The Tao of Tea

Just enough for a super small cuppa! I totally forgot I had any of this left.

It’s muggy outside and stormy but cold inside because of the air conditioning. BRING ON THE HOT TEA!

See previous notes for more of my feelings…in the meantime…SIPDOWN!

A nice lighter tasting Darjeeling-like tea that I am backlogging and enjoying!

I did a ‘double shot’ of this today and found it to be very good…much better than I remember so I am upping the rating. I’m glad I ‘doubled the dosage’ YUM!

Well, I just had a HUGE rock lifted from my shoulders!!!! WHEW! To celebrate I decided to have this tea that Auggy sent my way! Thanks A! :)

This really doesn’t smell like anything but the color is brilliant! It’s a Medium Brown but it looks like it’s glowing!

It’s fairly juicy and almost floral but not bitter – lovely.

I’m gnawing on a chocolate bar, which, might I add, seems to be the PERFECT pairing!

The liquor is a lovely amber color. The flavor of this actually reminds me of an oolong. It’s sweet, malty, woodsy, but with a very…unique vegetal note. Not quite spinach but close. Almost as if someone mixed an oolong with chrysanthemum flowers.

I have so much backlogging to do, but right now I’m just going to sit here and relax while enjoying this tea. It seems a bit smokier today but perhaps that is because I haven’t had the Bohea recently to compare smoke levels to.

Bumping this rating up a little.

Backlogging from this morning.

The first thing I noticed upon opening this tin was that the leaves were much smaller,(broken?) than that of the Bohea. The liquor, like that of the Bohea, is amber-gold but not as lively a color and with less gold. The flavor, unlike the color, was much lighter. The smoke and fruit notes much subtler. Due to this I actually managed to detect a coco note in my final, cooled cup :D

This is a very nice tea, but I think I still like the Bohea better. I never thought I’d say that about something that has as much of a smokey note as it does.

Going camping this weekend and for some reason the thought of campfires and tents made me start craving some of my favorite tea.

You know, I’d originally bought this because the description said there were coco notes. I keep drinking it because of the subtle smokiness and the earthy-sweet flavors. I am still amazed by how much I like this.

Wanted to have this last night but I was good and went to bed instead. So of course I have to have it when I get up!

Two infusions. 1st – 5 minutes, 2nd – 5 1/2 minutes. My son tried the second infusion and thought it was yummy :o My son, a tea connoisseur at the ripe old age of three years, seven months XD

Oh, I think it’s official now: I’m in love with this tea. Bumping the rating up to 100.

Having this again this morning. I think I like this tea so much partly because of how different it is from everything else in my cupboard.

Morning! Time to try one of my new black teas! I got two with very similar flavor profiles so I decided to try this one first just because “Bohea” is fun to say.

The smell of the dry leaves was very smokey which made me a little nervous since the last smokey tea I had was rather like drinking a campfire. But at my first sip of this bright, amber-gold liquor I was, if not in love then in like, and very much intrigued. It was sweet and fruity and the smoke was a nicely subtle compliment to the other flavors. It was a very…thought provoking flavor combination.

At a couple points I thought I detected the coco note in either the aroma or liquor flavor but it was even more subtle than the smokiness and I cannot be certain that that was what I was actually detecting.

I think, after another pot or two of this I could very definitely be more than just in like. Perhaps even in love.

Backlogging from last night.

So I finally got a chance to sit down with my box of teas from The Tao of Tea last night. Being evening I decided not to dive into the blacks quite yet and so I chose this. I ended up oversteeping it…by a lot. 14 minutes to be precise. There was surprisingly little bitterness however. The pale gold liquor tasted just like biting into an orange. Granted it was more like a just-ripe orange that might have benefited from staying on the branch just a bit longer but it was definitely juicy, recognizable orange.

This tea has a light, fruity flavor that is subtle rather than overpowering. It’s smooth and fairly pleasant to drink and I imagine it would take milk and sugar well. However, though it’s full-bodied, it lacks character.

Despite hating fruity teas, I actually wish the lychee was more prominent. The dry leaves smell delicious, but the brewed tea doesn’t really hold up to the promise.

I’ll try brewing this tea with 190° water next time and see if that makes a difference.

With all the lilacs blooming in my neighbourhood its hard to smell this tea properly. The flowery smell is not overpowering like some Tie Guan Yins Ive had. It is more on the grassy side than flowery. Very nice still.

Got a fresh batch of this Mega Yummy Oolong!
Packed in a bunch of leaves into my Yixing pot and made it coffee strong.

Really complex taste. First gulp has a sour milk taste mixed with wood ash, mmm yummy. After taste is a lingering toasted chocolate with a bit of lapsang souchong. Need to drink much more of this to form a better opinion, but I like it so far.

There must, I thought, while I stood here at my desk sniffing this package of tea, be something wrong with the inside of my head.

Flavored teas aren’t really my metier. I’ve been curious about them lately, though, and had enough success with the stuff I got from 52teas that I’ve been somewhat emboldened to branch out, after having been thoroughly chased away from them by Teavana.

Still…pear? All of the pear teas that I’ve tried have been abominable failures. One of them is probably what I would consider my arch enemy, in terms of tea, because I want to like it…I should like it…it initially promises me that I will like it…and then I spend the next quarter of an hour rinsing my mouth and wondering why I can’t learn that it’s horrible.

So, yes. Pear tea. Pear ginger tea.

It’s actually pretty good. I think the leaves are CTC leaf…they don’t have the appearance of pellets, per se, but they are very small and shredded in appearance. The pale yellow petals in the blend are quite pretty.

I think this blend works for me because it’s subtle. The pear flavor is there, but it doesn’t taste like stewed fruit. The ginger is there, but it’s even more subtle than the pear; it’s mostly notable in a gentle warmth that haunts your tongue after you swallow, with the sweetness of the pear just peeking about its edges.

I’m not sure whether or not I would rebuy this. I think it would make a fantastic iced tea, actually…

The good news is that Tao of Tea has a sort of frequent-buyer program. Every dollar spent with them earns you a ‘tea leaf’, and these can be used to buy…more tea. Or teaware. Or anything on their site. It’s pretty nice.

It’s also nice that you can buy their tea by the ounce…I bought a whole slew of 1oz bags of tea. It seems pretty inexpensive, as well.

Tried this a couple of times hot-brewed, never liked it. It had a little too much astringency/sourness, and the lemon flavor was too strong.

However, I recently tried brewing it the shinobicha method, and it was delicious. It was sweet, lemony, very much like lemonade. I think this tea is meant to be drunk iced.

I lived in my car for a few months last year as I drove around the country exploring and trying to figure out where I wanted to live. Whenever I stayed the night at a national park, I would wake up early, boil water on my camp stove and make cup after cup of Tao of Tea’s Pu-erh Tuo Cha. Such an amazing way to start a day whether among the ominous Colorado rockies, deep in the evergreen forests of Washington, or lost in the Iowa corn fields.