Murchie's Tea & Coffee

I’m finishing off the rest of this blend today. Made a small pot. I actually went by Murchie’s about a week ago and had it in-shop again, and once AGAIN enjoyed it, but am disappointed that mine doesn’t taste nearly as nice. Maybe I should buy a package of their Queen Victoria teabags instead.

Only somewhat bitter today, at least. Almost enjoyable. Which may be because the tea itself included a lot of the fannings that settle to the bottom of the tin. Huh!

Perhaps I will get a box of teabags of this next time I find myself at Murchie’s. I just wish the difference in taste between the loose and the bagged wasn’t so significant.

No bitterness today, it seems. And it’s cooling fast. Still, not as flavourful.

I’m finding this one astringent and drying, but considerably less bitter than my other attempts. Although it hasn’t quite cooled enough to when I REALLY start tasting the bitterness, so I could be wrong. I’ll just have to drink it faster before it cools then.

Overall though, finding this cup to be considerably more enjoyable. Reminds me of drinking it in-store. Mmm.

Also just ordered samples of Dawn, Firefly and Honeybee from The Simple Leaf. All at once. I think I’ve strained my tea-budget enough for a while. Damn, I was thinking of ordering from 52Teas too. No! Next month! Must resist.

Rating’s going up.

I’ve had this a few times since I got it, but haven’t logged it.

I remember REALLY liking this when I had it at Murchie’s, so I came home with two ounces. Only to find that it… tasted quite different. I’m guessing it was a difference in tastes from the bagged fanning-form that they serve, and the loose that I went home with.

It was a bold, black tea flavour with this faint green sweetness/vegetalness underneath, just enough to compliment, and then a hint of smoke. I brought it home, and all I got what a bitter, burnt charcoal taste. Very bitter, green, not nearly as much bold black, and burnt not smoky.

So I started experimenting with my steep times and temperatures. I don’t know what temperature their water is, but I steeped it at around four minutes and it was good. No bitterness!

This time around I brought the temperature down to 180F, the steep time to 2:30, and replaced 1/4 of the tea I used with Murchie’s Assam tippy golden.

There’s a difference, and it’s a difference for the better, although I don’t like how watery it tastes with the reduced steeping time. But I know if I steep it any longer it’ll go bitter (especially since I added Assam black). Maybe I’ll have to buy a little box of their bagged stuff. Damn.

Enjoyable, though. Blacker in taste—closer to the bagged form that I remember—with a bit of a bittergreen taste, and then a faint burnt not-quite-smoky taste.

Just used up the last of my sample today. Slightly different steeping parameters, and I made much more than I was initially going to because my mother spotted me making tea and wanted in. She has never tried an oolong before; hopefully she will enjoy it.

Higher steeping temperature, I think, may be the reason this looks darker. But it also might just be because I poured into a mug rather than a small teacup. I can’t quite remember how this tasted the last time I had it (I’m not going to cheat and read my old notes), but it’s pleasantly light in the vegetal taste, a stronger floral almost sweetness coming through with a sort of milky aftertaste. Sometimes I think I might be getting a nuttyness as well in there somewhere. And occasionally there is a sort of sweet yeasty ’bakey’ness, but it’s hard to pick out as a flavour on its own—I think it’s more of the taste I get because of how the other flavours blend together. Hmm. Especially since otherwise there’s no way I would consider this tea at all ‘bakey’. It’s light, maybe buttery, sweet.

I still think ‘magnolia’ just smells like jasmine, but it’s much lighter, so it’s nothing like A&D’s Jasmine Green, which seems to be much too strong for me to handle.

I plan to resteep this a few more times and enjoy my book. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell (Susanna Clarke) if anyone wants to know. I’ve been reading this book on and off for four years. I love it, but I just can’t seem to finish it.

Giving this an actual RATING now, because I realized I hadn’t given it one before.

This sips like a good book-reading tea, I think.

And for the record, my mother really likes it and came back for a second steep. This second one seems to have a slight tang to it, I think, but otherwise I’m not finding any significant difference.

Trying this again, different steep temperature and time! At first I tried to measure the temperature, but couldn’t seem to get anything over 170 even for freshly boiled, and the needle started going down so QUICKLY (I blame Canada and our temperatures, for some reason), that I just, instead, boiled water fresh, living it only enough time to STOP boiling before pouring it (I’m hoping that’s somewhere over 185, I was hoping for 200). Steeped for five minutes.

