The Cultured Cup

I like this much better than the Phoenix Mountain oolong from The Cultured Cup. It has good tea flavor but is not nearly as strong as the French Breakfast tea. This is a good general tea.

I liked this again today. It had more flavor than the last time, possibly because I used two teaspoons of tea per cup of water in the Breville. The first infusion, I limited the time to 3 minutes. The second was 4 minutes and quite good, too.

Brewed per instructions. Nice, lighter tea.

Although I usually dislike flavored teas, I find the Goji Berry and other flavors in this to be very good. They are not overpowering and I like the fact that it doesn’t have caffeine. This makes it a good afternoon tea, but because I can easily get a second and third infusion on it, I sometimes have to have it the next morning or brew my morning tea another way. This is billed as “A Cup of Value” from The Cultured Cup – I think it is a good value.

Working with a sample of this from a tea tasting, I have been most impressed by the quality of this vs the other Yin Zhen I have had (from Chado, which admittedly was probably rather antique when I last did a formal tasting).

Brewed with 2 grams of tea in a gaiwan averaging about 2 oz/60mL of water per infusion, I started at 30 seconds, and kept going for 7 infusions before I ran out of heated water.

The flavor is fruity, floral, sweet, but more delicately fruity than the Pai Mu Tan it was paired with. And even after 7 infusions of 30-60 seconds, there was more in the leaf to give.

This is an excellent tea.

As anticipated, this makes a dynamite iced tea, although I might have overdone it by trying to make sure it would be strong enough when chilled; the lemon is less prominent in this version.

Hard to believe I missed rating this one already. It’s simply brilliant. Warm strong Rooibos bass notes, then highlighted by intense, wonderful lemon WOW. The combination of the lemon and the Rooibos is just amazing. It’s got zing to make you sing. I shared it with colleagues at work last week and everyone liked it, and most said WOW. I know what to stuff everyone’s stocking with this year.

It doesn’t get bitter if left to steep for a long time, and you can resteep it a few times before it starts to lose the lemon zing.

Steep about one teaspoon of tea, 5-8 ounces of boiling water, about 3-5 minutes, and enjoy.

I can really think of only two knocks on this tea: one, the little bits of rooibos can escape unless finely strained after brewing; and two, the boiling water infusion means it is hot enough to burn my fingers when I drink it from my handleless cups, if I don’t let it cool long enough.