Tea - Loose Leaf Tea - Ramblings

Archive for August, 2008

Hojicha is a lesser-known Japanese green tea made by slow-roasting green tea leaves, making it unique among the typical tea from this country, which is normally steamed only. The resulting flavor is nutty in taste, combined with a non-astringent, almost caramel-sweet flavor. It is a unique combination of flavors, unlike any other Japanese or Chinese green I have yet sampled. Although I still prefer a good sencha or gyokuro, the hojicha is a refreshing change, and I recommend you try this one. It has a very low caffeine content, if that is what you are looking for.

Harney and Sons is one of my favorite vendors of tea. They offer a wide variety of single estate, blended, and flavored teas, and they typically offer a high-quality product together with excellent and friendly service. My experience with their teas has thus far been limited to the many loose-leaf varieties they offer (since that is my preferred type when possible), so it was with great curiosity that I sampled a silk-pouched version of the Earl Grey Imperial. The aroma of the leaves promised a subtle but quality taste of bergamot oil. The taste, however, was a great disappointment. There was no discernable bergamot in the brew, and while the base tea itself was okay, this tea should not be labeled as Earl Grey when it doesn’t deliver on the expected taste. Believe me when I say that the sample of this tea which I tried (I actually brewed several one-cup tea bags at different times to be sure) had almost NO Earl Grey flavor, and I am not one to prefer teas with a heavy hand given to the flavorings—I tend to prefer subtler teas. But this sample, whether it be the intent of the blend or that the sample may not have been the freshest, did not taste as advertised. Having said this, you should know that I have sampled Harney’s Earl Grey Supreme, which combines a higher-quality base blend with bergamot (in the loose-leaf version), and I can vouch for the quality of this version (although it is a bit more expensive than the Imperial Earl Grey). While I cannot recommend this particular tea based on my experience, I would encourage you to order a sample from Harney and Sons of either the Imperial or Supreme versions—you are sure to like one of them if you are an Earl Grey fan, and hopefully the sample I tasted was just a stale or bad batch

After much deliberation and far too many sips, I have decided to give Archer Farms’ Earl Grey Tea a measly four out of ten rating. Why? Because, simply put, it is at best a second (more likely a third) rate tea. Even compared to common (though very decent) bagged teas like Twining’s Earl Grey, it is a thoroughly sub-par blend with thoroughly sub-par leaves. It was also probably packaged and processed with thoroughly sub-par love.

I am not saying this because Archer Farms’ products are a Target Corporation exclusive. In fact, I went through a rather long period (about three days) of torturous self-doubt and introspective “motive-checking” to make sure a subconscious tea-snobbery wasn’t sneaking up on me and ruining the integrity of this teaview. The old maxim still holds true: The truth will set you free.

So here’s the truth on this tea.

Pros (there’s only one): Kind of like Bruce Lee or a Ford pick-up truck, no one’s ever going to accuse this tea on being weak.

Well, not exactly… one could accuse this tea on being weak on “awesomeness.”

Cons (there are a bunch): DRY DRY DRY! In fact, not only does this tea lack moisture, it seems to absorb it from the human mouth (Like a sponge! Amazing, but gross!). No, this is not a bad UFO movie, this is the consequence of a super-so-so tea.
Usually, the dryness in a tea (even in the “blah” varieties) fades, at least a little, before the tea is swallowed. In Archer Farms’ version, the dryness seems to pick up speed in a most dissatisfying and (frankly) frightening way.

As a result, this tea is unable to have any rhythm whatsoever. What I mean by rhythm is a change in tones throughout the duration of a “sip and swallow.” Most good teas have a certain complexity and flow, which, if in harmony, can be very interesting and enjoyable. Unfortunately, this level of dryness robs the tea of any chance of rhythm, making it a very boring blend.

However, if you are tired of buying tea from trendy labels, are running low on cash or want to support big company store-brands (or a combination of either or all of those reasons), I would bet Archer Farms’ Earl beats Safeway’s or Rite Aid’s (if they have their own) store- blend.

With SinceriTEA,
DL

Golden Lily Oolong is another wonderful tea from the folks at Zhi. This tea is from a small artisan farm in Taiwan. Like many oolongs, the dried leaves are tightly packed into small clumps, making the leaves appear smaller in size than they really are. The brewed liquid is a pale yellow color. This is an oolong that leans heavily on floral notes, which are evident from first whiff to the finish. The tea also features a weaker creamy (almost nutty) element. After sampling the tea to develop my own reactions, I reviewed Zhi’s website, which states that this tea’s creaminess has resulted in the tea earning the title of “milk oolong”, so it was great see that my taste buds are properly identifying flavors. To me, the creamy/nutty element is not as pronounced as in some of my favorite Formosan oolongs. Overall, the tea has a rich yet clean flavor profile. Additionally, I found that both the aroma and taste had a subtle, though enjoyable, background earthiness to them. This tea was easy to sip mindlessly while looking through the morning newspaper, but was also complex enough to savor and contemplate. My experience has shown me that oolongs typically live up to two, perhaps three, infusions, but the second infusion of this tea was noticeably weaker in the floral and nutty flavor notes. I recommend this tea to oolong lovers, but would caution that second infusions should be steeped for longer than usual (even longer than the typically longer second infusion) to ensure that the second cup lives up to the flavor profile of the first delicious infusion.

