Keemun Rhapsody

Grrrrr… argh…

I am so very sleepy this morning. I even hit snooze too many times and was subsequently late for work. D’oh!

So simplicity is what this morning calls for. Brewed this up in my generic tea bottle, with water out of the dispenser, which technically isn’t hot enough, but, again, simplicity. I was already heating my oatmeal.

This time, I am tasting the cocoa notes of this, which don’t usually come through for me as much. It’s a comforting, dependable tea though, and that’s what counts.

Last night, I downloaded the Zombies, Run! app to my cell phone, and went for a quick walk/occasional sprint with it. It was a lot of fun as I went around my own neighborhood, imagining it as a post-apocolyptic wasteland where I gathered supplies and ran away from hordes of shuffling undead.

I was thinking this morning that I would definitely have to add tea to my must-pick-up supplies in a Zombie invasion. This tea would be on my hoped for list. And Jasmine tea, as well. At some point, you might be reduced to Lipton teabags though. shudder

If you knew a Zombie invasion was coming, what tea would you stockpile? :D

Sipdown no. 187. The rest of the sample.

This was one of the black savant samples that I set aside a while back because I really liked it. Now that I’m trying to drink the stuff I like with equal frequency with the stuff I don’t like as much, I decided there wasn’t a lot of reason to keep this one around getting older.

The morning started badly. Not only are two of my power outlets out in the kitchen, the stove (which is gas, with a spark ignitor) wouldn’t stop clicking yesterday because the element got wet from my tea kettle being overfilled and spitting water into the burner. The BF got it to stop, but now it won’t click at all and has to be lit with a match. Not to mention my internet connection, which gets flaky every time it rains here, has been on permanent flake with the wet weather over the last few days. Geez.

At least this tea is nice. I wonder whether my palate has changed, or whether the tea may have faded a bit because I don’t think now I’d rate it as highly as I did before. Mostly because I’m detecting something that tastes metallic or minerally in this. Or perhaps like raw potato, which tastes minerally to me. There’s still a bread-like quality but I’m not getting a lot of smoke or sweetness and instead getting these other notes. It’s still enjoyable and I’m not going to mess with the rating because I’m not sure of the reasons for the change in taste. It could just be me. Sometimes things taste different to me from day to day.

I’m thinking about what to drink next for my big 1000th note!

Lena was lovely and sent me an entire sample tin full of this. I was really excited to give it a try, so I steeped some today.

I’m going to preface this by saying a couple of things. One, I am still adjusting to the fact that Jackee Muntz completely morphed on me from tasting like caramel sauce to tasting like what I guess keemun tastes like. Two, I’m not sure that keemun is a type of tea that is ever going to make my favorite black teas list. Three, this rating is completely liable to change.

Right. Now that that’s out of the way, this tea was decent. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great for me either. It tasted weaker to me than Jackee Muntz, which made me think that maybe I didn’t steep it for long enough, because the water was definitely at a rolling boil when I took it off the stove. Adagio recommends 5 minutes, but I was a little scared to let it sit that long, so next time I’ll try it at the full five.

I didn’t get any caramel notes from this, it was mainly lightly smoky with pine notes, maybe with some very subtle notes of cocoa. Reading the description now, I think I definitely need to let this steep longer. I didn’t get rich or sumptuous from it at all, and the supposed biscuit and fruity notes weren’t available to me on this cup.

I’m eager to try this again, because it looks like a relatively high quality tea, so I’ll probably give it another go tomorrow. Fingers are crossed! Good brain waves are being sent! C’mon, keemun!

This is a very fine, wiry looking leaf. The smell is earthy and sweet, like peat moss. First brew was five minutes. Fairly dark liquor, sweet and clean tasting like a Ceylon and finishing with an earthy, smoky flavor, rather like good barbecue, but just a hint of the smoke. Second steep wasn’t really worth drinking – the flavor was much weakened. I tried a new batch with a somewhat longer steep time – about six minutes. This made the earthy/smoky flavor much more pronounced, with no bitterness. This tea would probably benefit from a longer than usual steep. That finished off my sample, and now I am totally out! Sadness :( I like this very much!

I haven’t rated this one yet, although I’ve had it several times now. I’ve been busy power reading instead of hanging out on the internets. (Wheel of Time book 13!!! Aaarrrgg)

It smells like a fruity black, and it tastes nice and smooth, with a darkish fullbodied mouthfeel. I really like the aftertaste too. I’m really impressed by it!

Thanks JosieJade for such a generous sample!

Good, but not great. It’s a sweeter black tea with a nice, golden brown color and a smokey aroma, but the taste isn’t as strong as it could be, and the smokey aroma doesn’t last through steeping, so it looses a lot of what could make it unique. Not bad, and I think it could really open up with a longer steeping since there’s still no bitterness at 5 minutes, but not as good as I was hoping for from the “embodiment of this tea’s wonderful potential”.

I have run out of almost everything … Then I found a little bit of Keemun Rhapsody in the back of my tea shelf. I have always enjoyed Keemun – it’s moderately smokey, rich and dark and smooth. Perfect for the afternoon.
Made some tea related design work. I’m not done with it yet. I hope to finalize it next week. It will be available for people to download to be printed on a t-shirt, tote bag or a hoodie.
Here’s the preview:
http://www.antemeridiemdesign.com/fun/teaS.jpg

This is the last of my Black Savant Sampler. The smell is smokey, chocolatey, and a little piney. It’s a rich brown liquid, but not as dark as the Pu-Erh Dante I botched yesterday.

The first sip burned me. Apparently I didn’t let this one cool down enough… My tongue was still tingling in a pained way when I tried my second sip, so I couldn’t taste much except for an earthy tone. The third sip was really good. This is rich tea with a faint hint of sweetness amongst all that earth. I can taste chocolate, earth, and maybe some sort of fruit.

I think it’s really exciting how one’s palate develops. If I had tasted this in September, I probably wouldn’t have even liked it, let alone taste all the different notes in this tea. I’m not sure when my turning point was, but it’s like all of a sudden my eyes [taste buds?] have been opened!

i added too much sugar >.< but its still really good! i also didnt steep it for the recomended 5 mins i did 3 :)

im losing my train of thought lol im watching the food network lol! <3 barefoot!

this tea is nice and light for a black, but that may be from my 3 min rather than 5 min steep. it has a buttery note its a great breakfast tea :)

I needed to either take a nap or have tea. I selected tea. I normally have Keemun at work which is where I keep my tin of Rishi so I was really expecting the same taste when I took my first sip. But then I remembered why I love this one so much. Smooth, flavorful, so yummy. Just perfect.