It only smells MORE green (and floral jasminy). About the same temperature of the first steep last time.

Huh. This is definitely more pleasant, somehow. Vegetable and greenish, but also sort of milky, I think.

That peppery taste in the back of my throat after the first steep is back. I’m describing it as a sort of harsh grassy taste. Or feel. Hm.

The smell’s not as veggie-like. In fact, I can’t really smell it at all… But that might just be my younger brother making scrambled eggs in the kitchen.

Buttery taste, I think. Lot less veggie tasting too. Last few drops are more vegetable tasting (due to the piece of leaf and leaf dust at the bottom of my cup). Didn’t really consider this one as closely as the first steep because I was talking to my brother as I sipped it. Sweet butteryness. Hmm.

Free pop tart from my sister’s boyfriend! SCORE.

Third steep—the colour’s not getting any lighter (in fact, it’s been identical all three steeps so far) but I’ve got more tea particles in this one. I smell… Ehr. Nothing. Hm.

Wow veggie taste. And not green tea veggie taste. Just VEGGIE taste. Wonder if it has anything to do with the poptart I just ate. That probably wasn’t a very good idea in terms of timing. The other tastes sat sort of in the middle-to-pack of the tongue, but this one’s mostly at the front, reaching towards the middle. It’s… acidic, but not at all sour. Metallic, I guess. Yeah, I’m getting metallic.

Rinsed my mouth out, but still getting the same taste. A normal sort of grassyness returns too—the metallic taste has sort of faded.

Fourth steep—again with the sharp green metallic taste on the tip of my tongue. Curse you poptart! I somehow know this is all your doing. I think I’ve pinned down this kind of vegetable taste as a sort of spinach taste. With almost slight butter. Butter’s getting slightly stronger. Spinach green taste… butteryness is gone again. Hmm. I don’t think I’m going to steep this a fifth time. Seriously drank too much tea at one in the bloody morning. Hmm… It’s sort of a slightly sweet spinach taste. Butteryness comes and goes.

I don’t dislike or like it, but I have so little experience with oolongs that I still don’t feel right attempting to give this a rating. I think I just like babbling about flavours.

I would really rather my first oolong NOT have been scented, but the lady at Murchie’s gifted me a sample of this “On The House” because it was apparently top-rated and one of the best sellers last year. Very nice of her.

Going to brew this in my Libre because it’s glass, and I wanted to watch the leaves unfurl. I plan, once it’s done steeping, to pour all of the tea out into a teacup (I’m not making very much).

Water is cooling… I have no idea what temperature to brew this at. I tried to look it up, but oolongs are quite variable anyways, and I was getting results anywhere from 180-boiling. So I went “screw it, 180 it is”. Or, rather, slightly under 180. Nevermind. Steep Time was another issue, so I’m going to do four minutes.

The dry leaves are a sort of milky green jasmine maybe? The milky smell was more evident in the bag, but I transferred them to a small tin. Slightly floral sort of smell too, that reminds me a bit of Andrews and Dunham’s jasmine green.

This is very pale. Sort of a tinge of green. Light a light green tea. Dunno how it should look—the tea leaves themselves did look fairly ‘green’, so.

No milkyness in the taste. Very… green. That’s really all I’m getting. It was interesting to watch the leaves, though. They didn’t open up as quickly as I thought they would. Slightly sweet. As I continued drinking it started to get sort’ve astringent. I always figured that I would enjoy a “blacK” oolong more. This hasn’t changed that opinion. Although this is only the first steep.

Wet leaves smell… vegetal, green. Something else, which I want to say is nutty, but it’s not.

Oooh leaves are huge now. Got this water closer to 180. Going to steep this one for four minutes too. While waiting for the second steep, I noticed a weird taste in the back of my throat… Uh. Peppery, maybe?

Second one is darker, probably because the leaves were already open for this steep. Only slightly, though. Stronger smell, but still just green. More strongly vegetal than before. That almost maybe? Not quite pepper taste is back, stronger. Don’t know. Still don’t really like it. Floral jasminy smell’s still there. Oh! Buttery! I got a buttery taste for a moment there. Like a watery, milky buttery taste. I’m not sure.

Not liking this one again. Ehrck.

Third steep smells… Sweeter? Tastes sweeter too. This one’s actually kind of pleasant. When I breath out there’s a butteryness. Vegetal pepperyness.