Apparently the name of this tea alone has appealed to other reviewers as much as it did to me. The aroma of the dry leaves was decadently sweet. I placed my normal amount of tea into my brewing mug and after adding the hot water, the leaves grew so much that I am sure I could have gotten by with less. That fact is good to remember as this particular blend seems a little pricey, so it is a plus that it requires less per cup. The sweetness to the aroma that was so apparent in the dry leaves unfortunately did not carry over to the brewed cup. Golden Moon states that this blend consists of premium quality green oolong leaves, infused with caramel and burnt sugar. I am quite fond of caramel and most anything including it ranks pretty high on my list. In the case of this blend though, the caramel is not nearly as prevalent as I would have preferred. The tea was slightly sweet, but this seemed to come entirely from the burnt sugar, along with the fact that most oolongs seem to have a natural sweetness to them on their own. I did notice a bitter aftertaste which was unusual.

I am normally quite fond of flavored oolongs, but I didn’t enjoy this one nearly as much as I had anticipated. For my taste, I would have preferred more caramel flavor and possibly less of the burnt sugar as the more I drank, I felt that the bitter aftertaste was coming from the burnt sugar. I do agree that the oolong leaves used in the blend did appear to be of good quality and the fact that a small amount of the leaves went a long way helps to justify the price of this blend. All in all, it was a pretty good cup that I certainly would find pleasant enough if offered again in the future, but it also won’t be one that I rush out to purchase.

I love green apples and I love green tea, I’m just a little skeptical of how the two will mix. The blackish-brown leaves, both long and scrunched up smell a bit more like apple than tea, which is fine to me since green tea seems easily overpowered by nearly everything else. The scent of the steeped leaves, which are a mix of stems, broken leaves, and some larger leaves, is a little burnt; my wariness is increasing. The aroma of something burning is hard to get over; I feel like I’m about to have a sip of charcoal tea. After a few sips, I’m right; this is charcoal tea. Perhaps I got a bad batch. I drink half a cup and stop; I feel like I’m licking my BBQ grill. Something isn’t right. I’m still hoping I got a bad batch or that I’ve done something wrong. I’m positive the mix of green apple and green tea could be done really well but it hasn’t happened here.

If I reviewed teas solely on the basis of aroma, then TeaGuys’ Maple Sugar Black Tea would have scored an 11 out of 10. They have perfectly captured the sweet and inviting scent of maple syrup in the scent of their tea leaves. If I closed my eyes while smelling this, I could easily be tricked into thinking that there was a stack of maple syrup-smothered pancakes in front of me. Needless to say, after smelling this tea, I was more than excited to taste the brewed product. I brewed the tea as instructed, infusing the leaves for 3 minutes in boiling water. The brewed tea still has a maple essence to its aroma, however it is not as hearty as it was in the dried leaves. The tea tastes just like it smells, only in an even more subdued form. The maple is definitely present in the flavor, although truthfully I wish I could have tasted just a little bit more. The tea also has an interesting kick at the end, perhaps the result of the addition of pink peppercorns (?!!?) to this blend. I must admit that I initially struggled to see how adding pink peppercorns to a maple tea would be a good thing, but trust me, it works. The peppercorns seem to be added sparingly so that they do not over-power the maple flavor. While the maple flavor of this tea was really delightful, there were two factors that resulted in my lowered rating of this tea. First, it seems that the black tea base is a little too strong, and perhaps not of the highest quality. In my first cup, I could detect a bit of a bitter/over-brewed aftertaste. For my second cup, I steeped the leaves for two and a half minutes and still noticed this aftertaste. While the aftertaste didn’t negate all of the maple tastiness of the tea, it did detract from the experience as a whole. I am not sure if the tea leaves were over-steeped (even at just two and a half minutes) or if the tea leaves, regardless of steeping time, are just lower quality and produce this unpleasant aftertaste. My second issue with this tea is that despite its name “Maple Sugar” and the primary ingredient (besides tea leaves) being maple brittle, I found this tea was not sweet enough (and this could very likely just be in response to the bitterness of the black tea base). I added a small amount of sugar and some milk to the tea, which really let the tea shine. The sugar really enhances the maple flavor and the milk helped cover up that bitter aftertaste. In all, I really did like this tea, and I can see myself drinking it again. I will stress, however, that one needs to prevent over-steeping this tea to keep it drinkable, and that milk and sugar bring out this tea’s best.

