Taiwanese Wild Mountain Black

This morning I was rushing off to work, and was in need of a bit of a pick-me-up. I wanted to try another one of the teas from my Butiki order, and in the end I settled on this one!

Right away the dry leaves intrigued me when I opened the package. So big! Also, the aroma is lovely – honey and something fruity, with a bit of bite at the end. The flavour of the tea is much the same. The honey flavour is prominent, and finishes with malty black tea and the notes of golden raisin mentioned in the description. Lovely!

I will definitely have to sit down with this one again when I have some more time to really savour it.

This tea is amazing! It’s smooth, a little sweet, and I get a definite spicy note that reminds me of ginger. This tea has made me think differently about black teas and has inspired me to try more of them. Thank you Butiki!!

Recently bought a large quantity of high end black tea and I needed something to compare it to so I decided to pull out my Butiki collection :)

This tea is quite good. Very smooth. This tea provides that great feel of fresh bread hitting your stomach, but has the taste of a black tea infused with honey. Really enjoying this.
Although I have drank * a lot* of tea today… there is 32 ounces of this tea brewed for my enjoyment :p

Sadly Butiki is going away, I was torn as to whether I want to add the reviews of the various teas I have tried from them to my blog in a massive ‘farewell to you’ week or two, but alas, I do not have the time. Maybe I will do a single blog entry talking about my favorite Butiki teas from the ones I have tried.

Anyway, this tea! The leaves are humongous! I took one of the big ones and made it make silly monster noises because it looked like a little creature. They smell super sweet and a bit fruity, kinda like fruit drizzled with honey and then baked. Yum! So, enough sniffing, it is gaiwan time!

Yum, the leaves smell like a mix of fig, plum, and dates, it is sooo super sweet! It also has a little bit of a red wine (I am not enough of a wine sipper to pin down exactly which one) the liquid smells warm, sweet, and a touch spicy.

So funny story, after just re-piercing my lip I seem to have forgotten how to drink with a lip ring and I keep dripping tea! It makes me giggle. This tea is fantastic, very sweet and fruity, but it is heavy stone fruit, dates, and yeah there is even a dried fig note which makes me super happy. The following steeps keep the sweetness and add a touch of creaminess to it. Delicious!

Wow, Swedish Chef, you fell asleep at the stovetop. I was sorting through my Butiki teas and couldn’t find this one anywhere. Then, I realized that I drank this without ever writing about it. Probably because I was all whimperingly nervous and scared that I could never do this tea justice or something, so I kept hopelessly crying in my lutfisk and procrastinating.

Very unhelpful note to passersby who wonder what this tea was all about (was, how sad) but clearly my tardiness with providing a more qualitative description is a sign that it was indeed good. Great. Fantastic even.

Exit stage left.

Came home after a long day and needed some comfort tea, and boy-howdy did this ever hit the spot. I did four steeps in the gaiwan. The first (20s) was all honey honey honey honey. The second (30s) was darker honey in color and somewhat so in flavor. By the third (60s), the beautiful leaves were fully unfurled and the flavor had taken on apricot notes or maybe cooking sweet potatoes. Oh, and honey too. My final steep (90s) was softer and subtler, but even my beloved sniffed the leaves and immediately said, “honey” (and she wasn’t referring to me).

I don’t see this on the Butiki site, which makes me think their stock is gone and I won’t be able to order more before Stacy closes the doors. That makes me sad. Both not having the tea and the doors closing. I’ll just enjoy what I’ve got and hope I can find something comparable someday.

I am unearthing ancient samples today, and I apologize, but can’t remember which one of my Steepster friends sent me this tea. It’s been months and I forgot about it. So sorry!

Anyway I already had some coffee this morning, my BF spent the night here last night because he had a job interview and he kept tossing and turning and so did I. Definitely need another caffeine injection here.

This is a bit of a lighter tea and is very smooth and flavorful. Cocoa notes are wafting up from the cup as it sits next to me. It has a nice, natural sweetness that reminds me of brown sugar and tastes very clean, and also gentle. Pretty much devoid of any astringency whatsoever. This is definitely a tasty tea… so glad I was able to try it. I’ll have to remember this when I place my next Butiki order :)

Wow. I didn’t expect this tea to have a fruity flavor, but there is some type of sweetness I can taste….I like it a lot. A mild but full flavored black tea with an intriguing and pleasant taste.

Okay, time to try one of the high rollers here on Steepster. I’m always sort of nervous to try teas that are firm favorites around here… I know I won’t be shunned if I don’t love them but I’m still afraid I won’t love them. Hah. This is one of those creepy tree branch teas (I believe the other term is “spider legs”). The leaves are huge and black and very twisty and brittle. I’m surprised by the lack of dry scent – just a vague honey sweetness and some mustiness. I followed the recommended parameters (aside from the boiling water).

Yum, this smells like waffles! With honey and fruits notes, too. Becoming very excited! It tastes like waffles, too! Or to be more generic, it tastes like pastry, but there’s something about it that reminds me specifically of waffles. I definitely get a buttery texture and lovely honey flavor. There’s also that dark dried fruitiness that’s almost syrupy. And cinnamon? Mm! The aftertaste is grain and, in a few sips, fresh apricot. At the base of the flavor is a lovely rich caramelized brown sugar flavor, mm…

So yes, definitely waffles! I don’t necessarily get maple, so I suppose they would be waffles with a dark, caramelized fruit syrup and cinnamon whipped cream! Om nom nom!

This one is delicious, it reminded me at first of Fujian Black from WP with the chocolate notes and it has some fruity note in there too like plums :) I sipped a few small cups of it before I found my Hello Sweetie sample and then handed it off to Lance to try and he loved it too.
I’ll spend some more time with it very soon so i can write a better review.