Golden Moon Tea

My stomach was not quite ready for the holiday food that I had yesterday. I feel awful today. Today’s tea is all about recovering a sense of balance. Golden Moon calls this the most gentle of green teas, and gentle sounds reeeeeealy nice.

Maybe two minutes was too short of a steep, because I am getting barely anything – hot water with the faintest…I don’t even know how to describe it. Hay? Not really grass, definitely not floral… Even though it’s not firecrackers or revelations, it’s very nice for a queasy tum.

Steep 2, 3 minutes: string beans!!! Again, very light. Strangely enjoyable in a “tonic” sort of way.

Steep 3: lighter string beans. Still comforting, but I think this is it for these leaves.

I enjoyed the second steep the most. It really did help settle my stomach and I liked drinking string beans a lot more than I liked drinking asparagus :) I won’t be buying a tin of this, but I’d be into trying snow sprout from some other tea companies. It’s a really nice tea for when you need to tilt the scale a little more to the wholesome side of things.

I’m really tired so I think this will be short. So this surprised me with the light color. I also felt that the scent was extremely mild. Initially, I didn’t taste much. As I drank though, a light taste of tea began. This tea wasn’t bad but it also wasn’t good. I think it’s just too subtle for me right now.

Another Golden Moon sample. This is a darker oolong (more up my alley than the light ones). It brews up to a nice amber color. Tastes ok with some floral notes and a light malty finish. I agree with teaplz that it has a high astringency and it leaves you with a dry mouth feel. It’s nice but I probably won’t order more.

Lowering my rating on this because the more I drank, the less I liked it and about 1/2 way though, I poured it out.

Smells like a Ceylon (i.e. archetypal black tea), but a little fruitier, especially when hot. No additives this time – it’s tasty enough without, and I think milk might overwhelm the subtle bits (yes, there’s a little molasses) that make it more interesting than a typical Ceylon. A little sugar would probably be fine, but I wouldn’t do honey (again, subtle flavors). Some spice and berry make this quite satisfying, but I probably wouldn’t buy a stock; I like my black teas more in-your-face (a.k.a not ceylon) than this.

(Also I like parentheses :)
ETA: Actually, a tiny bit of cream was very good for this – brought out the rich caramel flavors. And a second steep at 5 minutes was slightly weaker but still very good.

Here’s how Golden Moon Tea describes it: “The robust flavor is equally elegant and complex. Rich and malty character, with subtle notes of ripe cherries, dark prunes, and hints of hazelnuts and honey.”

Yeah, I probably could’ve strong-brewed a bag of Lipton and gotten the same effect. Either that or my palette’s not sophisticated enough this early in the morning to discern all these complex tasting notes.

sips again

Nope…same effect.

Tried this yesterday as part of a HUGE tea sampler from Golden Moon. Usually in the mornings, I prefer a maté to a black tea. When it’s that early, I need more flavor variety, and I usually find most breakfast teas to taste the same way — burnt. This one was no real exception, even with a short brew time. I just needed the caffeine boost.

I was very excited to try this one since it gets such high reviews. But, another black tea that just tastes like black tea to me. It is a nice strong black tea with a malty flavor. It has a little peach flavor to it at the very beginning of the sip. It has something interesting in the smell – like wet peat. I probably won’t buy more, but I enjoyed the sample.

Added a splash of soy creamer and a touch of agave nectar.

I had this again yesterday with a friend. It is truly an great afternoon tea. Both of us enjoyed the dimensions and quality of this tea.

The dry leaves smell like a traditional black tea to me. The scent of the steeped tea is of a woodsy black tea.
For the taste, this tea is woodsy as well. I’m having trouble describing it but it’s easy to see trees all around me when I drink it. It’s not a very heavy tea though and the black tea is the main taste.
This was very pleasant and refreshing. I also don’t think it’s one I’ll remember far into the future but that’s not always bad. I still think I’d like to get this one.

Hmm, I just noticed more of the honey quality as the tea started to cool. Interesting. I’m still fascinated by how tea can develop new tastes like that.

I never even thought of trying this iced until I was looking around GM’s website. This is one of the teas that they say makes a really nice iced tea! It is good iced, but it seems to take away the creaminess that I love and have grown to expect from this tea. It certainly doesn’t taste bad, it just lacks my favorite quality. I’ll stick with making this hot.

On a side note: I am ashamed to admit that I broke my vow of not buying any tea the month of April. I caved and purchased a few GM samples and some 52teas blends. I’m sorry! At the beginning of April, I didn’t have a job, nor did I have any prospect of finding a job. But now that I have some regular income again (not to mention a sizable employee discount and the ability to use the bookstore as my own personal library), I can actually afford to indulge in my tea obsession. I have to feed the lion, so to speak.

However, my twenty day long tea-buying hiatus served its purpose. My tea cupboard is sufficiently cleaned out and I now have room for some new teas. The hiatus also allowed me ample time to really organize my tea priorities. The two purchases I made last night were things that I am certain I want, rather than being just spur-of-the-moment impulse buys.

What does this mean for you? It’s simple: Erin’s back!

My GM order came yesterday! It’s slightly cooler today, so it was still okay to make my tea hot. I really do love this; I have a feeling it will become one of my staple teas.

