Western Immortal Tea

Had this one in the evening after an office work day where I had finished all of my advent selections before leaving for the day – it was sort of a reward, since most of the advents don’t have straight teas and I’ve been missing them a little… Well, a lot…

I always struggle to explain this flavour combination in shou, but it’s one I’ve experienced many times before that I enjoy a lot. This might sound bad/weird, but it’s like if someone mixed really thick oat milk with something brothy like cream of mushroom soup, and a really mellow wet potting soil – all in the very best way one could possibly interpret that combination of flavours.

It was very thick and coating, with a cooling camphorous feeling on the throat. Maybe it was not drinking a pu’erh in over a week, but it tasted like it was sent to me by the Gods. Very smooth, and pleasant tuo cha and I deeply appreciated the convenience of having it portioned out.

EDIT: If it wasn’t clear, this was Western steeped.

Sipdown (1172)!

Finished this one off over the weekend while writing up podcast episode outlines. It was a realllyyyy nice mug, and I deeply appreciate the full bodied intensity of the cup combined with the sweet and coating star anise notes. This was a really good Chai with both cups I had and I love how robust it is without having any astringency or bitterness. I’d definitely recommend this to Chai lovers who aren’t afraid of a more anise heavy blend composition!

This is from a sample that was generously gifted to me by Western Immortal Tea. This company reached out to me on instagram to see if I would have an interest in reviewing one of their teas. They let me choose the tea, and I actually opted for the shou Tuo Cha that they carry but they including a few servings of this one in with the package as well.

I don’t normally do Chai, but I saw a lot of star anise in the dry leaf of the blend so I got a bit more excited than I typically would for a more traditional looking black chai blend. I’m happy to report that it does taste pretty dominantly of star anise compared to all of the other spices in the mix – something I was DELIGHTED by. There are other spices too; cinnamon, cardamom for example. I like the cardamom mixed with the star anise.

It’s still not a tea that I would typically order for myself, but I thought it was really nice! I’m happy they included a sample of it for me to try. I need more star anise in my life.

And just a side note… one of the product photos of this tea on their site shows them steeping it in a gaiwan, which was so interesting to me. I would never think to brew this tea that way, but maybe that’s how I’ll have to finish the sample now.