I picked up a 120 gram tin of Sunflower Jasmine Tea today at the local Korean-run Asian market. I had heard about this brand before, and curiosity kicked in. My understanding is that this tea is a household name in China—as common as Lipton in the states. The tin was incredibly economical at ~$3, so what did I have to lose?
Answer: Nothing! I was surprised by the instructions to steep 3 grams per cup for 5 minutes and using boiling water. That sounded awfully harsh to me—guaranteed to ruin just about any green tea, so I used 76C water and steeped for about three minutes.
The result was pretty good. If I were to factor in the price, I’d have to say that this may be one of the best tea bargains around. There is a flatness to the green tea base—it lacks the sumptuous texture of better green jasmines, and especially good jasmine dragon pearls. Still, it points vaguely in that direction and is perfectly potable with a nice taste and light aroma of jasmine.
The second infusion was better than the first, and I noticed that after the first infusion, the leaves were still constricted—barely hydrated. Maybe that’s why the company calls for a five-minute steep. If the leaves are super dried out (perhaps from age?) then it may take some time to revive them again, which would explain also why my second steep was better than the first.
A propos of age: the tin states that the expiry date is on the bottom of the tin. Nothing is written there, so it’s anyone’s guess how old this tea is. A year? Two years? Five years? Hard to say. It might be possible to find out by emailing the company, but I honestly do not see anything like a lot number anywhere here. Or is the lot number 1030? No, that looks more like the number of the tea, since it is painted with the same red color as “Sunflower”. Not sure.
This is not a great green jasmine tea, but it is a good one—nowhere near the land of Lipton and Salada! I intend to do steep-offs between Sunflower and all of the other jasmine greens I come across, just to see how they measure up. Most of them cost two, three, four, and some even five times what this does. We shall see whether they are really two, three, four or five times better!
Flavors: Jasmine
Almost worth it for the tin!
Marzipan, the tin is really nice, and well worth $3! ;-)