unique and I think pretty tasty! This tea however…… Not so much.

Not that it’s bad because it’s definitely not horrible but, like others have said, it’s very perfumy. Like a fruit and flower perfume. Not so much my thing, but I’m glad I got to try it! Thanks again TheDJBooth!

This one took second place in the tea comparison the night before last. It had the same apple like sweetness to it but the jasmine fu was much stronger with this one. It was done well enough the jasmine did not have super powers. I would really enjoy this one if I hadn’t fallen in love with Teavivre’s jasmine pearls.

I made this up for Dylan to try while I was sipping on my oolong. Dylan is rather nice about sharing his cup so I can try it out too with out making a buttload of tea. He was even nice enough to help my sip it while I was washing dishes this morning. I think I haven’t developed a palate for tasting greens.

I found it to be some what like stewed vegetables with a sugar like sweetness. The other green I tried was one of Teavivre’s and it seemed to be stronger with the sugar sweetness fu. It also had a nutty taste I kept looking for in this tea. Alas, there was no nuttiness to be had. Of the two greens, I prefer the Tai Ping Hou Kui from Teavivre.

To call myself ‘uneducated’ on green teas would be an understatement. A few months ago, reading the reviews on many of the higher quality green teas here on good old Steepster was somewhat confusing. Most of my green tea experience was the green tea Sobe that my sister always bought, or the occasional Jasmine Green that you get from Chinese restaurants.

With that, a lot of my ‘thinking’ on green tea still runs familiar tracks, and tries to discern the differences. In my head, I often say “this tastes a lot like x, but the differences are a, b, and c”. Sometimes I say that out loud. If I’m lucky, Missy is within earshot and I look less like an idiot babbling at himself.

Take this Dragon Well, for example. This tastes a lot like the Tai Ping Hou Kui from Teavivre that I drank a few days ago, except it’s a little less flavorful. It has the same sweet tones to it, but it’s significantly less sweet. It has a very roasted vegetable flavor to it… but it’s a little less buttery, toasted vegetables, and a little more steamy, swampy vegetables.

All in all, it’s pretty tasty for a green tea. However, I can’t see ever going for this while that Tai Ping was still available.

Has anyone else had both a Dragon Well and the Tai Ping Hou Kui? Are they remarkably similar, just of varied degrees of excellence?

I LOVE THIS. I don’t have much else to say about it. But with the combination of white tea and aniseed, I was biased from the start. I’ll eat/drink pretty much anything containing anise.
I love the smell of licorice (I seem to be the minority here), so I was inhaling this from the moment I opened the sampler packet. And it’s a heavy scent. Drinking this is like liquid licorice. But that’s why I plan to invest in a proper supply of it, now that my sample is nearly gone. You can’t keep an Italian away from her anise.

This is lovely! The tea base itself is nothing special, but the vanilla — apparently coming from vanilla beans rather than flavoring — is very distinct and tasty. The jasmine takes a back seat, but provides a nice floral touch to complement the vanilla. The whole thing is fairly subtle, especially when piping hot, but this is definitely a tea worth trying if you like flavors that take over the tea without taking over your mouth.

So it’s probably too late to be drinking black tea, but oh well! I don’t get to bed until painfully late anyway and I just got this in the mail and was dying to crack it open. I’ve had it before (in that damned free sampler they suck you in with) and knew I’d definitely have to make a purchase in the near future.

Ceylon definitely isn’t my favorite variety of black. It’s good as a base for flavored blends, but overall it doesn’t really have a strong enough taste to make me crave it on its own. Well, obviously this one is different—it’s very complex with notes of molasses, honey, caramel and chocolate. Yup, a lot of dessert-like undertones, which I love! I sometimes find dessert teas overpowering, with the flavors a bit heavy-handed, so this is like a very very light version of a dessert blend for me. I don’t really get the berry notes they claim it to have but I don’t like fruity teas a whole lot so I am certainly not going to complain! It’s also got a nice astringency and is very smooth and strong—not strong enough to really wake you up in the morning, but it’s a perfect “curled up in bed reading a book all afternoon” tea.

Not too tasteful, nor aromatic. Lots of fannings compared to other senchas.

I had a string of good news today and I also got to see my wonderful kitty who I have been apart from for a while, so I decided to reward myself with this tea! It is one of my absolute favorites so I try to savor it, but today was definitely a coconut day. I actually first got this in the little sampler on Golden Moon’s site—I ordered two teas and threw it in since it was free, and ended up buying all 3 of the ones they give you (though I got the Genmaicha Matcha from Den’s).

