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Thanks very much to Epi Tea for the pre-release sample of this!

I have to admit I’m a bit underwhelmed by this tea, especially after the Berry Rooibos yesterday. I don’t know if it’s me, but I just can’t taste the blood orange in this at all. I can smell it a bit, the taste is all rooibos.

Still, it’s a good cup, and I look forward to trying the rest of the samples!

Pre-release sample graciously provided to me by Epi Tea!

I really love the convenience of pyramid bags, and it makes me happy that the bags are biodegradable and the teas are organic. One less thing to feel bad about!

The rooibos here is well-balanced with the berry. It’s tart, but without the overpowering hibiscus that a lot of berry teas have. I like hibiscus, admittedly, but it can get tiresome. I don’t particularly like red rooibos (or rooibos in general, but give me green any day) but this is surprisingly tasty. I’ve added a bit of local honey and left the bag in while it steeps.

The only thing I wish about this tea was that there was more rooibos in the sachet, or that I had a second sachet to double the strength. I feel like this tea would make a fantastic summer iced tea. All in all though, it’s a solid offering, and a promising beginning!

Thanks to Teavivre for this sample!

I’ve never had a ginseng tea before, and never really had any ginseng. I’ve only really ever seen it on commercials “With ginseng for extra energy!” or whatever ginseng is marketed to do So I don’t know what the ingredient tastes like. But we’ll give this one a try!

The dry leaf smells kind of like a rock oolong. It’s dark and toasty. The feel of the leaves is different: they’re coated in something (probably ginseng). They’re uniformly dark green and almost matted together. The leaves feel sort of rough to the touch, like moss growing over asphalt.

Steeped in my tasting cup (I really want to get my hands on a gaiwan!) for short infusions.

Wet leaf smell – I’m picking up that same rock oolong scent, but stronger. There’s also a bit of a walnutty smell here. I’m hoping that doesn’t come through in the taste, because I’m mildly allergic, and I’d like to avoid starting the day with a headache.

First steep – 10s

The liquor is a rich golden color. It’s not pale at all, the way I’d expect a 10s steep to be. It looks like I’ve steeped it for a lot longer.

Nope, no walnuts in the taste! Excellent. The first few sips were rather tasteless, as I was focusing on the nuts and trying to separate the ginseng taste from the rest of the flavor. I gave up on that, and a sweetness started hitting me incredibly strongly at the back of my mouth. It was like a regular, unremarkable oolong, and then – BAM! Sweet! It’s all aftertaste. Interesting.

Second steep – 20s

The liquor has the same golden honey color as before, but it’s a little darker, a little more bronze. The leaves in the tasting cup have mainly unfurled, but they’re still rather crinkly. Reminds me of my wardrobe after it’s come out of a suitcase… :)

There’s a bit of astringency in the flavor here. The utter sweetness of the aftertaste has abated, and it just reminds me of a more astringent rock oolong.

Third steep – 30s.

Smooth, a little bit nutty. I dunno. This tea just isn’t doing it for me today. Thankfully, Teavivre’s samples are large enough to try a few times, but maybe this one just isn’t for me.

Sipdown. Took two sips of this and poured it out. Far too much jasmine.

Tis was sent to me courtesy of Teavana!

It’s an okay tea. There’s too much emphasis on the “creme” bit, so I’m finding that it tastes a bit artificial.

Tasting notes will be short as my computer has a virus and I’m stuck typing on the iPad. Buying that keyboard case back when I could afford it sounds like a good idea now… Ah well.

Sipdown. Finishing off the last of the sample of this. Brewed in my 2-cup teapot, then poured over ice in the teacup. It’s only 9:30 AM here and already it’s stifling. Yesterday I spent the whole afternoon hiding in my room with the A/C – I brought my kettle and tasting cup up with me, and really only came downstairs to swap out the teas.

I’m docking the rating a few points, just because I’m not as enamored with it as I was – it’s great, but after trying all these delightful offerings from Teavivre, I’m just not too excited about this one. Still good, though.

Thanks to Teavivre for this sample!

I’m still a pu-erh novice, although I’m fascinated by them and am trying to branch out. This is the first one I’ve tasted that has a date attached to it. I’m locking myself in my room with the A/C (not strong enough to actually make the room cool, but at least I’m not sweating… I hate summer.)