I’d go for a fourth steep (I hear good things about fourth steeps!),but I’m too full of tea now.

Don’t know how to rate this. Hrm.

De-cupboarding this tea as well. I’m glad I found a good Russian Caravan that isn’t too astringent or smokey; I’d definitely buy this one again the next time I’m in Vancouver.

This tea is ok with milk, but like I thought in my last post about this tea it doesn’t really add anything. Some Russian Caravan’s I’ve had (like that lovely one from Lavender Basics – *sniff *) went really nice with milk and actually tasted fuller and took on a slightly sweet note when drunk that way.

You get a big waft of smokey-BBQ when you open the bag and I was afraid that it would be too heavy on the Lapsang Souchong. My fears were allayed however, and while there’s some smoke, it doesn’t take over the tea and drown out all the other flavours. I’m picking up a slightly astringent, tannic sort of note that comes from the Darjeeling I think, aswell as a rounder, mellower flavour that might be from the Keemun.

It’s a nice, well-balanced black tea that goes down smoothly and that doesn’t really seem like it needs a ton of milk and/or sugar. Although I suppose you could add it if you wanted – I don’t think it would wreck the taste or anything.

Sweetening this tea doesn’t seem to really do much for it – if anything it seems to emphasis the sour/acrid aftertaste slightly. So taking this tea with plain milk and nothing else seems to be the way to go.

I was worried that adding milk would destroy this tea, but it actually seems to hold up to it fairly well. It takes off the bitter edge that the plain tea has, which I really appreciate, and it gives the tea flavour reminiscent of an earl grey with some jasmine added to it.

The black tea in this blend definitely seems to dominate the flavour, unfortunately it has a sour-bitter sort of aftertaste and I don’t know if it’s the Ceylon, the added lemon, or the jasmine green. Which ever it is I can’t seem to get rid of it by changing the steeping time, so next time I drink this tea I’ll try it with milk and see if that changes anything.

There weren’t any steeping recs on the box unfortunatly, so I sort of guessed at it. It’s a black/green blend so I didn’t steep it in boiling water. Still, the black tea in the flavour seems to be wanting milk, although I’m afraid that it’ll do horrible things to the green tea in the blend. The jasmine is a nice counterpoint, although I’m not really getting any of the lemon that is supposed to be here too. I’m finding that this tea is a bit astringent for my liking, but I might just need to fiddle with the steeping time a bit.

Used up the last of this; made two cups: one for me and one for my mom.

I called it Operation Murchie’s.

I was faced with a unique opportunity. My geomorphology teacher was feeling fairly under the weather, but forced herself to come into class long enough to answer questions concerning our next lab, as well as give out the compiled Class Stats before leaving to head home and rest.

Thus I found myself with three and a half hours to spare before my statistics class began. My first thought, logically, was “I should go to Murchie’s!” it’s usually a forty minute skytrain trip to get there from home, and only a slightly shorter one from my campus. Thus I’m usually unable to make the trip between classes (unless I fully intended to run to and from stops, and only spend a maximum of about ten minutes in the shop itself). I worked out how much time I should be able to spend, and then headed off.

The trip took barely thirty minutes (less time than it should have!), and here I am. I’d been planning to try the Library Blend for a while (it just SOUNDS deep, earthy and relaxing). I’ve sipped a few of Murchie’s black/green tea blends, but most I found I could only taste the black tea in.

This one is definitely green, although the colour is only slightly paler than the usual black. It’s okay, but I think I like their Queen Victoria better (a green black blend with a bit of lapsang; it tastes mostly black, but you do get hints).

The initial taste is black, but then very green, but it’s got a bold, taste—the black grounds it and keeps it from being TOO vegetable tasting. It smells green too. Overall it’s nice, and I think the name is very fitting (I could see myself sipping this in a library while reading), the taste is lovely (although not overall ‘for me’), and I might just get it again some time.

Murchie’s doesn’t have a wifi connection, so this was typed up in Word while I was there with the intention of posting once I returned to my campus.

I don’t know how hot the water is that they give you, but I think I steeped it roughly around five minutes before removing the teabags.

And THAT’s the last of that. Finished up the rest of this in one, big pot.

I don’t think I have much more to add. The last tasting note I did on this expresses my most recent and final thoughts on this tea. Smokey, still tasty enough to be a good staple, but a little on the “burnt” side.

