Ito En
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Many good teas consist of one leaf bud for every two fully developed leaves. Other premium teas are imperially plucked, one bud for every leaf. Ito En’s Yunnan Gold Tips are just buds, and nothing but the buds. It’s kinda what a white tea would be if you let the leaf buds oxidize.
This tea is smooth in terms of how it feels in your mouth, has a really malty taste with an aftertaste that’s sort of like honey or caramel. And with the tea plant pumping all that sugar to nourish these buds, it’s not surprising that this tea is sweet, even if you don’t add sugar, honey or agave. It’s not as full-bodied as a “regular” one-bud, two-leaf black Yunnan, but with a five-minute steep, this tea can hold up to milk.
At $7 an ounce, it’s not cheap. It can be purchased at Ito En’s store on Madison Avenue in Manhattan if you happen to live in NYC or it can be ordered online at http://www.itoen.com/leaf/.
So what don’t I like about this tea? Well, for one thing it’s not organic and that’s a pretty big deal for me. When you buy produce, you at least get to wash it before you put it in your mouth. Tea arrives dry and goes straight into your cup when you make it. While I like Chinese black teas, when I think about safe application of pesticides (or food safety in general) China isn’t the first place that comes to mind. Organic tea is a big selling point for me and given that there is so much wildly harvested tea in Yunnan, it wouldn’t think it would be hard for Ito En to find an organic source for this tea. Numi Teas apparently has an organic Yunnan gold tip tea, and I’ll certainly be giving that one a whirl at some point and see how it compares to Ito En’s.
But if you like malty black teas or like Yunnan’s in general, this tea certainly meets the taste criteria.
Preparation
I have a Yunnan Golden Bud that I haven’t given much attention, but will now be drinking tomorrow. Are tea buds easily distinguishable from leaves? Is it just a size thing? Now you’ve got me inspecting my teas more closely.
In a “normal” black tea with a mixture of buds and leaves, such as Rishi’s Golden Yunnan, you can distinguish the buds as the lighter strands. Because buds have very little chlorophyl, they have less tannin to release during the oxidation process and don’t get very dark. The Rishi Yunnan is very good, by the way, (I’m drinking it as we speak) and would probably be the tea I’d drink if I were stranded on a desert island and could only take one with me. It would be harder to see the buds in a tippy green tea, I suspect, but I’m sure there are people out there who can spot them.
This is my final piece, so I’m trying to savor it. Those notes of movie popcorn are really prevalent in the aroma of the first steeping.
The instructions on the bag recommended 190 for 3 minutes whereas the web site recommends boiling for 1-2 minutes. I went with the former for this first steeping.
A really unique pu-erh.
Preparation
This is one of the most curious teas I’ve tried in a while. The first infusion was had only a slight earthiness, unlike most other pu-erhs I’ve tried. What really threw me for a loop were the undertones of popcorn. And specifically, movie popcorn.
I’m serious. Stop laughing.
The second and third infusions tasted more like a standard Chinese green tea (with very almost none of the expected pu-erh earthiness) and had no remaining hints of popcorn.
Very strange. But, I like.
Even though Ito En is the equivalent of Lipton Tea in Japan, I really enjoy their iced tea. They are extremely refreshing and don’t contain any sweetner. I tried this one for the first time today and it has a stronger flavor than their regular green tea. It kind of has a grassy/sencha flavor to it. The regular Oi Ocha tastes more like barley/popcorn/gen mai cha to me.
Brewed myself a pot of this Oolong from Ito En. It’s by far, hands down, my absolute favorite tea of all time. A very smooth, earthy taste with a room filling aroma. Perfect in the morning or on a cold winter day.
Highly recommended.
really? Hmmm…..they aren’t too far from me. . .one of their locations is Brooklyn. . .i could find out if theirs another way. . .
It’s available https://www.itoen.com/water-sprite.html
Roasty and Toasty.. I enjoyed this today.
In fact, it was my deciding factor on where to go to lunch.
You see, I brought frozen Trader Joes burritos with me to work… but I’ve been eating those same damn burritos at work for awhile now. I decided to treat myself and eat out today. I was torn between a fresh cheap sandwich (a 10min. walk to the left) or a nice refreshing Teas’ Tea from the health food store (10min. walk to the right).
The Tea won. Which is really the only good thing about that grocery store. You have to check the expiration dates there. Too many times has an Odwalla or fresh fruit medley been bought, then returned promptly for having a really really nasty taste or smell from being past it’s date. So I decided to go safe, and went for a small caesar with a hummus wrap.
Harvest Market on 8th Street. Always check the expiration dates! That market should be fined. But they have every kind of Teas’ Tea, so I keep shopping there.