Little Red Cup Tea Co.

Sipdown! Buuut it’s not in my cupboard, so it doesn’t count. It’s formerly mine, given to my mom, but my teas were stuck in the bedroom with my sleeping son, so I drank it! She’s not a big fan of blacks anyhow. I was actually quite pleased with it today – it was light and sweet, and had another yummy flavour note that is currently escaping me (my post about it was eaten by a phone that died, sigh.) It was better than I expected! Thanks again to LiberTEAS for the sample!

Another sample from Alphakitty (with the appearance of coming by way of LiberTEAS!)

Just brewed a really small cup of this one to test out before leaving it behind. It smells just a touch smoky, and tastes likewise. Kind of like a bagged Lipton + smoke – astringency and other icky things that come with bagged tea? I do seem to like smokiness at a low to moderate level in my tea, so this works for me. But there are so many other teas out there that I’d rather drink, I will be ok leaving it behind. (I’m a poor descriptor; this is quite a nice tea, and really nothing like a bagged tea, there is just this particular flavour I associate with bagged tea that I’m catching. I need to figure out whether it’s a region or what, so I can stop making it sound like it’s a low quality tea!)

Thank you LiberTEAS for this Sample!

I find myself enjoying this one very much, as this being my first Keemun Black Tea. It certainly is a nice change from the traditional Darjeeling, Assam and Ceylon teas.

This leaf produces a pale brownish colored liquid with a nice smokey pine overtones, is coupled with some very nice buttery and faint citricy undertones. There is little to no astringency.

I’m very excited in trying other Keemun Black Teas, for this was a good experience. Thanks again, LiberTEAS for this great suggested sample!

I am almost done tasting all my new teas (excluding samples) and the 4 I have left from Little Red Cup have been sitting on my kitchen table taunting me for some time. After a rather awful experience with the first tea of theirs that I tried, I was hesitant to dip into another. But this is about as far as spinachy bitter green as you can get (plus I need the space these are taking up!).

The dry leaves smell like smoke and hay—I actually like both of these in tea if they’re not overpowering. Brewed it’s still smokey but there’s also a hint of fruit—peach or grape maybe? This is a brisk, bold cup, and really exceeded my expectations for sure. It’s also my first experience with a Chinese black straight-up, and it definitely doesn’t need milk. A little astringent but not bitter at all.

Backlog: I enjoyed a cup of this earlier today. It is pleasantly robust, with a nice fruity character that is somewhat wine-like, ending in a wine-y sweetness and then some dry astringency. Sweet, bold, and full-flavored. I like it, it’s a good Keemun.

This isn’t the highest quality Bai Mu Dan I’ve encountered. The leaves are broken and crumbled, and are certainly not as green as the photos on the website would like to suggest. They are dull and brown, with no visible signs of fuzzy down like I’ve come to expect from a high quality Bai Mu Dan.

With that said, this is not a bad Bai Mu Dan. It’s just not the very best that I’ve encountered. It’s nothing exceptional. But it is pleasant. It has deliciously sweet, fruity overtones and a nice hint of hay and air in the background.

Overall, a pleasant tea experience.

Fair Trade and Organic +2
Slightly Bitter -1
Lovely floral Balance +1
Good Pricing +1
A somewhat new company (I think) – nice website but it seems to still being worked on as it has already changed recently.
This is a nice tea – but there are many far better out there – here is the issue I have – I have been drinking Shang, Verdant, Teavivre all day today and yesterday so it is going to be very hard to measure up to those companies. HOWEVER in fairness to this one, I have had far worse! The thing is I am new to Jasmine tea as a whole so I have not necessarily had “far worse” jasmine tea. This company seems to be good and I have other teas of theirs to try so we will see.
I like that they seem to know who they are, simplistic bagged tea, with vibrant red, fair trade, organic, and excellent information about the teas, the company, sustainability, etc on their site.

Here is an excerpt from the site:
We decided to sell Chinese tea that is simple, high quality, and straightforward — tea that our friends from Beijing would recognize and enjoy. So: no Mango-Walnut-Green-Tea-Surprise. Instead we will sell green tea, black tea, and white tea. Just tea, no flavoring except for jasmine, which is as traditional a flavoring as tea itself.

I will sample more of the teas I have from them soon. For now this is good, not great maybe but very good.