The scent of the dry leaves is definitely dark and earthy. There’s a hint of the “fishiness” associated with pu-erh, but it’s no more than a passing whiff. Beyond that, it just smells old. Like smoke and leather and oak trees. There’s a lighter sweetness to the scent of the wet leaf.

First steep – 10 s

It’s a very dark brown color. It reminds me of the barn I used to ride at, down the street from my house. It was built into a hill and was very long and narrow, dusty and dirty and dim. When I look at the liquor it reminds me of the color of a well-used saddle, dark and leathery and deep.

I’d definitely describe this tea as “woodsy.” It’s not heavy, but it’s dark, and there’s a surprising coolness of mint here.

Second steep – 20s

Still dark, flavor a bit stronger than the first steep. Unremarkable.

Third steep – 30s.

Oh, God, yes. I let this cool to drinkable temperature before I attempted a sip. Oh my goodness. The first thing that hits my tongue is caramel. Sweet, light, a hint of chocolate with just the tiniest bit of astringency at the finish. Lighter, golden caramel colored liquor.

I’ll post this now, since I don’t want it getting longer than it already is (oops), but Teavivre, you’re killing me. You’re killing me! I can’t wait till school starts so I have money to go tea shopping.

Another gratuitous sample from Teavivre! I really wanted to try some more of their teas but I didn’t feel like sitting down to something dark, and I’d already had a cup of the Dragonwell this morning. So here goes with this one.

When I opened the sample package, I looked inside to see that the buds were a bit more curled than I’d seen previously, and there are some small leaves mixed in with the buds. Bending down to take a closer look, I was hit with a really strong scent – much more strong than I’d expected. It was a lot different too – very flavorful. Beyond the jasmine I got whiffs of peach, plum and nectarine. There’s something else there that I can’t quite put my finger on. Maybe a sort of orchid scent? It almost reminds me of the forest, mossy and cool, but not dark. Regardless, it’s the best smelling unaltered white tea I’ve ever smelled.

The steeping instructions asked for 1-3 minutes; I steeped mine for approximately 2 to 3. I didn’t set a timer. After steeping, the buds look a bit of a brighter green than before, and they’ve started to unroll just slightly. The wet scent of these is similar to the dry scent, but not as strong. I’m also getting a little bit closer to the flavor I was unable to identify in the dry leaves – it smells almost mossy, somehow.

I used my 2-cup teapot for this, which is a light rose color. I really do need to get a glass or a white teapot. I’ve been eyeing the 18oz glass ForLife ones… sigh. Too many teapots, so little money. As it pours, the stream looks white. Even in the light pink teacup, I can see that the liquor is a pale yellow in color. The scent of the liquor is even fainter than the scent of the wet leaves, but it’s still along the same line.

It tastes fantastic. I haven’t had a lot of experience with yin zhen teas – I’ve tried the Teavana silver needles and David’s jasmine-scented. Both of them have been soft but fairly tasteless to me. I can hardly taste the jasmine in David’s.

But this – this is something else. I can taste the jasmine there without a doubt, but it’s light and delicate, without the overpowering dryness or “soapy” qualities it can have when used in excess. The best descriptor I can find for the tea is “round.” It’s clear and pure, mild and sweet. It’s the fullest-flavored yin zhen I’ve ever tasted, and it has its own distinctive flavor.

The first time I went into Teavana (hardly knowing anything about tea, but knowing that silver needles was considered “expensive and quality”) I asked for a cup of their silver needles so I could taste it. The girl there said “Sure, but it has a very light flavor it’s really best blended with other teas. Would you like to try that?” She blended it with another, and it was good, but this is a tea which, while very light, needs nothing extra to taste fantastic.

Thanks again Teavivre – you’ve sold me. Another one I have to add to my shopping list!

