Berry Malt Black

Sipdown! (6 | 353)

Mastress Alita’s Sipdown Challenge (November) – “A tea from a small business”

Another tea from my white2tea order in early 2019.

Honestly, it’s good but nothing about it stands out to me. I definitely get the strong malty notes, it’s quite bready with an undercurrent of damp wood. Very smooth and full in the mouth, with some dark raw cacao and burnt sugar notes on the bottom end. But I’m missing the berry completely? There’s not really any fruitiness going on in general, at least to my palate.

Probably just a symptom of its age. It was still nice and comforting to drink as my first tea of the morning this past week or so! Very thick and full flavor that’s super satisfying.

I’m going to feel unoriginal with this one. I think Andrew or Evolvingness might have sent some a long time ago of this one because I swear that I’ve had it. Granted, I’m behind on my backlog, but there a few notes I know I wrote that were not saved during the transition like the Amber Oolong Whispering Pines one. Oh well, I’ll add more.

Back to this tea. Berry malt was one that I almost decided to get myself, but the shipping costs detract me from a lot of the White2teas options.I almost got myself some Fruit Bomb and their Daily Jin Jun Mei and Qi Lan Oolong, but then my wallet said no. I know, Canadians have it worse, but I’ve got other options. Thanks to Whiteantlers, I get to try this one. It is one of the smoother malty teas I’ve had, and while the fruit notes are stronger in the smell than in tastes, I still get a fruit leather taste from it.

It reminds me a little bit of Ancient Spirit since it’s got some balmy dryness to it along with some oak and older wood with the usual cocoa you’d expect from a Chinese tea. Malt and berries are obvious, but the tea overall tastes like malted raspberry leather. More specifically, like those fruit based natural fruit rollups.

I tried Gong Fu, but got distracted by 5 things like settinig my new insulin pump up, College PD applications, and so on, so it turned mega western-and emphasis on malt, raspberry, very slight and easy to miss cranberry, and leather. It was a little bitter and drying, but it actually was not bad at all. This one reminds me of a decent Cabernet in how it combines its notes on a dryer level. Even the notes I use for this tea are identical to what you would find on a Cab’s bottle for marketing.

I like this one, but I don’t love it so far. My preferences are contradictory when it comes to malt. I usually avoid buying black and oolong teas if it says malt, nevermind some of my favorites are some of the maltier teas described on steepster. If the tea just tastes like malt, it doesn’t really taste too different than some bagged teas in my preference. If it has malt combined with something else going on the tea, like caramel, chocolate, berries, honey, bread, then I get more interested.

The fruit leather with the malt keep me interested enough to experiment more with this one, but I don’t think I’m going to finish it quick. If anyone wants this tea or any of my other teas, I’d be happy to share. Then again, most of you are in the exact same boat where you’ve gotten a lot of teas just to try them, but have gotten more than you wanted because the industry needs us to get more than 10 gram samples to eliminate inventory. I have some Renegade Tea, Dan Cong, and Shui Xian bricks I have smelled and touched, but haven’t finished. I also have some really expensive teas I’ve refused to touch to save for a special occasion, which is also code for “I haven’t cleaned my good tea ware yet, but I will when my body is not hibernating 2020 off to speed track the year.”

Apologies for going to off topic. Again. Now the tea, I like it and think it’s a step up from most blacks. If this one is rushed, I can see the tea snobs brushing it off as one dimensional nevermind this tea is NOT one note. I think Gong Fu is the way to go for it so you don’t miss out on what it can do. I think it may be decent tumbler fuel if you don’t over leaf it, and it’s actually good when I’ve poured it over ice. Just sugar with it western might be better if you do it that way, but I also think it could stand up to cream and sugar. You’d need the sugar to highlight the berry notes and enough leaves to preserve the flavor in my opinion.

Your thoughts?

☑ Berry
☑ Malt
☑ Black

Have to love a tea that delivers what it promises. Very prominent raspberry/blackberry, turbinado sugar sweetness and fruity/funkiness, and a malty backbone. Perhaps a touch of licorice in the later steeps. Mild, pleasantly tannic.

This has more fruit flavor than some flavored teas.

One of the few non-puehr reds that White2tea started offering in the last couple of years. I have never been disappointed with their pu so decided to try their reds as well.

The dry leaves are large and wiry: their texture almost compels you to touch them and play with. The dry leaf aroma is not very intense but pleasant: malt and dried stone fruit.

The Western-style brew that I prepared was quite satisfying. Dark honey, dried apricots, bananas and dried plums dominated, but there was enough of a malt/cocoa backbone to prevent it veering into the excessive fruity cloyness.

The aftertaste is quite malty, but not in a jarring way that is too common for many Assams.

This is not a complex tea, but it is well-balanced and smooth. This dianhong kept growing on me as I went through my pot and then made it again the next day. A good choice for the every-day tea.

Gongfu!

Steeped this guy so strong earlier this week that in the photo below it looks like I was brewing I shou! I definitely didn’t mean to brew it so intensely – I just misjudged my leaf amount, and then was bad at keeping track of the steep times of most of the infusions. That’s a gnarly combination for a session. I paired it with some very ripe pears – pun semi intentional. It ended up being a good pairing because the creaminess of the pears helped combat some of that drying tannin from my poor brewing. My gaiwan also kind of matched the pears, which was fun but not intentional.

I don’t know – you definitely don’t always get the brewing right and that’s okay.

Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/CGH_LN6AK6v/

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPcWS3MdmoI&ab_channel=TheFiveBlobs-Topic