It’s probably not ideal to drink these sorts of greens two years after their harvest, but this is somehow still the nicest I’ve had in a while. It’s just so soft on my lips, sweet and maybe slightly salty, but in that gentle alkaline, brothy way, not in an….. actual… salted… way.
Great descriptors, I know.
The astringency comes out all at once in the subsequent steepings, almost too much, but it’s manageable. It’s not hard on my stomach. It drops back into mild brothiness fairly quickly. It leaves me feeling relaxed and slightly heady and…. capable of writing, hence bothering to pull up steepster again.
A little weird maybe to add this particular tea to the listings at all, or…any tea defined by its harvest date, since I don’t think you can get this one anymore, though it looks like they’re taking 2022 preorders.
I do struggle with the seasonal nature of senchas. While I do enjoy them greatly at their freshest, there’s often so much I want to try and yet I only want to open only one foil packet at a time and consume it as quickly as possible. This pressure to both savor it slowly, fully, and yet also immediately and all at once before it stales…it lands me in situations like this, where I have burned out on sencha two weeks into two years ago, and am just now getting around to sipping through it at a pace I can enjoy.
The shincha FOMO is just one of many silly little things to reckon with in this hobby, I suppose. I take it all far less seriously than I did a decade ago, but some bits of it still linger, leaking anxiety and perfectionism and optimization into what should be my relaxing escape.
I like to think these days I manage it better, but like everything, it’s an active and ongoing process. At any rate though, I am still enjoying this tea very much.
