Upton Tea Imports

Did a side-by-side with the Mist Valley Estate Tippy and while I preferred that one (it was sweeter) this was no slouch either. More astringency, tannin, and bitterness, but also more woodsy flavor which was enjoyable.

The leaves on this one are surprisingly lovely for such a mass distributor as Upton, complete with some noticeably long, pretty tips. Dry and brewing this smells surprisingly toasty and grainy—an earlier review mentions a vague resemblance to Laoshan Black of all things, and I can actually definitely see that (which is so surprising!); there isn’t the intense chocolatiness, but there is that barley-ish toasted chew feel. It isn’t like other Nepalese teas I’ve had, less woody and floral and more food-ish (I could be imagining it but I almost smell sweet cooked carrot). Some fruity perfumed astringency and tannin comes in at the end, giving it more resemblance to what I was expecting (darjeeling-ish qualities). Really surprised and impressed with this one!

The leaves are pretty onced brewed. The cup’s a lovely bright light orange-gold hue. Like most Nepalese black teas I’ve tried from Upton, there is a tantalizing sandalwood aroma dry and in the cup I’m just crazy about. That lingering sweetness that comes in, characteristic of these teas, is lovely.

A lovely “comfort food” darjeeling if you’re a fan of them. Sipped while watching the new Arrested Development on the couch late yesterday night with my husband, post-grillout (shrimp and watermelon and feta kabobs, buttermilk honey chicken kabobs with romesco sauce, cuke salad, leafy salad with blueberry dressing, yummy cookies!) game night (we destroyed the world playing and losing Pandemic, alas) with the neighbors. Nice evening, felt like a very appropriate beginning of summer.

Tea of the morning here, I am not wanting to get up today and was hoping this would help. This is a 5g sample from Upton tea Imports – the leaves inside are very dark, slender and curly.

I admit I forgot to set a timer so I have no idea how long this was really steeping for. I am getting some chocolate type notes along with spiciness in the finish. It would be interesting to compare this with the Imperial Bohea, which I really love. This isn’t as smoky as the I.B. from what I recall. I’m not sure I got the full flavor profile because of the timing issue but so far my impressions are very good. Definitely more on the mellow side of teas…

Upton tea recommends that you steep this for 3 minutes, but I thought it was a little too light and upped it to 4 minutes to bring out the aroma.

Its smooth and aromatic, but not too strong. would go well with some milk and sugar. I honestly don’t know what else to say about this because it doesn’t really stand out and is quite neutral. It reminds me of the tea you get when you have dim sum, neutral enough to balance out whatever else you’re eating. And that makes me want to eat dim sum…

Just got home from a long weekend at Harbin Hot Springs and I thought I’d relax with a nice cup of tea.

This is one of the 2012 ff samples I got from Upton, tried to restrain myself this year and did not buy any full sizes.

I smelled the leaves after steeping and they are so incredibly fragrant and fresh. The cup brews up to be a light orange and I am definitely getting the melon-like sweetness they claimed along with a slight nuttiness that reminds me of almonds or white chocolate. Excellent to sip on plain, needs no sugar at all and putting milk into this would be a crime. Totally devoid of astringency and almost broth like in texture.

When it comes to darjeelings people seem to either love them or hate them, but to me this is like a little bit of heaven in a cup!

I hope all my Steepster friends in the US had a great Memorial day weekend.

I steeped this for a good 3 minutes, but it may have not been enough. The taste is very subtle and cries for milk or sugar. Its definitely a neutral tea if you don’t have strong tea preferences, and would go well with desserts to balance out the sweetness.

This is the first time that I’ve consciously drank an assam tea so I don’t have much to compare this to. Its a very smooth tea, so its perfect for people who don’t have a strong preference for flavored tea. Someone else said that this tea is bold, but I’d say its actually quite subtle with a slightly malty aftertaste. I picked this up because it was one of the ‘best sellers’ on Upton Tea’s website, and I could only rationalize that people like this because its so neutral. It would be interesting to mix this tea with something really bold, to see if it would smooth out the flavor.

Sipdown – this was part of the Upton Assam sampler and not really my favorite of the bunch but pretty good with sugar and soymilk. See previous notes if interested.

Assam tea of the morning here. 3/4 of the Upton tea sampler. The leaves are very slender and broken (GBOP = golden broken orange pekoe)

This is pretty good, I wish I had the foresight to try it plain before I dumped in my usual soymilk that I drink with assams. I’m getting a lot of malty flavor with a bit of chocolate and a trace of bitterness in the finish. I wonder why you need your leaves broken if you’re drinking the tea in loose leaf form… anyway this is pretty good but a bit pungent and strong even with the addition of soymilk. An eye opener for sure but not something I would need to have around on a permanent basis.

I hope everyone has a great Memorial Day weekend!

This tea is very tasty! It has a lovely floral level, fresh juicy white tea base and a tasty sweet fruity finish. If you love floral whites, this is a must try! I very much enjoyed it!

However, the only thing I didn’t like about this tea was I couldn’t ID the fruity as pomegranate, tastes maybe more like a hibiscus, without any tart. The fruityness does go well with the floral and white tea base though.

