ifjuly Send Message

Still not going to rate teas as my nose is STILL stuffed up from my travel cold, blrm. But my Verdant samplextravaganza arrived today and I was too excited not to at least try something, and I had duplicates for this one (thanks Verdant!).

I went out on a limb with this order—I haven’t had an oolong I reeeally like yet, and the first few I tried (well regarded here, mind) I thought tasted downright strange bordering on gross. I never get the floral and peach elements people always describe. But then I had a tea flight in Portland at the Chinese Garden and it included oolong and pu erh, and I liked both fine, and finally tasted peach in the oolong! When I got back from the trip Verdant had a coupon code going on and I was like, well they’ve been so, so nice to me I want to support them, and if ANYONE has an oolong I might like I bet it’d be them…so here we are. I think I ordered samples of every oolong and pu erh they offer, just about.

This still has that salty thing going on with oolongs that makes me scratch my head, but it is much much gentler, that aspect. And unlike others I’ve had there is a lightly sweet and bready-without-being-yeasty thing I’m digging a lot. There is also a bit of tartness akin to blackberries or raspberries—normally I hate fruity astringency like that in tea (it’s everywhere in cheap supermarket bagged teas, blech), but here it’s light and refreshing, not harsh and puckery. More like actually eating a freshly washed berry than say, a Zinger tea. Clean tasting. I like.

One thing I have noticed as a common element to the few oolongs I’ve tried so far, the good and the weird/gross all, is that unlike black and sometimes green tea it seems unlikely they’d ever go bitter on you. Interesting.

Husband left early this morning to go out of town aaall weekend (won’t be back ‘til late Monday night, playing a show at a festival in Chicago) and I’ve been “good” so I can do pretty much whatever I want every day!! And being the dork I am, you know, all I really want is to play Animal Crossing: New Leaf, nap with the cats, watch Golden Girls, putter over art projects I never seem to find the time for normally, and drink tea the meditative, gaiwan-y way that I find I never have the appropriate time and headspace to devote to properly unless alone. Whee. I suppose I’ll probably hang out with my bestie for girly cocktail and movie night tomorrow, but otherwise just consider me a big reclusive dork n’ loving it, ha.

2nd steep: now it’s butterier, and also plantier but not in a bad way. Kind of like haricots verts cooked in butter, that sweet rich tender cooked green veggie thing. Yummy.

a zillion steeps (well, 6+) later: This is delightful in that way so many Verdant teas are—you can spend an entire half day with it and it transforms, always tasting good but in so many different surprising ways. The salt and whatever that marshy quality is I associate with oolongs was subtle when it was present at all, and disappeared after the 2nd steep, replaced with that fine buttery green vegetable flavor intertwined to varying degrees with light sweetness and a bit of peppery bite slipping in here and there. Often tasted like a delicious veggie saute, cooked bell peppers and fresh peas in their pod all coated with buttery smoothness. This leaves a creamy film feeling in one’s mouth that lingers, and I usually don’t experience that without over-the-top sweet flavoring (think cream earl greys, vanilla dessert teas, etc.), so to have that here with a more vegetal savory profile is novel for me and I really dig it! Didn’t get any cake-y notes until the very end (7th or 8th steep?), and it’s subtle but lovely. Yay my first total success with an oolong! (The one at Lan Su wasn’t bad at all, but it didn’t excite me…it was sweet and light, peachy, which was pleasant but didn’t bowl me over really.)

Back from my Pacific Northwest adventure! Had a wonderful time, especially adored Portland (the vibe of the city, all the lively varied neighborhoods, tea shops!, used book stores!, kitchen pantry dream shops like The Meadow!, naked bike night!, first Thursday art walk!, food truck areas full of people having fun late into the night!, so much craft beer!, Ground Kontrol!, Lan Su Chinese Garden, Washington Park’s Rose Garden and Japanese Garden and Hoyt Arboretum, taking the old historic highway through the Columbia River Gorge, Sauvie Island, driving down the Oregon coastline from Astoria to Arcadia Beach to Manzanita, the Tabor Park cinder cone at dusk, Mount Hood, all the yummy well sourced food…), though everything (Olympic National Park, particularly the rainforests and coastline beaches like Rialto and Ruby, the lavender farms in Sequim, Pike Market!, the ferry ride to Bainbridge Island, flying into Seattle right by Mount Rainier, on and on) was great.

Wasn’t expecting so much tea (there’s virtually none anymore in Memphis, alas), so that was a great surprise (husband dug how the bubble tea around town has more choices than tapioca pearls, stuff like coconut bits and fruit/plant jellies). Steven Smith and Stash seem the default in restaurants yay, and we just stumbled upon places like the Tea Zone and Camellia Lounge, multiple Townshend’s locations, and the Tao of Tea as we wandered places. So great.

I have a minor cold now (not too surprising, ugh air travel) so I’ll refrain from rating this while my sinuses and throat are impaired but I must say it’s really hitting the spot. Strong and bold without being harsh, and with a more citrusy bergamot than usual that somehow I dig (normally I prefer my bergamot flowery and complex, not fruity at all). Yum.

Once again, a tea I was kinda meh about hot is made short work of iced. Love how refreshing earl grey iced tea is!

Gonna be quiet around here for a week or two as I go out of town—I don’t bring tea with me when I travel (usually travel = chance to drink fancypants cocktails because Memphis’ craft bar scene is pretty crap so I gotta make the most of my chances) and I don’t have internet access/a smartphone anyway. Hope y’all have a lovely, tealicious week.

