Review: Dragon Pearl Mountain Jasmine Dragon Pearl
As much as I love Jasmine teas, I have to admit that I sometimes have a hard time telling the difference between Jasmine pearl teas. The twisted mini-soccer balls that spring out into long, thin fingers of tea fascinate me so much that I think I drink the tea too quickly in order to pour another pot and watch it again. As with other tightly wound teas, I used less tea in the pot than other loose teas, since these expand to fill nearly any space. I’m not sure that was necessary with this tea though since the effect was quite light and left me hoping for some more tea in my tea. I tried again and the tea improved with a bit longer steeping time. The aroma is of light white jasmine flowers. The scent isn’t strong; it’s more like catching a waft of jasmine on a walk past someone’s yard, rather than standing in front of a jasmine plant. It’s very pleasant, though for people who are in the mood to have their senses enveloped rather than caressed, something else would do better. What this tea does well is retain the jasmine beyond the scent and into the flavor as well. Other teas pull a bait and switch, drawing me in with delectable scents only to taste like slightly tinted water. Here, while the jasmine is light, it’s there, fragrant and green, leaving a pleasant feeling afterward.
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Background:
Have you ever purchased a tea because of its name? Or, have you avoided one because it created a negative mental image. This is one those teas that, when I first heard the name, assumed that it had been named by a marketing consultant. I avoided it in my early days of tasting specialty teas. And then I was a bit embarrassed to learn that it is one of the most popular Taiwanese oolongs and it is named in honor of the mountain of its origin. The name tells the tea lover a lot about the way in which the leaf is grown, harvested and processed.
I love the way this smells in the teapot: green, rich, with a touch of floral. I have a bias toward teas that are nourishing in some way and this definitely satisfies my senses. The dried tea is typical for oolongs; the tight little fists of leaves that range from medium to deep green open into whole leaves. The color of the tea is a deep amber. I steeped this for four minutes and by the time I starting sipping, most of the scent had dissipated. The taste is a touch brothy, just enough to add body. This would be a good choice for people venturing away from more familiar Chinese restaurant oolongs toward something heavier-the lighter pale ale version rather than a stout. I appreciate the light body, fulfilling aroma, and drinkability. I would recommend this as a great gift for someone looking to try oolongs.
The Tavalon website describes this chai as “A seductively flavorful blend of Indian black tea, cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, ginger and vanilla bean”. I absolutely LOVE the aroma of a spicy chai, so I immediately opened my sample to take in a deep breath. While the dry leaf is quite attractive, with whole cardamom pods and fairly large pieces of all the other ingredients, the aroma was not nearly as hearty as I was expecting. I brewed this tea as I normally do loose leaf chai and noticed that the aroma did not become any stronger while brewing. As I do with all chai blends, I added turbinado sugar and cream. While this was a nice enough cup of tea, it did not strike me as an excellent chai simply because the spices were too muted for my taste. I would have appreciated quite a bit more from the cinnamon and clove and possibly a bit more ginger.
I always love trying any kind of tropical green teas, so when I saw the description evoking images of tropical landscapes and warm humid temperatures, I hoped this would be refreshing. I live in the South and it’s wickedly humid in the summer so anything I can do to stay hydrated is awesome.
Serenity is the third Tavalon tea that I have sampled, and as with the first two, I am impressed with the crisp and fresh flavors of their teas. Serenity is a calming, caffeine-free herbal blend consisting of chamomile, peppermint, lemongrass, rooibos, and vanilla. By appearance, the dry blend seems to have decent representation of each herb, but when the tea is brewed, the chamomile dominates, lending its characteristic honey-apple flavor and scent to the tea. The mint and lemongrass flavors were only weakly noticeable, which I found very peculiar since these herbs typically have pretty strong and obvious flavors. Sadly, the rooibos and vanilla eluded my taste buds completely. In all, I would have much preferred a better balance of all of the ingredients so that each ingredient in the brew was able to be tasted, at least even a little bit. The chamomile here was so potent that it just overpowered the brew. Had I done a blind taste-testing of this tea, I probably would have concluded that this was a chamomile tea. Despite my disappointment in not being able to taste all of the ingredients, I still ranked this tea a decent 6.5 because the flavor of this tea, even though 99.5% chamomile, is clean, crisp and refreshing. I wouldn’t necessarily re-order this one myself though, because I have had other similar blends that better balance the various ingredients to provide a multi-flavor herbal tea.
TeaGschwendner’s Darjeeling Phuguri is a very interesting black tea with a hint of Oolong. This second flush harvest, produces a dark golden cup when steeped for around 3-4 minutes. I prefer to actually push my limits and steep it for a bit longer than suggested by the manufacturer (2.5 minutes), as I prefer a bit stronger tea. I can get away with this without any bitterness or undesirable undertones.
This smells delectable. There’s something earthy, slightly spicy and green in it with a streak of floral. The buds are beautiful long rolls that, once steeped, become a little paler green from their deeper dried shade. Rishi Tea’s website says these leaves were harvested from Yunnan’s old growth forest tea trees and it’s easy to imagine the connection; it’s more dark earth than a park in sunshine, more shaded greenery than blooming flowers. The scent is much more full-bodied than I expected; with a name like “emerald lily” I think I expected something lighter and greener, not so smooth and complex. Some teas are so light and substance-free, they have almost a cryogenic effect on creative thought; not a result I look forward to. The initial scents are stronger than the body. At first taste it is surprisingly light, but there is enough detectable body to add fullness. The taste is more similar to an oolong than a green tea to me. There is a little dryness, but it adds to the complexity and still feels replenishing. This is definitely a contemplative tea. If I were to ascribe magical qualities to it I would use words like “unblock”, “clarify”, “streamline”—words that unfortunately are better suited to a laxative bottle, not this. Ok so it’s not magic, but it does deserve to be enjoyed, not thrown back between meetings. It’s an excellent choice for meditative moods or memorable chats with loved ones.
In my opinion, there is nothing worse than synthetic tasting coconut flavor so when I first brewed a cup of Zhi’s Coconut Assam, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I happen to be a huge fan of anything coconut flavored and really wanted to like it so I was hoping for the best but didn’t have very high expectations. So it was not without pleasure when I tried the tea to find that it had a lovely natural tasting coconut flavor that had me draining the pot.