Full review on my blog, The Oolong Owl http://oolongowl.wordpress.com/2013/05/22/pomegranate-magnolia-white-tea-from-upton-tea-imports-tea-review/
Lots of pictures of my pomegranate tree in bloom!

Ordered this sample the last time I placed an order with Upton Tea. The leaves are olive green, very long and slender (needle like, duh).

The tea liquor steeps up to be a very pale yellow. There isn’t much of an aroma coming from this. Flavor wise, it’s slightly floral with very light vegetal notes of corn. This is a very gentle and light tea but I generally prefer my greens to have a little more heft. Probably not something I would bother to keep in my personal stash. Still, it’s an elegant and relaxing cuppa on this lovely spring day. If you like yellow teas you might want to give this one a shot.

Upton’s notes say the tea has a pine needle flavor but I don’t think I would have picked that out if I hadn’t read their description. I thought I detected a bit of smoke somewhere in the finish.

I had Della Terra’s The Perfect Pear this morning, and am trying this tea tonight, so it’s just been a pear day. I actually really like pears. My grandmother had a little scraggly pear tree in her yard, and it would grow the smallest, knobbiest pears on it every year, but they were good.

I’m not sure if I’ve had green rooibos before. I feel like I have in some tea, but I can’t remember which one. I’m not a huge fan of red rooibos, so many I will like it’s greener twin a little more. The dry leaves smell like rooibos with a hint of pear. As soon as I poured the boiling water into my little teapot I could smell the sweet aroma of pear. The tea is a clear, dark yellow orange color. The flavor is initially of rooibos, with a fresh pear finish. The little pear flavor that is present is very fresh, like eating an actual pear. There is a slight green rooibos aftertaste, which is less medicinal than a red rooibos but is still noticeable. Adding sweetener brings out more of the sweet pear flavor and covers up some of the rooibos notes. I added a little milk after the sweetener and it smoothed all of the flavors over, leaving just a lot of the juicy pear taste. It also brought out a litlte creaminess, which I couldn’t find at all before adding the milk.

Overall, this is a nice tea, but one I probably wouldn’t purchase. The pear flavor is perfect, but there is a little too much rooibos taste for me, and almost no creaminess. I think that pear is a difficult flavor to bring out in tea, but this one comes very close if you don’t mind rooibos. Thanks to Mercuryhime for sending me a sample of this one!

-Dry blend has small pieces of green rooibos and large pieces of sunflower petals.
-Dry leaves smell like rooibos with a hint of pear. Tea liquor aroma is strongly of sweet pear.
-Tea liquor is a clear dark yellow orange color.
-Rooibos flavor with a fresh pear finish. Green rooibos aftertaste.
-Best with milk and sweetener.
-Fair tea. True pear flavor, but rooibos taste is strong. LIttle creaminess.

sipdown! (276) as I’m pretty sure this is a tea my friend would love. Thank you Kittenna for sharing this one with me. This is a tea that tastes like peach. it’s not a bad tea…there’s no astringency or bitterness and it’s pretty smooth. But it’s not a tea i love, or need in my cupboard. It’s a fairly average tea with not a whole lot going on. there are better black peach teas out there that i’d pick before reaching for this one.

i’m watching teen wolf. the entire season in one day basically. watching that much tv in one day is something akin to eating nothing but cake for a day. but i watched it in a half ass way at least, and fondled my teas the rest of the day. multitasking!

also

i should probably buy some more decaf blacks cuz this is a nice option. bye bye rooibos. whatevs.

Tea of the morning here, 2/4 of Upton’s assam sampler.

I don’t have a lot of experience with CTC’s aside from knowing they are produced in a different way than orthodox teas so here’s a short primer for the curious: http://t-buds.com/orthodox-vs-ctc-teas-body-vs-flavor/

I steeped this for 3 minutes but might try it for 2 next time. It is definitely a strong assam, bold and malty with a bit of a winey aftertaste and some bitterness too. Definitely a lot better with milk and sugar and very eye opening. Meh, maybe I’m a tea snob but I much prefer the traditional assam leaf.

I have read this is primarily what they use to make chai with in India but traditionally chai is made with a lot of milk.

This is nice tea, but nothing special. It definitely does not live up to the delightful Upton Mao Feng Imperial though seems similar to their Jade Pekoe. It has a mild honeyed flavor, but not much smoke or deeper flavor. The leaves seem to be broken into small pieces, which I didn’t expect. I don’t catch any spice or fruit really. It is just a plain jane non-offensive tea that I probably wouldn’t have even pegged as Keemun had it not been listed on the package as that. It is not bitter, astringent or mineraly which speaks well, but probably best looked at as a bargain tea.

Finishing off the rest of this sample today. It tastes a bit better if you use more tea (leaf) but I’m still finding it lacking in flavor/artificial tasting and not sure why it’s curdling my soymilk… oh well! Not going on my shopping list, that’s for sure.

Another sample from Upton Tea Imports. There aren’t too many decaf teas I like but I figured I would try this one out. It definitely smells and tastes like vanilla, but the flavor is a bit thin and wine-y. I think the decaf process removes a lot of flavor from the tea, which is too bad. I added some soymilk to this and it was okay. Will probably finish off the sample I have with some sugar but won’t buy a large size.

I prefer the Vanilla Comoro from Harney and Sons for a vanilla decaf black tea.