I am a lover of Oolong and am always on the look out for a better blend. I had high hopes for this one based on the manufacturer?s description. Zhi Tea describes it as having flavors of raisins and honeysuckle and toasted almonds. They also say that it is renowned for its weight loss properties. I?m not sure I buy into that but I tend to drink tea simply because of the way it tastes, health benefits are just an added bonus. I brewed this tea using my Zarafina tea maker set on strong Oolong.

The brew was dark and it tasted nothing like Oolong; I thought that I had accidentally gotten black tea in an Oolong sample packet. They looked like good quality leaves but definitely did not look like most Oolong leaves. The tea did have a slightly nutty flavor but it was much too smoky for my liking. I couldn?t detect any honeysuckle or raisins and found it to be a little bitter. I would not recommend this tea.

I requested this tea to try and when it arrived, all I remembered was that it was a flavored rooibos. Compounded by the fact that the teabag packet was almost all in Japanese, I had no idea what I was in for! I brewed it with the utmost expectations, thinking that I could never dislike a flavored red tea.

I was wrong. My first mistake was disregarding the sickeningly sweet aroma emanating from the tea bag. Almost nauseating, really. I kept going, thinking that the tea itself would be mellower in comparison to fragrance which is almost always the case. This proved to be true; however, the flavor was still overwhelmingly sweet and fruity in a bad and fermented way. So at this point I decided to look up the ingredients online.

The website lists the ingredients as non-fermented green rooibos and mango with some citrus as well. I have come to the realization I don’t like mango. I’ve tried Stash mango black tea and didn’t care for it, either. Such is life. Such is…Mango! That being said, I do want to try almost every other flavor on Lupicia’s website because they all look tantalizing!

This review is based on that discovery of my taste buds. I don’t like mango and this was over-the-top with the sweet flavor. Those who really love mango would do well to try this but it isn’t for me.

The leaves are long and intact. There are few small or broken pieces in the sample. The leaves are silver, green in color with a few dark green or brown. They are twisted/wrapped, and many have a light fuzz/fur to them. The aroma has an earthy quality to it and with a hint of sweetness.

A Google search shows that this tea is picked with the buds still closed which is why it is closed or wrapped compared to black, green, or other white teas. Many white teas are from the Fujian Province of China. Silver Needle tea is gathered only for a few days in early spring. The tea is minimally processed which is why it still has hairs. There are those that believe the more downy the leaves the better the tea. Since this tea is very minimally processed it is thought to taste most similar to pure tea leaves.

You can find out more about Tea Zone at: http://www.teazone.com/. A new website is promised soon. Tea Zone is affiliated with the Camellia Lounge in Portland, Oregon. The site offers an array of teas with at least a few in each category, e.g. white, black, etc. The overall selection is medium to modest in terms of varieties and blends.

Brewing:

Hot Brewed: 1.5 - 2 heaping teaspoons in about 14 ounces of water. I let the boiled water stand for about 5 minutes before steeping for 3.5 minutes. For the second cup I did 1.5 teaspoons in 8 ounces of water (measured)

I did not try this tea cold.

Taste/Impressions:

I recently reviewed another white tea and so I had the opportunity to compare the White Needle side by side for visual and taste comparisons. The White Needle brews up to a very nice light color I would describe as translucent green yellow. I have tried multiple cups of this tea and each time the smell is outstanding. Though subtle the smell is distinct with an earthy quality reminding me of growing vegetation. There is a hint of sweetness to the smell with a hint of mint or nuts. I really love the smell of this tea.

For the first cup of tea I probably could have used more tea but the second cup was perfect. I used about a teaspoon and a half for 8 ounces. This tea is very delicate and light. This is not a strong or overpowering tea. It has a wonderful character and for a light tea has a nice lasting taste. There is no bitterness to this tea. I found the taste came out more as the tea cooled (about 5 minutes) from the initial brewing temperature. I don’t really know how to describe it but I am reminded of a very clear plant/vegetative taste to it. Nutty might be a good adjective for it. At warmer temperatures I did not detect any fruitiness or sweetness though as the tea cooled a slight sweet quality crept into the taste. I found the taste and temperature relationship to be very interesting and I liked that it had a different quality as the tea cooled. All of the tastes were wonderful. Since the leaves are minimally processed the taste must reflect the tea plant closely. Layered and full-bodied come to mind also.

Conclusion:

This is a delicate tea with a wonderful flavor. This will be a tea that I order and drink on a regular basis. I enjoyed the whole cup and gave it my full attention sip after sip until it was gone. I particularly like the lightness to it and yet it held my interest in taste and smell. I heartily recommend this white tea. Outstanding!!!!