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Strong black tea aroma with stone fruits and lemon and caramel after 8s rinse. The aroma reminds me of brewing beer, a thick sweet wort, delicious.

Western style, 5g, 400ml enameled iron brew pot, 96C water, 40s first steep

Lemony tang with caramel, malt, licorice maybe down low, vanilla, very very smooth, weak tannins and no bitterness. Sweet aftertaste that lingers a bit. Flavor is nowhere near as bold as the aroma would suggest, but it isn’t weak or thin either. This is a very nice cup of tea.

Second and final steep at 70s brings out more of a musty old leather undertone, but only just, and it’s under the lemon, sweet, stone fruits and caramel. This steep brings out just a bit more zing at the back of the throat, but nothing else new as a flavor.

The flavor grows on me, over the course of an hour. I’m really impressed. I should try this with a smaller pot or gaiwan. The aroma starts to remind me of a classic southern sweet tea, lemon, black tea and a ton of sugar, but the flavor has just enough complexity to keep me coming back.

Raw notes:

After 5 second rinse, vegetable broth aroma, green or lima beans, floral

1: straw/pale yellow green, with slight tendency to orange on first steep

umami, very slight bitter on the back of the tongue, full mouthfeel, veg broth, spinach

2: floral aromas diminishing, more earthy, sweet aromas, wet bark

second steep brings out brightness, more lima bean flavor, bitterness is way down, spinach is less.

lingering tannic astringency, almost not there.

3: brings more woody aromas, toast

taste is very bright and sweet, bitterness is coming back just a bit, cereal notes, like toasted rice. Toasted rice flavor stays for quite a while, very long pleasant aftertaste.

4: strong toasted grain aromas with still that green/lima bean underneath

brightness is down quite a bit, spinach flavor is coming back up under the toasted rice, bitterness increasing a bit more.

astringency stays with some broth kind of flavor as the spinach and rice flavors compete

5: cut grass aroma joins the party

bitterness recedes, flavors all muted a bit. astringency up, something mineral on top of the toast and spinach, like a butter crisp or romaine lettuce leaf chewed straight out of the garden, but faint.

6: pushed steep out of sequence to 45s. aroma is becoming flat ‘green tea’ with a strong toasty low end and almost no floral

flavor is very sweet, no bitter or astringency, but not much else going on.

7: push to 1:15 to close it out. Finishes with aroma of cut grass and toasted rice. Very pleasant. Reminds me of late summer (how apropos)

Flavor is a touch of sweetness over grass and toast, all very faint.

A nice hour and some spent with this tea. I would definitely drink this again, and can recommend it.

150ml Gaiwan, 175F, 12s + 4s per add’l steep except where noted.

Notable citrus and berries, with a more subdued caramel and floral (lilac?) aroma. First steep shows roastiness or maybe something acrid (in the best possible way) which in the second steep gives way to mineral flavors with more red wine flavors coming through. Minerals and roastiness give way to toast, flowers, berries later on. Brewed western style, 205F 30s + 10s per steep.

Reminiscent of old leather bound books, cedar, damp forest floor, something of a musty but not rotting wood smell. After 3 or 4 steeps, fruits become more prominent — prunes, figs, dates — and pipe tobacco. Very little bitterness or astringency. A very comforting array of aromas and flavors for a snowy early spring afternoon.

Gongfu, 150ml, boiling water, 2x rinse at 10s, start at 15s + 7s per add’l steep.

Relatively weak, steep 1 pyramid bag at boiling for 6m30s. Uninspiring and didn’t really stand up to milk either. What flavor there was was promising, but with one bag in 12oz of water at over six minutes I would have expected to be able to discern more than nutmeg and a bit of maple. Purchased as a single bag in plastic, may have been old/stale.