16396 Tasting Notes
One last session for the evening before I call it a night, embrace the sweet comfort of bed and mentally prepare myself for the nightmare that will be working retail on Boxing Day. I pulled this one a few days ago to drink, but just getting around to it now – it’s been in my cupboard for a while now and though I have tried it, it’s been a long time and I think it was only Western style that I first had it?
Started off with a rinse; the aroma is lovely! Stewed fruits, earth, molasses, petrichor…
Steep One: 12 Seconds
- I’ve been experimenting a little with my steep times for Gong Fu lately
- But haven’t settled into a generic “pattern” I’m sure happy with yet…
- This is ok; but oddly salty…
- I find myself thinking of red earth, clay, and jerky; or at least what jerky smells like
- Or cured meat!? Tough(ish) for me to place
- Longtime vegetarian, after all…
Steep Two: 12 Seconds
- Smells sweeter/less of umami and meats??
- More woody, with the same mix of red earth and clay
- Still a LITTLE BIT salty but not the same way it was
- Lingering finish is a bit more cooked fruit/stewed fruit and sweet earth
Steep Three: 18 Seconds
- Much, much better now in the overwhelming salt/meat flavour department
- Talking to Slack people about it; and I think it just didn’t air out as well as it could have
- Now it feels more well rounded, with a lot of sweet wood and earth notes
- Kind of a sweet, vanilla/nut undertone creeping in now
- Also still cooked/stewed fruits in the finish: prune/raisin
Steep Four: 25 Seconds
- Steeped leaf smells lovely; sandalwood and damp earth! Very peaceful…
- Yeah; totally a much better/cleaner flavour now!
- A mix of wood, red earth, raisin, petrichor, stewed fruit, resin, and walnut skins
- Kind of a creamy mouthfeel
Steep Five: 30 Seconds
- Best steep yet; mostly wood, petrichor, cream, vanilla, and walnut
- With sweet cooked fruit/raisin undertones
- Really nice finish! A slight, haunting linger of vanilla and wood then short fade out
Steep Six: 30 Seconds
- Much of the same as last infusion but with a stronger vanilla/cream thing going on
- REALLY digging this pairing of vanilla and strong wet wood notes though
- It’s good shit
Steep Seven: 40 Seconds (Give or take a bit; lost count near the end)
- Definitely seeing a decline in the robustness/dark hue of the liquor colour
- But I’m really enjoying the flavours as this one begins to die off
- Silkier, with soft notes of wood, earth, vanilla, walnut, and dates now
- Kind of brown sugar-y as well?
- REALLY clean finish
Steep Eight: 1 Minute
- Same as prior infusion, just a touch milder/more watery
Steep Nine: 1 Minute
- Still a light coppery colour to the liquor but like 90% of the flavour has faded now
- Mostly a very vanilla/wood sort of thing with light earth undertones
- And a bit of a caramel sweetness to the end
- It’s sort of a sad overall flavour though; very weak/watery
Steep Ten: Two Minutes
- Just a shadow of what this was
- I think this is as good as any a time to cut the session off
- There’s still SOME flavour left, but it’s quite late now
- And I should definitely be policing my caffeine/liquid intake
Overall thoughts? This wound up being a nice session with some really good overall flavours in the middle of the infusions. Plus, as the flavour notes did die out near the end they did so in a really lovely way which highlighted some of my favourite flavours I got to experience drinking this tea. I don’t know what was up with the first few infusions which reminded me so sharply of salted meats – probably just some weird funk from my not allowing this to air out long enough/well enough. It did sit for A LONG TIME air tight, and only in the last few weeks have I let it air out more openly.
Still good overall; nice end to the evening. Fingers crossed the caffeine doesn’t wind up biting me in the ass though…
Sipdown (455)!
Finishing this one off tonight as a pot of tea; it’s been a peaceful Christmas day in the house. We celebrated earlier in the week, so it’s just been a day off for us all. I’m embracing the serenity of it all because the crazy that is Boxing Day tomorrow…
It’s rare that I find a green tea that I really enjoy but this is one that I’ve found really consistent, and peaceful. It reminds me of sticky rice scented teas, but a little greener/fresher. Kind of a sticky rice and bamboo sort of thing? I’d actually probably order this one again just to keep some diversity in my cupboard for when I want that sort of sticky rice/calming sort of tea but don’t want to deplete my Sticky Rice Oolong stash.
Hard to explain how soothing I find these pandan/sticky rice teas but I just… do.
Morning cuppa, with some gingerbread cookies.
This was a nice enough Dian Hong, but I feel like I’ve had so many REALLY good Dian Hongs this year that I just didn’t have the same degree of appreciation for it as I’ve had for some of those other ones. I will say though, that it had quite a lot of sweet potato flavour to it, and that’s a quality I really love in a good black tea – Hong or otherwise. So I have to give it props for that, at least! Other than that, just some good overall sweetness; a mix of creamed honey notes and brown sugar, some mineral, and a bit of a twiggy kind of quality? Also some malt.
