Golden Moon Tea

I’m not a huge jasmine fan but this isn’t bad. I actually think I like the flavour better with a black tea base as opposed to a green one as the stronger base tones down the perfumy quality jasmine usually has. The vanilla is a nice touch too, lending the tea a creamy smoothness.

I’m used to jasmine teas being greens, so having those flowery flavours mixed with a black tea base instead is an interesting change. I think the stronger flavours of the black tea provide a more solid counterpoint to the perfumy jasmine for soemone like me who doesn’t like their tea tasting like a bar of soap. Even so, this black tea doesn’t taste harsh nor does it drown out the flavouring, so I think this tea is a good balance between two extremes. The vanilla is an interesting addition and it works really well with the jasmine making the tea taste sweet, like some sort of candy – cotton candy maybe?

A really fun and enjoyable tea, and I bet this would taste fantastic with some milk.

Bumping up because I have been craving this everyday since I had my first cup. Absolutely an amazing cup.

Thanks again Marcus!

First, “Thank you, Marcus” for sending me this amazing delight. I just want to say that I truly feel privileged to have been able to try this amazing tea. I can’t describe my experience exactly, it is just so unique for words, but I can say it is hearty, robust, and thick. I get a bright splash of honey flavor from the start but it is mainly in the background. It fades leaving the same bold flavor from start to finish but then on the tail a slight floral note which is actually more prevalent than the honey notes. Delicious!

First, “Thank you Marcus!” for sending me this wonderful new Sencha of yours to try. I made this according to the perimeters given my Marcus and I must say it is absolutely delicious. I think “TeaEqualsBliss” hit the nail on the head. It very broth like, the liquid itself is thick. I expected it to be very vegetal in flavor but in fact it was just mildly vegetal. I can truly say it is a lot different than a lot of Senchas I have had in the past. It stands very well on it’s own. I really am enjoying it.

If you are looking for more vegetal and more grassy try doubling the amount but not the length. That’s what I did today and it seemed to do the trick! I do, personally, prefer the ‘normal way/amount’ better in this case but I wanted to notice the difference that I found! A nice Sencha, indeed!

I received this sample from Marcus over at Golden Moon yesterday and tried it immediately! I must say I was impressed! It was brothy and beautiful! It was overly grassy – quite the contrary – really – it was smooth and soupy! It’s a neat sencha! A nice green! There seemed to be a hint of lemon towards the end of the sip that I was partial to as well! YUM!

A wonderful blend. I usually brew a pot and drink it as it goes from hot to cool. The taste is good at any temperature.

GM sample 22/31
I haven’t been a fan of rose tea in the past. Most I’ve tried have been tiptoeing the line between tea and brownish perfume. So I was kinda of skeptical at first of trying this tea. Especially after opening the package the rose smell was pretty strong. I strongly expected to gag on this.
However after steeping the rose mellowed out a lot. The fragrance is just strong enough to complement the tea without overwhelming it. Taste is smooth not unlike flower petals, with just a floral aftertaste. Is this something i would drink everyday, no. However I would drink this tea again, sometime in the spring :P

It is so warm here today! So, I decided to have this, as it is a nice, light, summery tea. I haven’t got much left now though, and I will sorely miss it once it is gone. The coconut has a slightly toasty note, but it still manages to be sweet, smooth and buttery.

You know, before this tea, I didn’t even like coconut. I’d tried a couple of coconut teas and we just hadn’t got along. So, upon receiving this from Marcus I was naturally a little intimidated, but…

It is SO GOOD. Creamy and sweet and not overly coconutty. Now I’m hooked on coconut teas!

Thanks Marcus for sending me this tea!

I love this. It is so different to any other coconut tea I have tried – the coconut is less in-your-face but in a good way. It’s almost creamy and it tastes sweet, even without sweetener. The liquor is a lovely colour – a glossy yellow-green. Yay! My favourite coconut tea ever!

Thanks Ricky for this tea! It smells very smokey right out of the package. Must have quite a bit of Keemun! This tea is perfect for today- I have been alone with my small kids for a few days, and I’m exhausted and also feel a cold coming on! This tea is perfect to wake me up, and also comfort. While trying to watch the kids and steep tea, I over-steeped and it was a little bitter, so I added some milk and a tiny bit of sugar (things I don’t usually do). It actually worked well! It is not astringent at all. I definitely taste the Keemun, also some Assam. I’m not a huge fan of milk in tea, but it’s working for me today. I can’t wait to try it when I don’t over-steep!

Oh man, is this YUM.

As you all know, I heart Golden Moon. Hard. GM pretty much jump-started my tea education with their sampler (the number one thing I can recommend to ANY tea novice). And now they’re pulling out the big guns, offering fresh and new varietals. Let me tell you, the excitement ensues!

Honey Orchid Black is a beautiful tea. When I opened the packet, I nearly squealed at how gorgeous the leaves are. These are huge. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a black tea with such full and gorgeous leaves. It’s kind of gnarled, kind of ancient-looking. Twiggy, leafy, and just full. Expensive-looking as well. This is no CTC. No these leaves look like they were carefully plucked from a tea bush with able, loving hands, and dried with the highest of care.

There’s a faintly sweet scent coming off the leaves. And when it comes time to steep this one up, I’m pacing around with excitement. Because as soon as the hot water hits the leaves, a delicious honey-like aroma floods my nostrils. It smells delicious. It smells like clean hay fields and honeyflowers.

I don’t think there’s a such thing as a honeyflower.

Maybe honeysuckle?

ANYWAY, it smells good. Great. Fabulous. And then the timer goes off and it’s time to drink!

