Yunomi

Backlog from yesterday, Steepster was acting really slow and would not allow me to do much.

This was a nice houjicha, definitely very roasty and earthy with a slight smoky note. I tried it hot and also over ice, it was good both ways but I wish it was a bit sweeter somehow.

Thank you KittyLovesTea for sending this a while ago! This is actually similar to the tea I just tried, even though the leaves seem very different even if they are both green. These leaves look like lawn mower clippings. :D There is also two different colors to them, a darker green and a lighter green. The flavor is very similar to the Dragonwell I had yesterday. It’s like creamed or breaded corn and the steep color is very light. The second cup was almost the same. I’m used to these types of greens being much different. Maybe I’m steeping them differently now. To be fair, the package says this expired at the end of February (way after KittyLovesTea sent it) and one sip did have a hint of that “old green tea leave” flavor, so I’m not trying this at its freshest. It’s still very good anyway. I’ll steep up the last teaspoon soon!
Steep #1 // 40 min after boiling // 2 min steep
Steep #2 // 42 min after boiling // 3 min

The unbrewed tea gives off a fresh vibrant savoury aroma with a background of mustard powder. Post brewing it has melon sweetness and a little astringency.

Light aroma on the unsteeped tea. I’ve tried a few different variations on the steep time etc but it still needs playing around with. In anycase, this tea reminds me of toasty tuna oil, minus the viscosity of the oil. The toasted rice seems a bit heavy, perhaps less rice or a tad less toasted.

Another backlog from last night, and another sipdown!

I bought this as part of a sampler pack from Yunomi.us, and so far I’m undecided about whether I like houjichas or not. There’s something about the taste in the background – that sort of “curly” astringent taste I associate with some green oolongs – that I’m not too fond of.

However, I still have 2 more teas in the houjicha sampler pack to try. I really wonder if either the dark or smoky roasts will knock my socks off. One can hope…

This isn’t a sipdown, but now that I’ve made a full pot, it will be soon.

This is a tad astringent, but still quite soothing. The flavour is light, yet still present.

Mainly, though, I figured this would be an easy one to finish off, since it’s already open.

I bought the sampler set of this plus the Basic, Dark, and Smoky roasts from Yunomi.us. I tried the Basic roast a while back, and while I liked it, I had never had any houjicha before to compare it to.

This is the second one I’ve tried, and it’s really really mild. So mild that it’s hard to taste much of anything, but I don’t mind, as I’m just getting a nice cup of warmth rather than a lot of umami taste. I wonder how I’ll like the dark and smoky roasts, though.

This is super super green and I adore the leaves – they almost look like the greenest grass clippings. And this tastes super duper green. The second infusion was better than the first, which I accidently let steep longer than I wanted so it was really intense. The secondary steep had some citrussy taste to it as well. I enjoyed this very much.

I finally get to try another of this tisane type, hurray! It smells so good- like toasted brown rice cakes. The flavour has is a bit roast nutty. Went well with my Thai soup.

A fairly sweet and full bodied houjicha without much umami flavor.

Not sure what angle to come at this tea as I’ve never tried anything like it before. Seaweed (or Kombu/Konbucha/Kombucha – not to be mistaken for the mushroom) is a new type of tea completely for me. In powdered form you add 2g of powder (which they kindly provide you a spoon to measure with) and mix it with boiling water for roughly 100ml volume. Very simple and quick.

Reading about Kombu on Wikipedia it claims to be high source of B Vitamins, K Vitamin, Calcium, Magnesium, Sodium, Potassium and moderate-low levels of Vitamin C and E. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kombu

Flavour wise this is very salty, I’m talking one of the saltiest things I’ve ever tasted. Not as bad as my experiment with pickled Sakura Blossoms (which I found to be inedible) but for someone who rarely uses salt this is very strong for me. Adding to the salt it’s also thick which makes it very broth like, so rather than salt water it’s a salty broth/soup which in a strange way is sort of nice. It tastes exactly as you would except seaweed to taste like. Sure I’ve tried seaweed from my local Chinese takeaway but it’s fried and mild…this tastes more raw.

No rating as I am still thinking ‘wtf is this’and ‘damn this is salty’. Will take some time for me to get used to this…if I ever do. But at least I can keep this down ie looking good so far.

Thank you Yunomi.us for this free sample that added as a nice surprise as I opened my order today.

Nice large leaves and lots of sticks in my 5g sample. Beautiful sweet and toasted scent that I liken to a honey cake I used to make in my automatic bread cooker machine. The more I sniff the more grassy and mineral it becomes but it is a very nice scent.