I love how the coconut is very creamy instead of tart. Today I tried it with some sweetener and it brought out some nectar-like notes in the oolong base. I love this tea!

Another big thanks to Ricky for sending me that surprise package of tea! This one smells very creamy and toasty, and maybe even buttery. I didn’t add anything to my cup.

Up front, there isn’t much coconut flavor. It’s very subtle, which is perfect, since the coconut would have been too much if it was overwhelming. This is a wonderfully smooth tea, perhaps the smoothest I’ve ever had. It has a full mouth feel – it’s very buttery and creamy. Toasty, too. What I like about the coconut is that it doesn’t taste artificial at all; it’s more like I’m drinking coconut milk that’s infused with toasted coconut.

What I like best about this is that I let my mother taste it, and she promptly sat down and ordered more – using her credit card! Score! Thanks again, Ricky!

Very dark—almost like coffee in appearance and aroma. Added warm milk and honey. Flavorful and different.

Mmm, this tea is really lovely.

When I opened the package it smelled like maple candy (as someone else described in their review) and I loved it. I do wish it was as good as it smelled in the package because then I’d give it a 100.

I smelled it while it was brewing and almost gagged and got really worried. I didn’t like the smell while brewing at all – very vegetal.

Now I am drinking it and it’s very nice. It has a background flavor of caramel and it’s very delicate. I’d actually like the caramel to be stronger in it. I may have too much water for this amount of tea in the sample (there were not any instructions about the amount of tea that this sample makes).

Being a novice to oolongs and recently having learned to rinse oolongs in hot water before brewing, I was a little confused about this one. Since it has flavor I wasn’t sure if rinsing it for 10 seconds in hot water washed away some of the caramel flavor. I’d be curious to know if other people rinsed and whether this is recommended or not for this tea.

Update – second steeping is grassier and has less caramel flavor.

This makes up for my last tea. The cup is quite pale, the scent is a strong coconut cookie. It smells so good. It tastes somewhat like a coconut cookie too but not as intense. There is smooth, buttery, lightly sweet with coconut mixed in. I don’t see myself drinking this everyday or even that often but as a nice dessert tea here and there it has potential. I’m going to try a second steep and take it to my lecture with me.

I’m back logging a bit. I had this one this morning. This really reminded me of the teas I get at restaurants and planes but better. It was crisper and cleaner in a way. Nothing really impressive but certainly nothing bad. It’s a really safe choice, especially for people not that use to tea. I’m not sure if I will buy it, it will depend on the price when I place my other Golden Moon orders.

I’ve never really had white tea before so I thought I’d give this a try. The cup is light and golden. The smell is intense and not pleasant to my nose. It smells like flowers but not fresh ones.
If I hadn’t had other floral teas, I would conclude I just didn’t like a floral but I’ve had some I love. This one tastes more of stem then anything. The taste is thankfully not as intense as the smell was but still not something I would buy. I’ve considered not finishing the cup but I didn’t quite get to that level. This did not meet the spot so I’m going to have to pull another from the basket.

Cardamom pods, whole cloves, and cinnamon bits mingle with gnarly black twisted leaves. Simmered entire sampler package in 1 cup milk for 7 minutes; sweetened with a bit of honey. Smooth, creamy, rich, lightly spicy—in a word, delicious!

Hey all! I am very excited today and have to share this with everyone :) . I just found out I have now passed both parts of the USMLE step 2 for med school.
On to the tea- Very nice smell of pear in the dry leaf. Made my tongue get ready for a nice dessert. Brewed, it smells a little too sweet. I like the pear underneath the scent of sugar though.
It doesn’t taste as strong as it smells. I can still taste black tea and there is pear and honey on top. It’s not a dessert taste as I expected but a light spring weather afternoon tea to me.
The tea isn’t bad. I’d pick it over some and would enjoy it in another sample pack but I couldn’t drink this enough to buy it.

This smells much fuller then the Twinnings I’ve been drinking.
I’m not very sure how to describe this tea but I find it better then other English Breakfast teas I’ve had. It doesn’t seem like anything special to me though. I think I like teas with another layer of flavor right now. Perhaps I’ll try lemon in the future with this. I’ve never been fond of sugar in tea and cream just doesn’t do much positive or negative for me. This might be a tea that I will stock in the future. There are plenty of people who like the simpler black teas and my not like my other selections and this is a pretty good tea for the morning.

I felt like something fruity and sugary, so I chose this.

Oh, this is honey alright—pure wild honey. It’s a musky, pollen covered, honeycomb dripping of honey one day old. The scent is like a sticky, sappy honey-coated pear so sweet and overripe it’s almost turning to brandy!

The taste is less brazen, more candy-sweet and “translucent” like a lollipop or pear jello. Underneath, the black tea base is toasty but sweet—as if the leaves have been so completely infused with the flavorings that they’re almost indetectable.

The tea is cooling now and I really am reminded of Middle Eastern desserts! Something about it reminds me of pistachios and saffron and rosewater…and syrupy baklava.

Yummy tea..I like it!

The golden yellow liquor smells roasty and faintly of licorice. The taste is mildly smokey, sweet with an ashy finish. There is a green vegetable/melon aftertaste. Moderate astringency and a bit of bitterness.