91 Tasting Notes

88

This is a nice tea.
Nose; strong gardenia, plumeria, slight cinnamon, sour cherries, juniper, mango, ginger, slight compost.
Palate; lighter than nose, plumeria, ginger, tart plum, slight cinnamon, kumquat, kiwi fruit, nice throat.

Preparation
195 °F / 90 °C 0 min, 15 sec

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86

this one is sort of OK…
Nose; light roasted grain, grass, lychee, light floral note.
Palate; light honey, lychee, slight herbal — thyme, romaine, light floral note.

Preparation
195 °F / 90 °C 0 min, 15 sec

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88

Nose; Sweet spices — clove, cinnamon, orchid?, walnut, mineral note.
Palate; sweet, slight spice, orchid, walnuts, mineral.

Preparation
195 °F / 90 °C 0 min, 15 sec

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93

Love this one!
Nose; buttered wheat toast, honey ( yum ), lychee, very " warm ", slight rosewood, light orchid, light grass.
Palate; Allspice, lychee, osmanthus, round, slight ginger, mandarin orange, slight grass.

Preparation
195 °F / 90 °C 0 min, 15 sec

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80

While my experience has been very good with tea from YS, once in a while one misses the mark for me. All of this is so subjective though YMMV.
Nose; honey, malt, freshly baked bread, plums, wet leaves.
Palate; slightly bitter, plums, slightly tannic — astringent, malt, cocoa at back of palate, was unusual and had a very dry mouth feel. I did not like that aspect.

Preparation
195 °F / 90 °C 0 min, 15 sec

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70
drank ban tian yao by JK Teashop
91 tasting notes

OK, so maybe I am just too much of a tea snob, just too critical, but here I am, so I guess I will keep going…
By and large I have not found the JK teas up to snuff, my experience has been better with Whispering Pines, Verdant, and especially Yunnan Sourcing.
Nose; lightly roasted nori, seashore.
Palate; not much there, slightly sweet, oatmeal, brown sugar.

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80

This is not your typical Zheng shan. Almost no smokiness, unfortunately, I did not care much for it…
Nose; Honey, malt, ginger, lemon peel, Darjeeling.
Palate; honey, slight yam, lemon, bitter, seemed kind of disjointed to me.

Preparation
195 °F / 90 °C 0 min, 15 sec

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85

Once again, this is a tea that can be really exceptional or just meh…this one was in the meh category for me.
Nose; light osmanthus, spices, wheat grass, light honey, woody note.
Palate; sweet spices ( oddly this one was more cinnamon like that the rui gui from the same source ), light honey, sweet apple, dates, not much mineral note.

Preparation
195 °F / 90 °C 0 min, 15 sec

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83
drank rou gui by King Tea
91 tasting notes

To start, I found the Rou Gui from YS to be much nicer.
Nose; mineral, roasted vegetables and grains. The roasted notes pretty much obscured what else was there, though later steepings revealed the spice flavors.
Palate; light and delicate, roasted barley, sweet spice showed up later…
Not bad, just not great.

Preparation
195 °F / 90 °C 0 min, 15 sec

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87

I found this one really fascinating.
Nose; I got a definite really good cigar note, now I used to smoke cigars so for me this was more nostalgic than off putting, be warned…sweet potato, leather, earth, toasted grain.
Palate; nice full mouth, slight cigar again — so unusual, molasses, malt, sweet potato, a light floral note.

Preparation
205 °F / 96 °C 0 min, 15 sec

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Profile

Bio

Drinking tea is fairly new, but have had good wines for many years, so that is my perspective…
I generally brew in small ( under 200 cc and often under 100 cc ) pots either Japanese Tokoname or Chinese Yixing. I vary my steeping times a lot before I decide on tasting notes — I take a sort of experimental approach, gong fu one time, western short steeping another, vary the water temp, etc. to see what the tea will offer. Also, I will take notes on different days since what one brings to a cup one day will not be the same the next. I rate teas somewhat the same way as I rate wines, with over 90 being excellent, and over 95 being truly remarkable — even once in a lifetime. Over 85 very good, over 80 good.

Location

USA

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