Rishi Tea

Peppermint, chocolate, a book, and my dog at my feet. I couldn’t ask for much more!

This with chocolate and a book makes for a good night.

Not much to say, a wonderful standby to share with the boyfriend (steeped a little longer and more of it because he likes his mint strong) while we split a cupcake and watch X-Files :)

Mixed this with Chamomile Citron by Tea Forte (trying to use up as I am finding things I like more). This is a very good and enjoyable peppermint. The boyfriend and I often have this at night when we watch our shows. I can for sure say that this is something that will always have a place in my cupboard, it may vary by company which one I have but there will always be peppermint on hand!

this matcha’s really good. yes, there is some grassiness present but it is yummy & creamy thanks to the added sugarcane :D

the powder is a bright verdant green, bright like Red Leaf’s matcha, much brighter than Republic of Tea’s. the only thing is, it produces a much thinner liquor than normal for a matcha (and less froth!), so i used less water and needed only a touch of soy milk in order to enjoy it like i normally do.

with Republic of tea’s matcha, i use a lot more sugar & need plenty of milk to get it to a shade of ‘sage latte’ as the liquor is a thick dark green producing a lot of froth. it’s also a lot more chalky and bitter.

in contrast, this Sweet Matcha by Rishi is very pleasant and smooth, and i would recommend it to any matcha newcomer! i myself love it and find it to be very similar to the Starbucks green tea latte.

This is definitely one of my favorites. Rishi has outdone themselves with this new line of tea. http://onthebean.com/shop/tea-bags/pu-erh/rishi-tea-pu-erh-bordeaux-tea-bag-organic-fair-trade-tea-blend-15-ct.html

This is delicious. The first thing I noticed was the amazing aroma. It smells just like a piña colada. The coconut and other flavors are noticeable without being overwhelming or leaving an aftertaste. I purchased this at http://onthebean.com/ and look forward to trying the other flavors.

somehow steepster ate and buried this? grrr.

nope. wrong mix for me…. actually i thing chico chai might have ruined me for others, to be honest. i had high hopes….. but it was completely out of balance and so strong after a really moderate 5 minute steep that it went right down the sink.

damn.

the semester’s almost over. i spent the weekend working my butt off analyzing data on global theory that is outside my specialty only to have it ACTUALLY HAPPEN…..!!!!!!!!! and then i got marked down because i wasn’t focused enough. …. ……. ………… are you sure i wasn’t focused enough? because i’m pretty sure i was. do you feel like reading it again maybe?

however, at least i loved the project. and at least my ‘lower mark’ was an A-. and at least that was tying together SO many different disciplines that regardless of the mark i am very bloody proud.

this chai. hum. if you would like to have random patches of body hair forcibly burned off by spice via tea containing milk and agave…. then steep this for 5 and have at her. this will be going in the traveling tea box for my part. arrivederci!

Meh
That is how I feel about this tea long story short
-Soapbox
Rishi was my first loose leaf tea company so I will always have a special place in my heart for them. I have never had a bad tea by them and I believe the retail box packages are the best possible way to start tea and getting a footing for loose leaf tea not to mention to date some of the best I have ever had were purchased from their small lot batches on their website. Consistency is hard for tea companies let alone one that offer literally every type of tea available from yellow to pu er. SO with that said Im going to give this tea a “C” that not an insult but rather an indication that a tea of this high of quality does not excite me anymore considering I was the typical american who thought tea was the thing in bag you threw into styrofoam cups on an airplane or when you had a cold.

-Review
I remember there other crop a few years back being “better” a heavier body and more bold taste so I was a little disappointed. But I think it is was my blue collar tea taste because I can tell these leaves are of a higher quality plucking (1/2 leaves ATTACHED to a bud) and a lot brighter in color(usually indicating not from a high output factory" over cooking". Just as I prefer summer harvest over spring Darjeeling’s higher quality/price is not always “tastier”. Still this tea is a great example and high quality once again, I am just spoiled at this point with access to sites that sell teas I can’t afford and should not but do purchase from.

Found out that my Vitamin Shoppe has a suprisingly good selection of teas. They had a bunch a rishi and pukka teas which I am a fan of both. They even had some from the Tea Spot. Who knew a vitamin shop would be a source to get loose leaf teas. This one caught my eye since I am into all things chai. It seemed like an interesting blend so I picked it up. The smell out of the bag was minty with a hint of chai spice to it. Steeped the mint mellowed out a lot which was nice. The chai flavoring is very mild, This is a delicious chai but my only gripe is that the chai flavors be stronger.