I let my father sniff this tea, and he’s reevaluated his “bacon” stance and now calls it, more appropriately, “campfire” tea. And actually asked whether or not it would be a good one to drink around the campfire. I think it would be.

I woke up today and decided, “smokey tea”. I then went, sat down, and loaded up Steepster to see when the last time was I’d even made a tasting note on any of the teas I drank, and found that at the top of my Dashboard was one from Rabs on Caravan.

Too bad I had already decided I wouldn’t drink any caravan, because I’m starting to get low on lapsang, so I want to finish that one off. Even though the lapsang I got from Murchie’s, I feel, isn’t actually that great. I love Caravan, but I find this lapsang to be a little burnt, and less smokey. So the faster I finish it off, the faster I can try lapsangs from other places. I can’t decide between Tealicious or Tea Desire yet, though.

I also came across bagged Russian Caravan at my local organic market—five bucks—yesterday, but had to convince myself to put it down and not get it. It was actually what inspired me to start drinking up the rest of my low-quantity smokey teas. I’ll be able to buy it without guilt after I run out. I wanted it for travel, because I no longer make smokey teas in my tea libre. The plastic/rubber seals absorb the scent and it is impossibly hard to get it out. So bagged smokey teas that I can bring with me and just throw into a paper cup with hot water (or even a mug—sometimes I bring one with me places) would be nice, if I don’t have my little teaball with me.

Still got a good few scoops left. This’ one that has lasted a while, because it’s the only one I haven’t been able to share (which I do a lot); nobody wants to try my alleged “bacon tea”.

Having this in between class. I was carrying three tins on me today—Earl Grey, 1001 Nights, and this. My travel tin of Lapsang is almost empty, oh no! I need to go home and refill it.

My Libre has been on and off temperamental today. It leaked the first time, not the second or third, and then I flip it for my smoky tea, and it leaks ALL over the place (and usually it only leaks when it’s on its side, and if you wipe the inside rim before you screw the parts together, it prevents this!). It stopped quickly enough, flipped it back rightside up and it was fine, but then I went and opened it (I waited a few seconds and gave it a few shakes to get rid of water that may have collected in the rim) and it EXPLODED water everywhere. Not a good thing to have near a laptop.

So I LOST some water in the process, but there’s still a drinkable amount here. Baaah.

The cafeteria at my college gives you water at 190 degrees (I know, I checked—got weird looks the whole time standing there with a thermometer in a weird glass travel mug).

Even after this I can’t hate Libre; I just keep blaming the leaks on myself. I probably didn’t wipe the inside enough, or screw the pieces together tight enough, or shake the water out of the cap well enough. I still love you, Libre.

Hmm tea came out a bit watery (funny, considering how much water I lost in the process of making it), but still deep and smoky pine tasting (I love that pineness—it’s weird and sweet), and seriously warming to the soul. The Libre container keeps my hands pleasantly warm and the smokyness of the tea keeps my insides pleasantly warm, and now it’s almost a bad thing because I’m feeling somewhat sleepy as a result, and I want to climb into a sleeping back outside in the fresh air and take a nap.

If I wasn’t so impossibly busy with class and work, I would go camping, I think.

There’s a slight, weird aftertaste in the back of the throat—it’s not bad or good, and I can’t really tell what it is (or if it’s due to the tea, or if it had already been there and I just hadn’t noticed it until now). Barky, I think. Maybe it’s the pine taste.

Also, mmmm smoky breath. My favourite part.

I was afraid I was going to brew this tea and my poor palette would be unable to tell it from Caravan. They certainly smell quite similar. But lapsang smells VERY different once brewed. You can definitely tell that it was smoked over pine. The pine is there. Mmm, campfire. Mostly because pine’s often what we end up throwing on it. I can’t stop sniffing it. It’s very nice.

The taste is definitely weaker than caravan. But I can’t remember—maybe I steeped that one longer. Taste’s quite different. Sweeter. The pine, maybe. Still savoury. When I purchased this, the lady gave me an odd look and asked if I had ever had it before. I suppose I should have seen it coming—people either love or hate this tea. I explained that I had been meaning to try it (she let me sniff it, and it smelt as expected). Mm, I like it. I think I like Russian Caravan more, but maybe I should have just steeped this one longer. It’s got a… deeper flavour though, I think. Tasty.

Just finished this off with my mom. Hurrah! Not sure if I will be getting any more. At least not right now. I think I will use this opportunity to try other Assams.