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__Morgana__ drank Silver Needle Reserve by Red Blossom Tea Company

2036 tasting notes

The sweet alpine water I get. But the rest… I’m so frustrated I could cry. This tea has excellent, excellent reviews here and I barely taste anything!

I thought I was going to make a breakthrough with this one because the dry leaves have a very intense woody/nutty smell. But after steeping all of that goes away. The tea’s aroma is so subtle I have to strain to get anything out of it. It’s clearly not just hot water, but floral? No, I don’t smell flowers at all. Maybe a slight sweetness, toward that spun sugar I sometimes taste in white teas, but not fresh cut roses or apricot blossoms.

The tea is almost the color of unsteeped water, so I am wondering whether I should go hotter on this — maybe do the herbal steep method and see if I can get more. There is a slightly nutty aftertaste if I squint really hard, but very little to the rest of the sip other than a subtle spun sugar note.

It’s not terrible, but it just tastes to me mostly like particularly fresh and clean water. But if I wanted that I could drink Fiji, no?

Flavors: Nutty, Sugar

Preparation

185 °F / 85 °C 4 min, 0 sec 5 g 17 OZ / 500 ML

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I got obsessed with tea in 2010 for a while, then other things intruded, then I cycled back to it. I seem to be continuing that in for a while, out for a while cycle. I have a short attention span, but no shortage of tea.

I’m a mom, writer, gamer, lawyer, reader, runner, traveler, and enjoyer of life, literature, art, music, thought and kindness, in no particular order. I write fantasy and science fiction under the name J. J. Roth.

Personal biases: I drink tea without additives. If a tea needs milk or sugar to improve its flavor, its unlikely I’ll rate it high. The exception is chai, which I drink with milk/sugar or substitute. Rooibos and honeybush were my gateway drugs, but as my tastes developed they became less appealing — I still enjoy nicely done blends. I do not mix well with tulsi or yerba mate, and savory teas are more often a miss than a hit with me. I used to hate hibiscus, but I’ve turned that corner. Licorice, not so much.

Since I find others’ rating legends helpful, I added my own. But I don’t really find myself hating most things I try.

I try to rate teas in relation to others of the same type, for example, Earl Greys against other Earl Greys. But if a tea rates very high with me, it’s a stand out against all other teas I’ve tried.

95-100 A once in a lifetime experience; the best there is

90-94 Excellent; first rate; top notch; really terrific; will definitely buy more

80-89 Very good; will likely buy more

70-79 Good; would enjoy again, might buy again

60-69 Okay; wouldn’t pass up if offered, but likely won’t buy again

Below 60 Meh, so-so, iffy, or ick. The lower the number, the closer to ick.

I don’t swap. It’s nothing personal, it’s just that I have way more tea than any one person needs and am not lacking for new things to try. Also, I have way too much going on already in daily life and the additional commitment to get packages to people adds to my already high stress level. (Maybe it shouldn’t, but it does.)

That said, I enjoy reading folks’ notes, talking about what I drink, and getting to “know” people virtually here on Steepster so I can get ideas of other things I might want to try if I can ever again justify buying more tea. I also like keeping track of what I drink and what I thought about it.

My current process for tea note generation is described in my note on this tea: https://steepster.com/teas/mariage-freres/6990-the-des-impressionnistes