Since I have made the decision to stay up tonight and have not posted anything in several days, I’m forcing myself to be productive and crank out another review. I am dipping much further into my backlog than I have been recently for this one, as I finished what I had of this tea either during the summer or fall of last year. Looking back over the notes I took during my review session, they’re horrible, just all over the place. I have no clue how well this review is going to go, but here it is.
I had no clue how to properly prepare South Korean green tea at the time I set about reviewing this one (still have no clue), so I decided on a multi-step Western brewing process. I started by measuring out 3 grams of loose tea leaves and then steeped them in 8 fluid ounces of 158 F water for 30 seconds. This initial infusion was followed by four others. For the second infusion, I steeped the tea leaves in 8 fluid ounces of 163 F water for 45 seconds. The third infusion lasted 1 minute 15 seconds and was conducted with 168 F water. The fourth infusion lasted 2 minutes and was conducted with 173 F water. The fifth and final infusion made use of 178 F water and lasted 3 minutes.
Prior to the first infusion, the dry tea leaves produced aromas of zucchini, peas, toasted sweet corn, cucumber, hay, soybean, and baked bread. After infusion, I found new aromas of grass, summer squash, chestnut, and asparagus. In the mouth, the tea liquor offered up gentle notes of zucchini, soybean, grass, peas, toasted sweet corn, chestnut, and summer squash that were balanced by hints of baked bread, hay, minerals, butter, cream, cucumber, and sea salt. The second infusion introduced mineral and butter aromas, as well as a vague vegetable broth-like umami scent. Stronger and more immediate notes of minerals, hay, butter, cream, and cucumber appeared in the mouth along with oat and grilled lemon notes and hints of umami, honey, and sugarcane. The third infusion offered a very vague grassy, vegetal nose with barely detectable lemon and honey presences. The tea liquor turned very creamy and buttery in the mouth with strong mineral notes. I noticed a slightly more prominent umami presence as well as hints of hazelnut, pine, lettuce, and green apple. The fourth infusion again offered a mildly grassy, vegetal nose. This time there was more of a mineral presence in the mouth, but I also noted prominent hazelnut and chestnut flavors and a swell of grass, vegetable, cream, and butter notes on each swallow. The final infusion offered little in the way of a nose and presented heavy mineral notes with very vague creamy, buttery, nutty, and vegetal hints.
This was a unique green tea, and I enjoyed certain characteristics it displayed, but it made for a somewhat uneven drinking experience overall. I can best sum it up by describing it as three more or less great infusions followed by two very disappointing ones. At least that description accurately describes the experience I had with this tea the way I chose to prepare it. Don’t forget that I was not in the best mental state and had no clue what I was doing when I was working my way through what I had of this tea. I’ll just stop here before I get off track. There are certain aspects of my life during this time that I do not want to talk about just yet. I guess this tea was pretty good.
Flavors: Bread, Butter, Chestnut, Cream, Cucumber, Grass, Green Apple, Hay, Hazelnut, Honey, Lemon, Lettuce, Mineral, Oats, Peas, Pine, Salt, Soybean, Squash, Sugarcane, Sweet, Umami, Vegetal, Zucchini
Stay strong my friend. Better times ahead.
Be well, eastkyteaguy. We’re all rooting for you.