Shanghai Lichee Jasmine

Another sample sent by my friend in florida. :) Love her to death for passing off a few teas to me, since most of them are not teas i would normally purchase for myself. This way i’m getting to step outside my comfort zone and try things that she enjoys.

I’ve enjoyed the one lychee tea that i’ve tried so i figured even with the jasmine this one had a decent chance of being something i’d enjoy at least a bit. I was right, though i could certainly do without the jasmine. I’ve got at least a few more cups of this left, so i’ll be trying this as a cold brew for sure. I want to see if that brings out more of the lichee or lets the jasmine take the dominant position.

As a hot brew, this is mostly lichee with a splash of jasmine that comes out more through each sip.

After my billionth cup of Earl Grey this month, I needed something different. (No, I’m not knocking the EG, I just realized that my selection as of late has been rather one dimensional.)

Anyway, in pouch, this smells extremely medicinal. I’m getting straight-up Robutussin scent from this. It’s worrisome, but we shall see how much of that translates.

The bag lists the brewing instructions as “190-212F, 3 minutes”… which, for something being billed as a breed of jasmine green, seemed like a horrible life decision in the making. So this was brewed at 165F, 2min.

Flavor is… different. There is a strong punch of sweetness that gets right in your face. I’m guessing that’s the Lichee (I don’t think I’ve ever had Lichee tea before?) I’m happy to say it doesn’t taste like robutussin. There’s a decent amount of warm grass flavor to this, as the green tea base is happily present. However, the jasmine seems lacking. I think the lichee is drowning out the jasmine, which is unfortunate. It also tastes pretty artificial, which is something I have noticed in several of these English Tea Store teas. I mean, it’s drinkable, but it’s not great. I would love to try some different, more natural lichee teas from a different company. Something that doesn’t have a lingering flavor of Hawaiian Punch (like this does).

Overall: It’s ok. Not good. Definitely not great. But it’s average. I’ll give it a C-