I had to brew this rather oddly as I’m at my house (my parents’ house I suppose, but it feels so odd to say that) and I have none of my tea aparattus. So this got brewed in a measuring cup and I totally messed up the ratios and steeped it for 6 minutes. Oh well, it still turned out fantastic because this tea is MAGIC. Seriously, tea of the gods here.

Pouchong/BaoZhong is by far my favorite “base” tea—it’s somewhere between a green and an oolong, and I could drink it every day and be happy. Sweet, light, floral, buttery, fragrant—everything I love! Add in the coconut flavoring that somehow tastes both creamy/raw and sweet/toasty and there’s really nothing better I can imagine.

We are almost done with our samples! We have three left. I want to wait to try one for a bit.

This is very smooth. Definitely sweet with a honey like flavor. I think it makes a better afternoon tea for me. When I need some thing to wake me up with, I need a bit more bite, a tea that will insist that I perk up immediately. This is good but nothing really calling out to me.

We’re slowly making progress through all these samples, woo!

For a straight black tea, this is very, very light and sweet. There is some honey flavor to it, but nowhere near the flavor that I associate with the Sinharaja from Golden Moon. This one is much… well… less of everything. Less flavor, less sweet, less worth buying again, methinks.

It’s not bad, really. It’s just not… striking. And it is a bit spendy for a middle of the road tea.

Caesar gives thumbs down.

I’ve decided I really like Darjeelings. This is the first one I’ve tried, stand alone, so I have nothing to compare it to. Now I have a mission, to find the Darjeeling that belongs in my stash forever.

I though I’d brew this one for just 3 minutes. It isn’t often I find a black that requires more than that for my preferences. I was careful to brew it just before boiling as well for the same reason. I got a medium bodied tea with sweet, creamy notes. Very grape-ish sweet notes. I can taste just a hint of a nutty flavor as the finish. No bitterness or astringency in sight. I think it’s a nice afternoon tea. I think I might want some thing with more body or bite for a wake-up tea.

Sipdown – one of my first teas – not THE first but a close first. Still really like this one a lot – may reorder one of these days. :) Upping rating a bit since it is still good after all this time!

Haven’t been tealogging much the last couple of days but then I have not had many teas either. Been feeling sickly so just sleeping a lot. Today I had to get out to a fundraiser function with my daughter for Children’s Miracle Network – a WONDERFUL charity that has helped us in the past with her many medical needs! Love them! Regardless – when I got home I wanted something simple, something I knew I would enjoy, not too over powering as my tummy is still upset, something soothing, something I knew how to steep without looking at directions lol.
This seems to be one of my comfort teas. Reliable, dependable.
No rating change – just logging.
Now…back to the sofa.

Backlog by several hours.
I am raising the rating – this is a good coconut tea. Lovely base pouchong.
Lasted many steepings and kept me sane during stress.

I’m thinking I really like flavored greens. I do like my matcha but it seems to be a different beast all together. It might be the texture of matcha.

Cooked green things with sugar is the association I’m getting with this sencha. There is the mushy green taste followed by a sweet flavor. The sweet just reminds me of sugar or corn syrup, some thing sweet with out fruity flavors. I let it cool down a bit too much in my cup. I totally get the seaweed association now. Once it’s cooled down a bit it smells and tastes like seaweed. I don’t think this is a green for me. Perhaps I can try it in another brewing style and see if that will work better for me.

Tried this one with a little longer steep time today, bumped it up to four minutes (we usually do our blacks at about 2-3). It made this one a little more heady, and definitely a lot more malty. Upped the astringency notably as well, but that is to be expected. Still quite a good little black tea from Golden Moon. Quite enjoyed this one from the black sampler.

If you should find yourself looking for the black tea sampler from Golden Moon though… stop. Don’t do it. You can buy all four of the teas in the same 1 oz packages for about $6 cheaper than buying the sampler itself. Granted, if you do that you’ll be able to stop and go “Why the heck am I paying $9/oz for tea?”. I think they really just want to discourage people from getting samples. For $42, you can get one ounce each of four black teas. For $52, you can get four ounces each of those same four black teas, in handy little tins. The math just doesn’t work out.

This is a very smooth, sweet black tea offering from Golden Moon. What strikes me most about this tea is the color of the brew. It is a vibrant, VIBRANT ruby red color. The thing shines.

The tea itself is very smooth and malty, with a very honey-like finish. Like it literally tastes as though there is honey in this tea. Obviously, this makes it a little sweeter than most straight black teas. The aftertaste of this one is a little sharp, though. It’s definitely better on the tongue than it is on the memory.

I could definitely see keeping this around for company, it’s just visually striking, and the flavor has a familiarity to it that lends itself well to gatherings. I may keep a tin of this around just for that. I wish I had enough of this sample to try it iced, I bet it is splendid.