Since there were no instructions on the website for steeping this or any other bancha (that I can find) I will use Yunomi.us standard steeping method.

Tea – 5g
Water – 80C
Volume – 180ml
Vessel – Kyusu

First Steep – 30 seconds
Yellow green in colour with virtually no scent despite it’s very apparent colour. Flavour is mild with roasted grass tones and sweet honeysuckle that dissipates quickly and you are left with a touch of smoke in the after taste.

Second Steep – 10 seconds
More roasted and less grassy. Honeysuckle and sweetpea tones with a slight smoky after taste. Also a little sour. For the most part it’s sweet and a perfect strength for me personally.

Third Steep – 30 seconds
More toasted than sweet but it does lighten a lot in the after taste. Tastes like raw pea. No smoke this time, instead the after taste is grassy and mineral.

I enjoyed this Bancha much more than I thought I would, though the first steep was nice it was far from ‘special’ compared to others I have tried. It kicked up a gear after that and steep two and three were delicious, so very natural and sweet with light smoke. Plus now my mouth is coated in a delicious roasted sweet pea flavour that reminds me a little of light pea soup. I may get more of this in the future.

I botched this tea and underleafed it – I used the entire sample and it came out to just under 2.5 tsp, although I used three cups of water.

This was kind of weak, but I could still taste the umami sort of grassiness that happens in a lot of gyokuros. However, as I’m not a fan of resteeping and I have so many other teas, this will stay as a sipdown.

Thank you to Yunomi.us for this sample which was included with an order a few months ago.

Crisp dark green needle leaves mixed with a few light yellow green stems. They have a very sweet honeydew scent that is very pure and beautiful.

The steeping instructions are a little different for this tea, it recommends doing one long steep rather than several short ones. So this will be steeped in my Kyusu for 2 minutes. 80ml for 2 minutes seems a little strong but that is what the instructions say on the website.

The resulting tea liquid is medium to dark green and has a sweet yet savoury broth scent. Flavour is strong though not overly so, the umami is rich and lingers into the after taste. Savoury and sweet at the same time with some astringency and rich mineral tones. Like thick cabbage water.

A further steep with the same 2 minute rule reveals more savoury umami but less sweet than previously. It’s still thickly mineral with cabbage and broccoli notes yet it seems toned down as a whole compared to the first steep. Still slightly astringent.

Another 2 minute steep – Severely toned down from what it was but it still has a lot of flavour, only now this is more standard Sencha like. Medium strength, minimum umami and astringency but remains mineral with added grass tones. Has some sweetness once again.

Another 2 minute steep making this number 4 – Extremely mild, all that remains is sweet grass.

This was a pleasant tea that offered lots of umami for the first two steeps which work well as a boost throughout the day. Sent me a little tea drunk.

Another Yunomi.us club sample for me to try. The website description of this Sencha likens it’s flavour to that of coconut milk. I do like the sound of that on this beautiful sunshiny day.

The leaf is dark green with a few hints of light green mixed in, also some stems are present. They are a crisp, long needle like shape and have a sweet yet creamy and floral scent. Very similar to a milk Oolong, not sure about coconut yet but milk is very apparent.

First Steep – 30 seconds
Light green liquid with a sweet milk scent that is light yet pure. Flavour has gentle grassy notes with some sweetness and a hint of milk/cream in the after taste. Also has floral tones that remind me of sweet pea mixed with buttercup.

Second Steep – 10 seconds
Despite the short steep it has tripled in strength and has some astringency. Not as sweet as before or creamy though some is still present. More mineral also like sweet grass or fresh spinach.

Third Steep – 30 seconds
More astringency and again less cream and sweetness. Tastes more like a standard Sencha at this point. Highly sweet grass and sweet pea like, thick flavour but with minimum astringency really overall which makes it a pleasant steep. Offers minimum dryness upon after taste.

Overall – This tea started off with high cream notes but ended up being mineral and more standard Sencha like, almost like it transforms from one tea into another. Quality was good and this would be a splendid every day tea.

And here goes my second attempt at steeping a tea from Yunomi.us western-style.

This time it was a gyokuro: approx 1 tsp per 8 oz (didn’t measure the volume poured into the teapot), ~75C, for 2 minutes.

Not bad, but a bit weak. I think I could have gone for 3 minutes without much fuss.

And oh yeah, this is a sipdown. But I have other gyokuros still in my cupboard.