Thanks to Teavivre for this sample! Dragonwell is one of my favorite kinds of greens, so I was really excited to try this one. I brewed up a cup of it yesterday – it was morning, and I wanted a nice tea to drink, but I didn’t necessarily need much caffeine. I baked all morning for the tea party yesterday afternoon, and the stress definitely woke me up! I made shortbread cookies, vanilla scones (with the recipe DaisyChubb posted a few weeks ago – delicious!), a fruit salad and a homemade dill and goat cheese dip, and my friend made cucumber sandwiches, muffins and chocolate covered strawberries. We had so much food, and we ended up sitting around the table for seven hours just munching on all the goodies! It was a fantastic day, and the party continued until three in the morning… crazy. And then the next day I went straight to the beach all day and didn’t really get to try any new teas. Anyway, I made this tea yesterday, had a couple of sips of it, and then didn’t get to finish the cup because I was baking so frenetically!

After I drove my sister to camp today, I brewed another cup of this. And oh, it is good. I’ve been thinking about it all day. The leaves are long and flat, a pale grey-green color. The leaves smell beautiful. There’s a very quiet vegetal flavor here – I wouldn’t describe it as grassy, but green. There’s a characteristic chestnut scent there as well.

Sipping it, it tastes just the way it smells. One of my favorite things about a Dragonwell is just how clean it tastes, and this is no exception. Even though I’ve made it with regular old tap water, it tastes like I’ve made it with mineral water. I love it. It’s very light, it’s green and nutty. It’s one of the most soothing cups of tea to me. I’m in love with it. This is going into the order with that black dragon pearl tea… oh, it’s fantastic.

Thanks so much to Angel and Teavivre for these samples! They took a little while to get here, but in perfect condition. Teavivre is, in my opinion, well worth the wait.

I’ve never had a black pearl tea – the only pearls I’ve ever had are the small jasmine ones. I went for that little sample packet first. Upon opening it, I was surprised by how large the pearls are, and how tightly packed. They’re mostly a dark mahogany color with little striations of a lighter yellow, sort of like pine. I suppose trees are on my mind today – it was Red Pine Forest day with my preschoolers at camp. They very much enjoyed building “mouse houses” in the dips between the tree roots!

Tea! The dry leaf smell immediately conjures up something musty and dark. There’s almost a hazelnut to it, but there’s something more than that. It sort of reminds me of walking through a darkened barn, with the scents of hay and leather hanging thickly in the air, the rustle of horses and cows as they shift about and flick their tails to ward off the flies.

Never having had a black dragon pearl this big before, I think I overdid it – I put three pearls in my little tasting cup and steeped for around 15 seconds the first time. The wet leaves have such a distinctive smell – it’s the same scent as of the dry leaf, but sharper, finer, more present. It’s not as muted. I read recently that the human nose works best in warm, damp conditions… I can definitely see that here! I don’t smell so much of the hazelnut connection as I do something burnt… not badly burnt, but deliberately charred. I can’t think of what, though. Chestnuts at Christmas? Macadamia nuts? There’s more than a little bit of dark chocolate in here too, and some notes of currant. Chocolate covered nuts? It’s bothering me that I can’t put my finger on it, especially because it’s so distinctive and I just know that there’s a name for it.

The liquor of the first steep is a warm golden-red in the white porcelain tasting bowl. I notice immediately how smooth the mouthfeel is. There’s almost no astringency or drying, and it leaves a sweet aftertaste on the tongue. The scent I identified in the scent is extraordinarily present in the taste. Usually I have a hard time distinguishing exactly what something is going to taste like based on the smell, especially straight teas (It’s much easier for me to approximate the flavors of spicy chais or fruity herbals) but there’s a direct link to the taste of the tea all the way back to the smell of the dry leaf.

Second steep, and as I pour the water into the cup it immediately blossoms a deep red. The pearls have mostly unrolled and are like spider legs climbing up the side of the cup. The liquor is a deep red-brown color. Definitely overdid it with the pearls – the first thing that hits my tongue is a strong astringency. It actually helps define the flavors I was missing earlier – it almost reminds me of a graham cracker. That coupled with the chocolate notes and the astringency in this steep – it’s like a warm summer night, all your friends sitting around a firepit, roasting marshmallows on sticks, the smoke blowing through the breeze and stinging your eyes when it’s aimed in your direction.

Possibly the best black tea I’ve ever tried!

Edit:

I’m steeping three pearls now, Western Style for three minutes. It’s just as good, and I’m even getting notes of butter in the middle of it. Incredible! This tea just keeps on giving!