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Kittenna drank Kagoshima Japanese Black Tea by Tealux

6111 tasting notes

Picked up a packet of this tea to split with Indigobloom and Sil, as it sounded interesting.

And interesting it is! First off, it looks like a CTC tea. No long, thin, wiry leaves here; the leaves aren’t even as intact as they are in crappy flavoured loose blacks. Nope, it’s practically powder. Naturally, that made me super wary of bitterness/astringency. A sniff of the tea, which smells fairly mild, made me brave enough to actually use nearly 1.5 tsp for my ~8 oz. mug, which I wouldn’t have done for a CTC (but at the same time, I didn’t want it to be too weak!)

The second interesting thing – while this tea was brewing up, I sniffed at the brewing basket, and it smelled exactly like squash! Like my cup was filled with cooked squash. I’m not entirely sure which type of squash, but not a particularly sweet one. Just kind of… nutty. So squashy, though – it was strange!

Third, the flavour. Of course, a tea that smells so strongly of squash… yes, also tastes of squash. And it actually quite a bit milder than I would have expected. It’s fairly smooth, and the squashy flavour ends with a black tea sweetness which is quite nice. Not being a huge black tea fan (nor always a huge squash fan), I’m rather glad that this is a sneaky sort of sipdown for me (in that the packet of tea only has enough for about 4 cups, and I’ve had my one!) Super interesting to have tried, though!

Preparation

Boiling 2 min, 30 sec

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4 comments

Indigobloom
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Squash… interesting!?
Sad to see you got tea dust :(

Kittenna
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Yes – you’ll have to let me know if you agree! :) And about the “tea dust” – I’m pretty sure the tea is meant to be like this; I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it whatsoever! It’s like how matcha is supposed to be a powder, and how gyokuro is in smaller pieces as well. It certainly wasn’t astringent; I just was wary because often greater surface area causes that sort of thing.

Indigobloom
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Either way I’m looking forward to trying it out!

Kashyap
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while this doesn’t surprise me about the ‘squashy’ flavor…I am still intrigued and appreciate you sharing

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Indigobloom
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Squash… interesting!?
Sad to see you got tea dust :(

Kittenna
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Indigobloom
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Either way I’m looking forward to trying it out!

Kashyap
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while this doesn’t surprise me about the ‘squashy’ flavor…I am still intrigued and appreciate you sharing

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Bio

I have always been a tea fan (primarily herbals and Japanese greens/oolongs) but in the last year or so, tea has become increasingly more appealing as not only a delicious, calming drink, but as a relatively cheap, healthy reward or treat to give myself when I deserve something. I should clarify that, however; the reward is expanding my tea cupboard, not drinking tea – I place no restrictions on myself in terms of drinking anything from my cupboard as that would defeat my many goals!

My DavidsTea addiction was born in late 2011, despite having spent nearly a year intentionally avoiding their local mall location (but apparently it was just avoiding the inevitable!). I seem to have some desire to try every tea they’ve ever had, so much of my stash is from there, although I’ve recently branched out and ordered from numerous other companies.

I like to try and drink all my teas unaltered, as one of the main reasons I’m drinking tea other than for the flavour is to be healthy and increase my water intake without adding too many calories! I’ve found that the trick in this regard is to be very careful about steeping time, as most teas are quite pleasant to drink straight as long as they haven’t been oversteeped. However, I tend to be forgetful (particularly at work) when I don’t set a timer, resulting in a few horrors (The Earl’s Garden is not so pleasant after, say, 7+ minutes of steeping).

I’m currently trying to figure out which types of teas are my favourites. Herbals are no longer at the top; oolongs have thoroughly taken over that spot, with greens a reasonably close second. My preference is for straight versions of both, but I do love a good flavoured oolong (flavoured greens are really hit or miss for me). Herbals I do love iced/cold-brewed, but I drink few routinely (Mulberry Magic from DavidsTea being a notable exception). I’m learning to like straight black teas thanks to the chocolatey, malty, delicious Laoshan Black from Verdant Tea, and malty, caramelly flavoured blacks work for me, but I’m pretty picky about anything with astringency. Lately I’ve found red rooibos to be rather medicinal, which I dislike, but green rooibos and honeybush blends are tolerable. I haven’t explored pu’erh, mate, or guayasa a great deal (although I have a few options in my cupboard).

I’ve decided to institute a rating system so my ratings will be more consistent. Following the smiley/frowny faces Steepster gives us:

100: This tea is amazing and I will go out of my way to keep it in stock.

85-99: My core collection (or a tea that would be, if I was allowing myself to restock everything!) Teas I get cravings for, and drink often.

75-84: Good but not amazing; I might keep these in stock sparingly depending on current preferences.

67-74: Not bad, I’ll happily finish what I have but probably won’t ever buy it again as there’s likely something rated more highly that I prefer.

51-66: Drinkable and maybe has some aspect that I like, but not really worth picking up again.

34-50: Not for me, but I can see why others might like it. I’ll make it through the cup and maybe experiment with the rest to get rid of it.

0-33: It’s a struggle to get through the cup, if I do at all. I will not willingly consume this one again, and will attempt to get rid of the rest of the tea if I have any left.

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