Backlog from this afternoon:

Man, I’m having a really hard time with steeping these teas from Yunomi.us. The recommended steep parameters on their site are so different from anything else I have in my cupboard that I really don’t know how to brew them properly.

Take this tea. The site says to use 2 tsp of leaf, which they say is 8 grams. But I used 3 tsp of leaf, and it was still only about half of the 10-gram sample package I was given (so 5 grams). Do I follow the weight or the volume?

In this case, I stuck with the volume, because otherwise there would have been absolutely no room left for water in my gaiwan. I don’t have a kyusu, so I figured that gaiwan steeping would be the closest thing.

On top of that, they said that for the first steep, I needed to use 3 oz of water and steep for 2 minutes. My eyes are wide with surprise – so much tea, so much time, and so little water? Wouldn’t the tea be irredeemably bitter?

I used my gaiwan anyway. Yup, this is quite grassy and bitter and umami. Which was surprising, because the dry leaf smelled so sweet and hay-like. The leaf it self was a deep emerald green, and short and small like grass clippings. Now that I’ve had this tea, I realize that one of my favourite greens, Shincha Kuro by Capital Tea Ltd, is also a gyokuro. (I should have guessed, but that was one of the first really good teas that got me started on this journey, but I digress.)

I steeped this 4 times: 2 minutes, 30s/30s/30s. The first steep was using 55C water, the later steeps using approx 80C water. By the 4th steep, the tea was still quite grassy and astringent. I really wonder if I’m doing this right.

The next time I try this, I think I’m going to follow the steeping parameters outlined for my Shincha Kuro and see if that changes anything. Withholding a rating for now.

I was sat here falling asleep and trying to wake myself up with the promise of Matcha when I remembered I had this sample with me. It’s not Matcha but it is powdered and my intrigue has built up over the months, it’s produced with the same method as Matcha but the leaf itself is different. Matcha = Gyokuro where as this is Tsuyuhikari which is a type of Sencha and is a new cultivar for me.

‘A cross of Shizu7132, known for its Japanese cherry tree fragrance, and Asatsuyu, known for its beautiful green colour and characteristic bean flavour, Tsuyu-hikari, when grown properly, combines the best of its two illustrious parents’. Thanks to Thes Du Japon website.

I am lead to believe that this tea comes in full leaf as standard, yet what I have is powdered and differs from everything else I have seen.

Yunomi.us whom I received the tea from has this on their website.
‘Royal Emerald Tea® is powdered sencha green tea developed by the Fukushima family. High quality green tea leaves are ground into a fine powder using a stone mill like matcha tea powder. The tea is a vivid emerald green in color and has a sweet taste with less astringency than ordinary sencha tea.’.

Royal Emerald Tea must be it’s frequented English name. Well I have two little sachets of powder and two steeping instructions, one for hot and one for cold. I’m sticking with the hot as I wanted traditional Matcha originally.

1 stick = 1g
Water Temp = 80C
Volume = 180ml
Steeping instructions are virtually the same as Matcha.

Runs off to make this interesting tea
Yes bright green is spot on, very beautiful and bright colour with a strong sweet Sencha scent.

Flavour reveals a sweet and floral Sencha with thick grassy tones and a slight astringency. The mixture has separated at the bottom of my cup but it’s nothing that a quick cup swirl can’t fix. It’s a nice strength, I was worried it might be too strong but it’s scent is more than it’s bite. Very creamy too in the after taste after a few sips. No dryness either which can be expected of a powder.

Unusual yet interesting, and strong enough to make me go light headed and on the verge of being tea drunk. Japanese greens, particularly strong greens, tend to go straight to my head. This was no exception. I will be ordering more of this in the future.

http://yunomi.us/shop/17286/tsuyuhikari-green-tea-powder-bulk-1g-sticks/

Sipdown! Well, sorta.

I’ve had this tea for nearly a year and a half, and while it’s good, I also have some buckwheat from Yunnan Sourcing that I need to drink too. So I took the last little bit of this (a few tablespoons worth) and instead of drinking it down, I baked with it!

I blitzed the sobacha in a small food processor until most of the groats had broken down into flour. Then I added some white flour, butter, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt to create a crumble topping, and made an apple crumble with it!

The crumble has a nice, warm, bready, nutty note to it that’s really interesting. A fitting way to let this tea bow out.

Oh, and plus: I saw Civil War last night, and it was awesome. AND I JUST BOUGHT THE NEW RADIOHEAD ALBUM AND I WILL LISTEN TO IT NOW AND EVERYTHING IS AWESOME.

