Thanks to my friend Aisha for swapping me some of this tea!
Today is one of those days where the thunderstorm’s been building all day long, and now it’s a bit darker than it should be at 4:30 pm, and the air is cool and damp, and it smells like rain. I’m so excited. I love rain and thunder and lightning.
The leaf of this smells like buttered, movie theater popcorn. It’s great. It’s mostly green leaves, and they’re flat and hard-edged and sort of artichoke colored, and then there are some twisty black leaves in there as well.
I steeped according to my general Adagio green parameters – 180, 2 minutes.
Okay.
The smell is still sort of caramelly, but the flavor is first buttery green tea (green tea + caramel?) and then vanilla. I taste a tiny bit of the pu’erh in the background, but it’s not enough to overwhelm the flavors.
If I had tried this tea before placing my last Adagio order (it should get here on Wednesday, hopefully!) I’d definitely have added some of this. It’s creamy and mellow without tasting too artificial.