As with all the Rishi teas I’ve tried, I enjoyed this one. I hadn’t had white tea before, but this certainly isn’t what I had expected. I followed the instructions and used 2 tablespoons for an 8-ounce serving. The infusion was indeed “amber-orange,” as the description says; I suppose I had expected it to look more like a green tea. The taste was interesting as well—much less delicate and much more rich than I had expected (although it definitely was mild, subtle, and delicate—just less so than I expected). I’m not sure I could yet identify what flavors there are yet; I’d have to give it a few more tries. My wife tried some; she finds green teas too subtle for her liking, but enjoyed this. Make of that what you will.

Green, round, dark to the back of the throat, light in the front sides and tip of the tongue.

It’s a medium strength tea. A bit astringent. A slight sweettart (plant, not candy) touch to it at the end.

Finish is comfortable but has a bit of an edge. Yes, as I drink it’s definitely drying my mouth.

Not a fan.

A very nice Darjeeling. In the first steep, I tasted a flavor and astringency similar to that of grape skins (my wife and friend who were trying it with me made fun of me on this point, but as a kid I would occasionally peel grapes and eat the skins and flesh separately, and it was definitely a grape skin flavor). The second steep was more rounded and mellow, less astringent and tasted slightly spiced. Very good overall.

oh dear.

rishi, i am normally such a fan. even after the chocolate chai fiasco. this blend stopped me almost as soon as i started….. it was pepto bismol tea. =0/

believe me i wish i could say otherwise. i do feel very badly. i couldn’t even finish my cup. correction, i couldn’t swallow more than 2 sips of my cup— down the drain!

(i need to gargle)

This weekend I went to a bigger Whole Foods than what is closer to my house and was happy to see they had Rishi in bulk bins so I was able to get as little as I wanted and the price was at least 50% cheaper then when I buy it already boxed.

First try: so far I like it, like sweet toasty popcorn, I’m already thinking about making another cup.

Can this be a meal replacement? I think if I already ate too much for the day it could.

Edit: already had a second cup in one night, yumm. I’m going to have to get more soon. I can’t wait to try the fun flavored ones :)

I know a lot of people around here are anti-paper filters, but in case anyone else is like me, and uses them at work for convenience I thought I’d review these just in case.

I recently switched to these after using the David’sTea drawstring cup shaped filters for about a year. I haven’t been drinking much actual David’s Tea tea lately, and I don’t even have a local store to shop at, so I got really tired of having to pay shipping AND paying 10 cents per filter. These Rishi filters were half the price and I found them at a local supermarket. The main reason I liked the drawstring filters so much was that they would not spill out if I just threw them in my purse full of tea on my way to work in the morning. Luckily these Rishi filters are nice and LONG so I can just roll them up! So far I haven’t experienced any purse leaf loss, heh. Also apparently they are compostable, for anyone who cares about such things. If I didn’t use my metal steepers exclusively at home I’d probably toss them in the compost pile, but the whole point of bringing them to work for me is they are super disposable and easy to deal with.

For Christmas, my brother got me my first Yixing teapot—and I decided to dedicate it to Tieguanyin oolong (partly because the Whole Foods in town sells it, and I like to avoid shipping). So, I seasoned my pot with it and used it to makes very first gongfu style tea. I was really impressed—I loved this one Western style (see my other review for more detail), but I think gongfu brings out the subtleties more (no doubt partly due to the number of steeping a possible). I’m really looking forward to experiencing this tea even more as my pot continues to soak it in—it’s now an every-weekend tradition!

Picked up a few teaspoons of this tea at Whole Foods today, along with a few others. This was the one that my wife and I decided to try first, and we loved it! The dry leaf smelled vegetal and slightly unpleasant, but the aroma of the first steep was wonderful. There were some vegetal notes, but they were balanced with all the other notes (I noticed some nuttiness and a some roasted grain smell). The flavor of the first steep was also delicious—a great combination of delicate and hefty. The flavors (which were the same as the aroma) were strong, but not overpowering. The flavors of the second steep were more delicate. This is only my second oolong, but if this and the previous one are any indication, oolong will have to become a semi-regular staple of my tea cupboard!

I love ginger, I love pu-erh, so I thought I’d love these two together. Having said that, I probably should have steeped this correctly when popping this tea’s cherry, as it’s heady, earthy, very pungent and strong – I could tell this as soon as I opened the bag. However like my normal state-of-affairs the past day, I steeped it for about 20 minutes.

Yes, it’s good. Yes, it’s very ginger-y. it is also way too strong for my morning, yet that’s my own damn fault. I would only recommend this to folks who LOVE pu-erh (and strong ones at that, with an earthy, mineral taste to them) as well as folks who LOVE ginger (biting, heady, adventurous).