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Ashmanra’s sipdown challenge – January 2024 Tea #7 – January 20 – National Coffee Break Day

Saddest of sipdowns here today.  Uh, these flavors are still melding together so so well.  It’s like a syrupy, almondy, hazelnutty, coconutty, chocolatey, sweet coffee dream.  The coconut is still amazing!  Because of its longevity I will raise the rating from 90.  I will really miss this one.  I think it is most like a tea I had from adagio, but I forget which… maybe Reichenbach Recovery.  I see that has caramel and hazelnut but it also has bergamot.  So this tea seems like the adagio if it didn’t have the bergamot.  Probably if I mix the above adagio flavors from this blend it will remind me of this tea, especially as the base black teas also taste the same/have similar depth.   The Herbal Infusions website it still up!  This tea is still on there!  All is not lost!  Hopefully I will get to have this tea again one day.
2024 sipdowns: 10

Thanks so much for this one, Cameron B! I was really missing fresh oolongs when I woke up this morning, seeing as I have been trying to rein in the ridiculous tea stash and not buying fresh teas. I think I have been doing fairly well the last few years — but I don’t know if it’s just the volume of tea packaging that is necessary for just the one serving remaining of tea I tend to leave around, it’s like the volume of tea never seems to decrease. Oh well! One day the stash will be down! And I will certainly know which teas are necessary to have around. I have only had a couple of these oolong bricks in the past. This one seems bigger than the other oolong bricks I have tried, but also seems to use bigger leaves and isn’t quite as compact as they have been in the past. The flavor is light on the first steep. But by the end of the session, the huge leaves are bursting from the basket infuser. Possibly this one shouldn’t be used for mug steeping, but the flavor was never too harsh. It’s actually a hard oolong for me to describe. Nothing really stood out here, in flavor profiles. Where are the flavors for me that derk noticed?! And it was those super nuanced and distinct oolongs I was missing this morning. oh well. I certainly don’t fault the very elaborate packaging here — this one should have definitely maintained the flavor with it being wrapped in three different wrappers. hmm
Steep #1 // 29 minutes after boiling // 7 second rinse // 2 minute steep
Steep #2 // 10 minutes after boiling // 2 min
Steep #3 // just boiled // 2 min
Steep #4 // just boiled // 3 min
2024 sipdowns: 9

Ashmanra’s sipdown challenge – January 2024 Tea #6- A grocery store blend

It was time to finish this one!  I have certainly loved it.  I would definitely buy this green beany tea again… I wonder if it tasted like green beans originally?  hmm… too long ago to remember…
2024 sipdowns: 8

additional notes: How in the heck does this only get a rating of 88 from me when I thought it was one of my most treasured teas I dread finishing?? Raising the rating and it is almost gone. I wish there were more teas like this… but looking through google, I don’t see this type of tea existing AT ALL anymore, other than green tea.

additional notes: I had the resteep of this one THE SAME NIGHT it was so enjoyable (rather than waiting the night after for the second steep, as I usually do.) It’s just very accurate to the name. The nuttiness and the caramel are such a great pairing on green rooibos. I’m almost done with the tin, though I bet I shared this a lot in the past. Would definitely reorder to add more to the tin! It’s aging very well, too. Raising the rating from 84.

Just noticed ashmanra and I both mentioned Keebler cookies while writing notes for this tea. :D

The puerh sample for this week!  I’m not sure what is going on with the wrapper for this cake, but it reminds me of Bullwinkle. The dry leaf, I could be wrong, the first time I smelled it I could swear was banana.  Otherwise, a typical hint of a rich, earthy (in the best way) ripe puerh that always gets me looking forward to the flavor!  Physically, the leaf looks very large in the cake and not as much gold in color as some cakes contain.  Again, I could be wrong, but the flavor of the first steep reminds me of black cherry.  There is also a quality to it that dries the mouth.    But the second and third steeps lose that cherry flavor, becoming a standard flavored, rich ripe.  The fourth steep took me by surprise, as it is so rich there might be an astringent quality to it, which I never notice in ripe puerh, especially from Teavivre.  But this isn’t a bad thing, in the opinion of my tastebuds — I’d rather it be rich than weak. But it’s also impressive the flavor is this strong with only 5 grams and such a large leaf.
Steep #1 // half sample (5grams) for medium sized mug // 20 minutes after boiling // 7 second rinse // 2 minute steep
Steep #2 // 11 minutes after boiling // 3 min
Steep #3 // just boiled // 3 min
Steep #4 // just boiled // 10 min

I wanted to finally write a note for this tea, as the book I’m reading now mentions Emily Dickinson —  when it isn’t mentioning Herman Melville anyway (the book is ‘Dayswork’ by Chris Bachelder and Jennifer Habel).  This tea always confuses me, as I forget if it is green tea or black tea.  The package doesn’t say, the website doesn’t say.  Then I look at the leaf and it LOOKS like a black tea.  But then I brew it and it’s green tea.  So I finally hand wrote that it’s ‘green’ on the package so I actually remember.  But it’s a good tea!  Lots of florals!  It’s older now, so I’m sure it was much better before.  But a cold winter day calls for a floral tea.    It also might be better when I don’t brew it like a black tea.

edited to add: OH it looks like Cameron B updated the steepster page to say ‘green tea’, so there you go. :D Should have checked steepster.

Ashmanra’s sipdown challenge – January 2024 Tea #5 – A small business blend

One of my favorite small business tea shops!  This was an unexpected sipdown!  I didn’t know it was close to being gone.  It’s a good Yunnan, a peppery Yunnan.  Somehow pepper is the most distinct note.  I’d buy it again, though this isn’t the best Yunnan and I also notice that S&V has a handful of different Yunnans available.
2024 sipdowns: 6

So this was the other tea mishap of the day!  Being indecisive I just threw this one in the mug, thinking it was a plain green (the wrapper just says “Green”), but it has citrus and gingko, making this the second gingko tea of the day!  I didn’t even know I had two gingko teas around.  It was pretty good though!  Plenty of flavor while not drowning out the green tea of the blend.

Thanks for letting me try this one, Meowster!  Hilarious tea mishaps today.  I brewed this one like a raw on the first steep!  (Better that than to steep a raw like a ripe, I guess.)  I don’t know why I thought this was a raw.  The leaves even looked dark and ripe when I threw the tuocha in the infuser.   By the third steep, it’s so smooth that I would definitely know by now if it was a harsh, overbrewed raw puerh.  No negative qualities here, but I also wish it had a stronger flavor.  I don’t know if the gingko just seamlessly blends in with the puerh flavors, but it really did almost seem like just a ripe puerh to me with no additional ingredients.  Four pretty consistent steeps (except for that first one that was brewed like sheng.)