Dry, brewing, and in the cup this has a weird unpleasant aroma I can’t quite place. It’s gross to say this but it reminds me of that sort of urine-y aroma some rooibos has. The chocolate only comes out enough to notice in taste, not aroma, and it’s behind that other gross mystery element. Needless to say this is sadly not a keeper for me—too bad because dry it’s lovely, studded with gold.

The longer it sits: I think the smell might be a synthesis of lemon with the dark chocolate? Because now I can taste the lemon, it gets stronger and more distinct. But initially, the way it combines with the other elements it translates weird, a little chemical-y like Pine-Sol plus something else—>urine. Hmm. I will say that as it cools the weird offputting element recedes (or maybe I just get used to it?) and welcome flavors of chocolate and lemon come in, but even then I’m not crazy about it (and with so many delicious EGs out there that’s not really a problem!).

EDIT: Just looked at Steepster reviews for this. I seem to mostly be an odd man out, eek, but one person described it as like chocolate-coated wet nap. Yes! Perhaps that’s where I’m getting my urine/Pine-Sol bathroom-y evocation from.

EDIT 2: And now I see lemongrass is on the ingredient list, along with artificial flavors. I adore lemongrass (Thai’s my favorite cuisine probably) but I have a feeling that might be what’s grossing me out here, because sometimes stale or off lemongrass can remind me of pee.

This is as delicious as Steepsters hyped it to be! Has the balance and multi-component loveliness of Zen Tea’s EGC. Smells glorious, wonderfully floral and bergamot-y like Zen Tea’s (that smell dry and brewing that just makes you go “ahhhh”) with a rich, creamy texture nearly as buttery as Della Terra’s EGC. A definite winner I could easily see being one of my go-to regular Earl Greys.

Been cold brewing all of the teas I was kinda meh about when tried hot, letting them sit overnight in the fridge in my Takeya Flash Chill pitcher, and setting aside a little mason jar of simple syrup with mint from the deck herb garden for my husband (you don’t want to know how sweet he makes his tea given he’s a southerner, ha). So far this has definitely been the winner in terms of having the biggest gap between how I felt about it hot and how we feel about it cold—it is so delicious iced! There’s more flavor (that was what disappointed me about it hot; the taste wasn’t bad, just too weak), and it’s thirst-quenching, but also a smoky, mysterious element that makes one think of campfires, appropriate for iced tea. Really great. Husband loves it too.

I’m gonna keep the score for the hot tea so I don’t confuse myself when I look at my rating logs, but I’m definitely making a note for myself on a “favorites iced” list.

So I feel a bit hypocritical drinking this, as it has gold glitter sprinkles in it, the sort of thing I usually giggle dismissively about when it’s in something from David’s, say, but I’m sorta enjoying the Jem and the Holograms-ness of it this morning (maybe because I’m still so sleepy—didn’t go to bed ‘til super late and my head’s still fuzzy from the beer I had last night watching the Chuck season 3 opener on DVD—my tolerance is just terrible).

This smells lovely, like, well, sweet pear. There’s that element of canned pear as opposed to fresh, but it works somehow. I might prefer Joy’s Teaspoon’s Spicy Pear a smidge more—that has a warmth that lends a baked-fruit element I really like, and there isn’t that astringency of uncooked fruit this has. But this is nice. I’m curious what blending it with a chocolate and/or nut tea would do…

This reminds me a lot of my beloved Upton Imports Baker Street Afternoon Blend in that there’s a delicate floral element, probably from the bergamot, laced up with the smokiness, a combination that’s somewhat unusual and to me quite beguiling. The chocolate combined with the smoke makes one think of keemuns like Hao Ya, but there’s no trace of bitterness here. Really yummy afternoon tea break sort of thing, good with a cookie.

I like it a lot! If you’re in the mood for a very bergamot-y standard-tasting Earl you’ll be disappointed, but if you like either of those aforementioned teas you may enjoy this. I definitely did.

Dry this one has a strange, almost soapy chemical smell, and the cherry seems more the alarmingly pink jarred maraschino type than fresh. Brewing a perfume-y element comes through all the chocolate and cherry aroma. Once finished brewing, in the cup it has a distinct liquor-like smell, as if the cherries are fermented.

Unlike with many DT offerings, a lot of those strong scents don’t translate into flavor, for better or worse. There is the taste of dark chocolate a la H&S Florence, and some cherry-ish thing with that soap comes in at the back of the sip.

All in all this isn’t terrible or gross really, but it is kind of strange, puzzling. Wouldn’t restock, I don’t think.

So considering it’s almost 90F here today it’s hardly “rich chocolate tea” time but I just received this along with Griottes and Professor Grey among others aaaand I should be due for my period shortly, so I’ll go with it and maybe do a chocolate-a-thon taste comparison today.

Brewing the aroma reminds me of Harney and Sons Florence (and to a lesser extent American Tea Room’s Choco-late—that one’s more sugary powder mix though), that sense of a big black brick/bar of dark rich chocolate, something like Callebaut or Cafe Tasse. It brews up a surprisingly bright reddish color. It is even sweeter with less chance of bitterness than Florence, sort of a bridging of it with Choco-late in terms of delivering the intense chocolatiness of Florence with the sweetness of Choco-late, and adding a creamy dimension (ever since trying their Earl Grey Cream I’ve noticed Della Terra’s cream flavor is quite good and distinctly richer, butterier than most other companies’). I have a mail tea swapping friend who I’m sure will love this, can’t wait to send her some.