The first thing I notice is how unusually colored this one is for a black. It looks more roasted-oolong (or an oolong on the darker end of the scale) than black. The color is a deep honey, nothing at all similar to the ambers and dark browns of a lot of black teas. I take the first sip and YES. This is what tea drinking is all about.

It tastes less heavy than I expected. This tea doesn’t assault you with its flavor. No, it’s subtle and smart. It coaxes a little smile out of you. It elicits a contented sigh. At the beginning of the sip is a delicious sweetness, honeyed deliciousness mingled with a light black tea flavor. Not at all roasty, and entirely smooth. Then there’s this floral component, a JUICY floral component, similar to the way jasmine has juiciness, but not at all the same flavor. It’s softer. Like gauze. Or gossamer wings. It’s lovely.

Then comes the delicious endnote, a whisper of sweetness that lingers and lingers and lingers.

It’s great.

I can’t wait to see how a second steep will go for this one!

Alright, I historically do not like green tea. Just wanted to warn you.

Now, I’m hopeful with the scent. There is a oolong element to this that gives me hope.
Taste though is still very vegal. I have to say, it’s tame enough that I don’t hate it. I’ll drink the rest of what I brewed. It hasn’t won me over to green tea though.

GM Sample 21/31
This rating is probably a little baist since I don’t particularly like black teas. Strong black tea taste with slightly floral undertones. Had to add a lot of honey to finish. Very strong blend.

This tea reminds me of TeaG’s Bossa Nova, minus the hazelnut. I would of liked more caramel to this tea. Very easy to drink. Slightly roasted flavor. The oolong in this is quite nice!

This tea smells sweet dry and once brewed. The chrysanthemum gives it a little honey taste to it. I am not big on the floral musky taste of it. It was an okay tea, I probably preferred it plain. I didn’t bother to to rebrew, just wasn’t much a fan.

GM 20/31
So it’s not really breakfast time….but i’m a college student so i’m still waking up. I normally don’t like back tea, too bitter (guess that’s astringeny?) and i usually have to put in a ton of honey to be able to drink it. However this one was not bad. It’s smooth and light, with honey undertones. Just a bit of bitterness at the end. I usually like fancier type teas but not a bad plain jane tea if your in the mood.

GM Sample 19/31
Smells very strongly of pears and sweetness. It’s almost like honey but not quite. Almost darker. Stepped this tea is very dark, darker than I would have expected. Tastewise a little disapointing. To me the black tea overpowers the pear and the tea isn’t sweet at all which is a little confusing cause it’s honey pear.

Continuing my journey through the GM sampler, I audibly sighed when pulling out another black tea. It seems all my random selections are black. But I was bold and steeped it up, because it has the word “vanilla” in the title.

For a black tea, this is surprisingly light! The vanilla is more than an undertone; it’s pretty much the entire flavor. There’s little vanilla bits in the leaves, and inhaling the tea’s fragrance almost reminds me of vanilla bean ice cream. And that follows through with the taste as well. There’s a hint of jasmine, which is really all it needs. It’s sweet without being overly so.

Way to go, guys. Looks like I found a black tea that I actually (shock!) enjoy.

Having had a better experience than many of my cohorts with this tea, I’ll offer some ideas which might have made the difference. 195F or 200F is too hot for this tea. And it’s so easy to use too much of this tea … consider how dense the dry tea is … probably twice as dense as a non-rolled green leaf. I didn’t weigh it, but I’d guess that a half or 3/4 of a teaspoon of tea would be plenty (2 grams) per each 6oz water. I made a 12oz mug using less than a teaspoon of tea.

Another tip is to pour the water down the side of the steeping vessel, rather directly on the tea … or at least try to pour gently. Pinhead gunpowder is usually made from smaller and more tender leaves than regular gunpowder, and thus is somewhat delicate, like a Japanese green. Also, do not put a lid on while steeping, especially not the first steep … try that with your fussy green teas. It may help.

Green is my least favorite tea type, so I won’t be buying. But when writing these notes, I try to stay objective and be a judge of the tea’s quality, compared to others of it’s type. I’ve had one pinhead gunpowder before this one, and a couple of the regular. The pinheads have been more subtle in both cases than the regular (4-5 mm size).

So, on to this evaluation. Tiny (about 2-3mm) nuggets of shiny, dark green tea — truly a pinhead gunpowder tea. The liquor from them was a clear, radiant gold, and the oft-noted wisp of smokiness was there, too, in the scent and flavor. Thus, gunpowder tends earthier, to me, than a more floral green, like a mao feng. It presented practically nothing in the way of astringency or bitterness to distract me from it’s herbaceous greenness. A bit of artichoke, I think, not particularly sweet or grassy, but nicely juicy. Steeping in a glass mug with glass infuser may have helped preserve it’s pure nature. The second steep at 3 min had more body and wetness than the first, with equal strength. As I finished it, up popped the sun, and voila, it was Thursday!

EDIT: Okay, I went and weighed the tea. A rounded teaspoon is 3.5gm, which is about 50% more tea than needed for 6oz. So it’s not twice as dense … only one and a half times. If a person were to use 2 tsp for a 12oz mug, they would have used enough tea for a 21oz pot.

Dry leaves are big, thick and really black, but only a slight roasty scent. Weighed the portion because so hard to estimate such a bold, fluffy tea. First steep 3.5 min, the honey and floral are obvious in the scent, and repeated in the flavor. Second steep, 6 min, less malty, but with more body and added caramel and roasted barley sweetness. Third steep, 12 min, used less water and got a decent cup, but added a bit of dark agave syrup to round things out. A very impressive tea. I liked the sweeter, 2nd steep best, with the strong roasted flavor toned down and the caramel notes developed.