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nice, clean green buttery snap pea bordering on spinach with a strong note of fresh grass. a very vegetal, satisfying cup of yummy vegetable (which i really can’t quite pinpoint!) which is definitely great after a meal. this is lovely.

not something i always reach for, as i need to be in the mood for it & i can’t drink this on an empty stomach as greens tend to make me a little hypoglycemic (they seem to have a diuretic effect on me) & then i start to feel dizzy. must always have this with food, but i find you can truly savor it as a digestif.

and savory this is! a savory, buttery silken green. the dry leaf smells of fresh cut grass (ultra green grass that’s been shining in the sun but has not dried out. it’s verdant and fresh, having retained its moisture from the last rain—that kind of grass.) the coolest thing about this tea is that it is truly a ‘green’ green tea! the liquor slowly transforms into a rather bright shade of peridot that becomes cloudy as bits of dust settle. it’s very neat to see. and really, the liquor this tea produces is an honest replication of peridot. a most splendid color!

though i am by no means an aficionado of greens, i did have several cups of Teavana’s Gyokuro Imperial earlier last year and this somehow reminds me of that. both share a richesse and silken texture with a highly vegetal flavor of seemingly high quality. from what i can remember, the differences between the two is that the liquor produced by the Gyokuro was much brighter, like a chartreuse, almost like someone dipped a highlighter pen in the water. though clearly green, it had a neon yellow essence, like the oily residue from a curry comprised mainly of turmeric and asafoetida. hard to believe such a supernatural shade of green can be produced from tea leaves!

would actually like to revisit Gyokuro just to see how much it differs from my memory of it vis a vis Sencha.

but all in all, this is a solid H&S offering which is quite nice in my book. i actually had my first infusion after some chocolate peanut butter ice cream by Haagen Dazs, which was absolutely decadent (!!!!). this Sencha somehow brought me back down to earth & was an interesting juxtaposition of flavor.

gonna have my second infusion after this tasting note!

just finished my 4th and last pillow-sized sachet of this lovely Nilgiri tea. sad to see it go! it is a delicious and refreshing iced tea. i add the juice of 2 & 1/2 lemons (then throw the lemons in) & a generous amount of honey though nothing that makes this too sweet. i fill the pitcher half-way with ice then add some cold spring water as well & keep this in the fridge until i’ve lost control of my willpower.

i’ve tried a lot of black teas & i must say i’m impressed with Mighty Leaf’s Nilgiri. they also claim it’s organic. might that explain why this has such a clean, smooth & bright aroma as well as taste? the leaves almost have a ‘lemony fresh’ quality & when infused in water the tea smells like it would taste delicious hot or plain. but i’ve enjoyed it so much iced.

makes sense that i no longer see this in supermarkets (was it a trial run?) & if there are any Mighty Leaf iced teas left on shelves, it’s only the Calypso Mango or Ginger Peach-flavored blacks (which are slightly artificial and clearly not as desirable as the organic Nilgiri).

off to the online stores i go!
(in the interim i will use Harney & Sons blackcurrant from filter bags to make iced tea….the last time was quite a success!)

just got 3 good steeps from this one (as normally tends to be the case). a nice, unobtrusive jasmine flavor. not overwhelming but lighly floral. somehow i feel cleansed by drinking jasmine tea. i don’t dislike it as i’d originally thought i would! my first experience with a jasmine tea was Teavana’s Jasmine Silver Needle & it is quite pleasant. so too, is this offering from Fairway Market! for a fraction of the price. it’s also not Silver Needle. but still…a satisfying cup! good after a meal. simple, refreshing, cleansing.

1st steep i made sure water was sufficiently cooled & did 3 minutes. subsequent steeps went to 5 & 5+ min with hotter water. didn’t seem to ruin the flavor & yet the liquor was a solid honey yellow….each time! very interesting. wonder what the base tea is.