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Thanks so much for sharing this, Kawaii433! I certainly don’t think I’ve even had a tea that looked like this before? The closest might be Zen’s black dragon pearls. Black bundles with hints of gold, but these leaves have a sheen to them. GABA is Gamma-AminoButyric Acid — a neurotransmitter responsible for inhibiting overactive firing of neurons in the brain. It is the body’s anti-anxiety mechanism supplemented in the natural form through a drink. (Info from Mandala’s GABA black.) This sounds like a great idea in theory. I can’t say if it helped my anxiety, as I looked up what it meant after drinking the tea. I wish I had known to pay attention to my anxiety at the time…
On to the flavor: If you were a fan of Butiki’s Premium Taiwanese Assam, this might have the closest flavor profile out there right now, that I know about. However, since the GABA unravels into quite a large amount of leaves, I probably shouldn’t have used one teaspoon. So the second steep ended up a little brisk which I’m sad about. But the third steep didn’t have that bite to it at all and was much like the first steep again. The Butiki starts out long and wiry, which means I would have been using less leaves compared to these unraveling bundles. Then at times, the tea seems more like one of those Ruby black teas. But I also at times described Butiki’s PTA to Ruby as well. So maybe this is a tea in between a Ruby black and Butiki’s PTA. I’m sorry I don’t have more distinct flavor notes for this though… A Ruby tea tastes a Roman nougat in a Russell Stover candy at times… though this tea isn’t QUITE that. The next day, I did want to revisit PTA because of experiencing this tea and it just reminded me that it’s always like caramelized strawberry, so possibly this tea is more like a Ruby than PTA. Nothing can really compare to the PTA, I suppose.
Steep #1 // 1 teaspoon for a full mug // 16 minutes after boiling // 2 minute steep
Steep #2 // 7 minutes after boiling // 3 minute steep
Steep #3 // just boiled // 3 min
2019 sipdowns: 22