Since I have a bunch of buckwheat from YS, I have less incentive to hoard this now. And it’s tasty – cozy, toasty, nutty. I’ll see if I can get a second steep out of this.

But otherwise, let me tell you about this awesome soup I just made that I’ll have for lunch over the next few days:

- 2 big carrots
- 1/2 head of cauliflower
- 1 acorn squash
- 1 red onion
- 5 cloves of garlic
- 1 inch piece of ginger (very thick)
- curry paste
- salt, olive oil
- herbs and spices (whatever works for you)
- cream
- chicken broth

1. Take the cauliflower, squash, and carrots, and cut them into medium-sized chunks/florets. Drizzle them with olive oil, salt, and pepper, along with whatever herbs/spices you have on hand (eg: sage, oregano, garlic powder, whatever).
2. Toss the veggies, oil and spices together to coat, then roast them in a 375°F oven for 50 minutes or so. Make sure to give them a stir every often so they don’t burn.
3. A few minutes before the veggies are done roasting, chop a red onion and finely dice/grate the ginger and garlic.
4. Heat a large soup-pot, put some olive oil in it, and then add the garlic, ginger, and onion. Let them saute for a few minutes and add some salt and pepper to the pot.
5. Once the onions start to brown, add the curry paste (2-4 Tbsp) and stir it all together. If things are clumping up or sticking to the bottom of the pan, add some liquid to deglaze.
6. At this point, the roasted veggies should be done roasting and have had some time to cool outside of the oven. Take those veggies and chuck them into the soup-pot, and give them a stir so they can get coated in the onions and curry paste.
7. Now add the chicken broth in (I dunno, 4-6 cups? I didn’t measure). Let the whole thing boil for about 15 minutes. You can taste the broth as it’s cooking to adjust the seasonings as necessary.
8. After it’s done boiling, turn the heat off and get out an immersion blender (stick blender). Then start blending like crazy until it’s a puree. It doesn’t have to be velvety smooth, but it should definitely be a puree.
9. Now add the cream (1 used a small 1-cup carton of 10% cream) to finish it off.

Then eat it!

Fucking delicious, yo. I’m going to really enjoy lunch tomorrow.

Backlog from last night.

Continuing the Xmas movie extravaganza, hubby and I watched “Arthur Christmas” last night. It’s a cute movie, but I thought it was kind of overstuffed and frenetic, trying too hard for an emotional resolution it didn’t earn. The hubby is far more lenient when it comes to critiquing movies, and he’s pretty happy with this one.

Anyways, the tea. I was so happy to have this tea back in my life that I steeped it twice and kept the soaked buckwheat grains to have for breakfast this morning!

Perhaps I was a bit skimpy with the buckwheat and didn’t add enough in, but the flavour didn’t have the amazing roasty sweetness I experienced when I first had it back in April/May.

Nevertheless, I will hoard this until I can find a source of sobacha that is easier to find or cheaper.

Sipdown!

I mixed the last of my sample with a pot of genmaicha tea to see how it would turn out. The buckwheat added a lot to the aroma of the tea, but it didn’t seem to change the taste that much. Ah well. Although I really loved this variety of sobacha, I bought a different kind today when I was downtown that seems pretty similar. Same variety of soba (dattan) but by a different manufacturer. On a gram-by-gram basis, the kind I bought today is half the cost of this online. Fare ye well, tasty sobacha!

Hey Steepsterites!

Remember when I said a while back on the forums that I would start reviewing tea on my blog, with a twist of comparing tea to fictional characters? Well, my first review is up, and it’s of this lovely cup!

This is a cup of grainy roasted goodness! It smells rich and nutty, almost like peanut butter, and the taste is like roasted rice or really thick, hearty bread. Soothing. Comforting. This is the kind of tea that just wraps you up and pats you on the head and makes you feel warm and safe. But make no mistake: this is not a weak, mush-mouthed tea. This tea has character. It has kick. It’s distinctive.

Comforting and maternal, with a backbone of strength and distinctiveness underneath? Which fictional character did I think of when drinking this tea? You’ll have to read the whole thing here to find out: http://christinavasilevski.com/2014/04/sunday-tea-books-sobacha-buckwheat-tea/

Sipdown!

I made the last of the sample package tonight and it was a good way to wind down the evening. However, I really want to try other houjichas before I decide what I like. This one was pretty no-nonsense. I’m curious about how it will compare to the smoky and dark roasts.