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Hmm I don’t know what it is, but all of the teas I’ve tried from Eteaket have tasted savory to me, even ones that boast being “sweet”. This is no exception. I had written a review for this a couple days ago but I guess I forgot to post it and it ended up refreshing and deleting it all, and I seem to have lost the rest of my sample so I can’t even have another cup to refresh my memory.

I do remember that unlike orange oolong supreme, this is made with whole leaves rolled up into knobby balls. And that the tea steeped up yellow and was savory and sort of citrusy and sort of vegetal. But that’s all I remember.

This smells like the powdered orange Gatorade mix my mom once bought when everyone got the stomach flu, and then sat in the cupboard for a few years until finally we through it out because the Florida humidity turned it into a sold rock.

I’m so used to oolong being rolled either into spindles or into tight balls that when I see an oolong that’s just flat broken pieces, it surprises me. The aroma of the tea while steeping is no longer orange Gatorade but roasted peanut skins

Sipping, it’s savory roasty and even sort of floral? I’m not getting orange, which is surprising considering how the dry leaf smelled. It’s roasty in the beginning of the sip, and towards the middle a bit of floral comes out, and then goes back to roasty for the end of the sip, with only a bare hint of roast sticking around in an aftertaste.

Like I said before, I’m not big on floral teas, but I figured I might as well try it since I already have it. I steeps this up double strength, and then flash iced it and sweetened it.

It’s actually not bad, the tea is a brownish yellow color, and the aroma is sweet fruity and a little flowery (less like a rose than I was expecting). The front of the tea is sweet and fruity, sort of like apples and strawberries, why meets with a soft floral taste towards the end of the sip, and lingers with a refreshing aftertaste. If you don’t mind floral, and like fruity, then you’ll like this.

I love the smell of jasmines, the remind me of my childhood, and they just smell so happy. I’m learning that I’m not big on floral in my teas, but jasmine seems to be the exception.

Opening this up, there’s a strong initially burst of sweet jasmine, that mellows out after being exposed to air for a minute. The leaves are twisty, with a few silver tips dispersed through out, an a couple twigs.

The wet leaf and tea aroma smells like jasmine, but also sort of savory if that makes since. Less sweet smelling than most jasmine teas I’ve had. The color is a brown veering yellow.

Sipping, not as savory as it smells, but not as sweet as I’m used to. I almost want to sweeten it, but resist out of fear of the sweetener clashing with the savory instead of sweetening it overall. The jasmine isn’t really present till the end of the sip and hangs around with an almost pepper aftertaste. It’s sound more strange than it tastes. There isn’t much flavor coming from the base tea, just jasmine.

As it cools the front sip is almost brothy in presence (as in I don’t taste like in sipping broth but I feel like I am).

Overall not as sweet or as strong as I would like, but would be could for someone who would like a less sweet jasmine tea.

The dry leaf is emerald green, with long needle like leaves, that smell like butter and spinach. As it’s steeping the aroma is so buttery, almost to the point of smelling like popcorn. And the wet leaf once removed has a spinach presence again, while still smelling buttery. It’s mouthwatering.

The first steep (1m) is light gold, clear but there’s some floaties in it so I made sure to drink fast. The taste is mildly butter and spinach, with an oceany (seaweed and minerals) aftertaste.

Second steep (30s) is a greenish gold color, and cloudier. The aroma is more ocean like than before, though not quite salty. The taste is still a bit buttery, but less so than the last cup, mild veggie, and a little sashimi grade salmon (salmon sashimi is one of my all time favorite foods): fresh clean slightly mineral sort of buttery and distinctly from the ocean. I can only imagine how amazing this would be with sushi.

Third steep (1m) same greenish gold as the last cup, but with the clearness of the first cup. Vegetal aroma. The taste is less buttery, more mineral vegetal, even a little metallic. I think I’ll stop here.

This is really good, lots if the things I like in a green tea. I didn’t get any floral despite what the description says, which is fine by me because I’m beginning to realize, unless it’s jasmine, I’m not big on floral.

In honor of Brendens new shipping policy, I’m having a cup of this.

Confession time. I’ve had this before and was left feeling… Uninspired. I didn’t write a note because based on the cult following that GO has, I was expecting to want to get this tattooed on my chest and to name my first born after it. When I didn’t feel the need to do either of those, my first thought was I did something wrong. So I gave it some time, and vowed to try again.

Determined to get the best cup, I used about 1-1.5 tablespoons, and steeped for just under 2 minutes, in a sort of gongfu style. I don’t know if the change of style had an effect, but taking a sip, I think I finally understand what the issue was: I had it a month ago when I first decided to try black teas, and one my palate wasn’t as refined, and two I wasn’t fond of malt yet at that point (now I totally dig it). The front of the sip is lots of malt and cocoa, and a thick mouth feel that together reminds me of good dark fudge. Mmm. The mid sip is smooth creamy vanilla with the fudge, and a dark cherry note also comes out. Like I’m eating cherries and then eating decadent fudge.

There’s little vanilla bean seeds at the bottom of my cup. Is it weird that I find them cute? I don’t know how I missed the cocoa the first time I tried this, it’s so prevalent.

The leaves on this have lots of silver in them and they’re very twisted and curly, very beautiful. They smell vegetal and sweet.

Steeped up, it’s slightly astringent and bitter, sweet chestnut and peas, a light floral note, which lingers with the sweet pea taste in a nice aftertaste. I’m learning to not totally reject slight astringency, and don’t mind it in this tea. I’m also finding that I don’t like most straight green teas with sweetener. I tried added some to the last half of the cup, ad found that I like this much more unadulterated.

Oh how tastes change, I used to have to sweeten everything, and now not only can I drink a bunch of teas unsweetened, but I prefer some that way.

The first steep is very malty, dark, and probably would hold up well to some milk. Full bodied, and full flavored. As it cools a bit of a raisin note comes out. There’s also a dark sweetness, not quite molasses, but like a dark honey.
Second steep is more sweet than the first. A bit of malt and cocoa Lots if molasses end of sip and lingering after taste, with a bit of honey and cherries.
The third steep was more molasses but with a dark fruit (plum?) thrown in.
Again I am amazed by how much flavors I’m getting from a type if tea that I thought of as bottom tier. I need to stop assuming things about teas I haven’t tried. This tea seems dark, but in a sweet kind of way. Like a good girl who’s had her heartbroken and turns “heartless”: a darker version of her sweet self, but the sweet can’t really be hidden by the dark.

I cold steeped this over night, the dry leaf smelled kind of fruity and sweet, but the wet leaf when I strained it this morning smelled like cough syrup: sweet and candy fruity, but medicinal and fake.

The aroma and front of the sip is medicinal, the middle sip isn’t too bad, sort of lemony and berry like, with the end of the sip taking on the medicine taste again. Coupled with the fact that I was drinking this out of a red plastic cup, my mind kept trying to tell me I was drinking cough syrup.

I think that the fact that I cold brewed this made the tea suffer, something that probably would have been fine in a traditional steep, became fake and medicinal in the 15 hour steep.

This kind of reminds me of those strawberry hard candies with the gooey center flavor wise. Sweet, artificial, but still sort of berryish. The chocolate is definitely like those Easter bunnies that say “chocolate flavored”. Again, I can get the flavor, but it’s distinctly fake. Also a touch astringent. I did get a big whole dried raspberry in my scoop though, so there is real fruit in it, and I also see hard shiny shards that look like they might be pieces of cocoa shell mixed in with the tea leaves. This isn’t terrible, in fact I probably would have adored it back when I first was getting into loose leaf, but I’ve become a bit more picky about my flavored teas.