4 Tasting Notes
My go-to Genmaicha. I may drink this tea more than any other tea at the time of this tasting note. This has been my choice of Genmaicha for about two years. I can acquire it easily through a local organic food market, it’s cheap, it’s nutty, it has a good balance of flavors for Genmaicha.
It probably won’t knock your socks off, but for me at least, it is a tea that I keep going back to and can drink all day without growing sick of it.
Preparation
I got this tea in the $3.00 sampler pack from Den’s. First pot of this I did according to directions from Den’s, 30 second steep. This yielded a much “greener” flavored Genmaicha than I am used to, mainly due to the added Matcha but partly due to a shorter steeping time than I am used to. I didn’t find the nutty notes from the roasted rice coming through as much as I would have liked.
Second go around I steeped it how I usually do Genmaicha, for about 3 minutes. This second time was a better cup of tea for me with a bolder, nuttier flavor.
Not sure how I feel about the Matcha being in there. Most will go into your cup the first steep, so if doing multiple infusions of this expect a much different cup the second time.
This is a much lighter, more vegetal Genmaicha than I am accustomed to, I feel I prefer something a bit heartier, like the Genmaicha from Frontier that I usually keep in stock.
Preparation
While staying for a few days at my folks house I found myself rummaging though the cupboards looking for a tea and stumbled upon this. While I am actually a fan of Bigelow Earl Grey, I can’t say the same for most other mass market bagged tea. I was not surprised this didn’t break the mold for me the way their Earl Grey does. It was adequate and served to warm me sufficiently after lending my hand on the family farm on a particularly chilly September day. What more can I say?… It was warm and tasted of tea.
When bagged tea is all that’s available, Bigelow’s flavored teas are a solid choice, and I never drink flavored tea otherwise so that’s saying something. I already liked their vanilla chai, and then I stayed for over a week in a hotel that had I think 12 or 16 of the teas that Bigelow offers and I got acquainted with all of them. I agree the Darjeeling is not good, and the plain green tea is about the worst, but the Earl Grey, and the lemon one, and the orange one were all pretty good. (The Mint Medley is good too if you like herbal blends.)
I bought a tasting tin of this loose leaf milk Oolong on a whim. The price was right and I can always use more tea tins (my cupboard is a mess).
The aroma of the dried leaves was very interesting, as was the aroma of the tea once steeped. The flavor however I found to be a little too astringent and not nearly as milky as the aroma had implied. Still a very nice cup of tea, and maybe I will appreciate its notes more on my next cup now that I know what to expect.
I must say that this tea was expertly rolled. Once steeped the one teaspoon of dried leaves had expanded to fill my fairly large infuser. The leaves seemed to be of great quality and were very much full leaf.
Preparation
Subsequent cups I have steeped at a slightly lower temperature than what was recommended on the the tin. This resulted in a less astringent brew and was more pleasant and milky. Still not particularly fond of this tea though. As nice as the aroma is I can’t get into the flavor.
I agree that their instructions are wrong! I steeped this loose leaf Milk Oolong for only three minutes and used cooler water. The result was not astringent in the least!
This, and the frontier Bancha are great bargain green teas. The bancha is pretty grassy, but I like that in my green teas. I pick them up at whole foods in the bulk spice area for a pretty good price.