And yes – twiggy over woody. I know that those are kind of the same things, but I feel like there’s a different connotation attached to either. Woody, for me at least, kind of speaks to a more well rounded, “thick” kind of quality and twiggy, in my mind, is something a little more “springy”/with a bit more liveliness to it? I don’t know – in my head there’s a difference.
This also worked nicely with the gingerbread; sweet and spicy. A good tea for cookie dunking…
Decided to do a late night Gong Fu session after we got back from the restaurant; I don’t work tomorrow and we’ve already celebrated our Christmas so there’s no reason I can’t stay up late tonight and sleep in tomorrow.
I’m doing the whole cake of this one; just broken up into a few smaller chunks. It’s very loosely compressed, so it was really easy for me to break it up. I ordered a couple of these a while ago to experiment with and am only just now getting to them – I couldn’t resist the thematic tie in of having a ‘fruit cake’ for Christmas. Visually, the ‘cake’ is stunning though! Large leaf pieces, and a wide range of colours! Plus, when I cracked open the vacuum sealed packaging, I was hit with the most lovely aroma! Very sweet, with bright notes of overly ripe cherries and peaches. So many people have described this one as tasting like banana though, so I’m fascinated to see if I get that too.
No rinse – going straight into this one!
Steep One – Ten Seconds
- Sweet and fruity; but not too much overall body right off the bat
- Cherry jumps to mind; but almost more of like a candied/cocktail cherry
- A bit floral, quite green
Steep Two – Ten Seconds
- More of an equal mix of flavour; cherry, floral (jasmine/peony), and sweet grass
- Underlying notes of coconut?
- Just a touch of astringency along my inner cheeks; pleasantly so at this point
Steep Three – Fifteen Seconds
- A little bit of a grassy sharp/sour quality in the top sip
- I suppose it’s a LITTLE BIT like under ripe banana?
- Still getting that sweet floral and cherry sort of thing though
- And a very creamy sort of soup in so far as mouthfeel
- Though unlike other reviewers I wouldn’t say it TASTES creamy???
Steep Four – Fifteen Seconds
- Cherry, jasmine, grass, coconut, butter???
- Hints of under ripe banana still
- Same astringency
- Maybe this buttery quality mixed w. the coconut it’s what being called “creamy/milky”
Steep Five -Twenty Seconds
- About the same as above
- Worth pointing out that this has still been quite light throughout
- No real “punchy” flavours at all
- Also, I know this is ‘light’ roasted but it doesn’t much taste roasted to me at all
Steep Five – Thirty Seconds
- No astringency in this sip at all
- Mostly a sweet, generic fruity sort of quality; a little flatter than previous steeps
- I might start stacking steeps now???
- There’s been no mind blowing flavour progression so I don’t see why not
Steep Six/Seven – Forty Seconds (each)
- Generic fruity/floral mix of typical greener oolong notes
- Very smooth, unimposing flavours
- Missing the more distinct cherry/coconut though
- A LITTLE MILKY IN THE UNDERTONE!?
- Kind of banana leaf like???
- Would be nice to drink whilst doing something else; like studying/cooking/etc.
Steep Eight/Nine – One Minute (each)
- Wow, ok this one is so close to just tasting like water…
- Slightly sweeter, kind of floral water…
- Yeah; calling this one done now I think
Ok, so thoughts overall:
I’m a little bit let down by this one in a few ways? For starters, the dry aroma was so beautiful and enticing, and those first few steeps seemed actually really promising but there’s absolutely no staying power to this tea – you get that very slight bump in flavour within the first three to four steeps and then it essentially flat lines? The rest is kind of my own fault for reading reviews before hand and kind of expecting certain flavours from the tea based on those reviews: some were there, but others were super absent and the ones that were present weren’t to the degree I’d let myself expect that they would be.
Positive notes – this was ultimately a very smooth session, if not a little boring, so I think this would be an excellent candidate for something to steep relatively mindlessly whilst doing something else. Plus, since it was a somewhat short lived tea/didn’t have a whole lot of staying power I think it’d work for times when you want to get that Gong Fu session in without making a commitment to like fifteen+ infusions.
And ultimately, there wasn’t anything ghastly/unpleasant about this tea; it was just kind of boring. Totally better than the fruit cakes I usually find myself presented with this time of year, though!
We just got home from my mom’s birthday supper at The Keg, which is like this SUPER FANCY expensive steak house type place in town. We went there last year, and she really loved it so we went back again…
It kind of infuriates me that a place as nice as The Keg still doesn’t carry anything nicer than Lipton for their tea options. Like, they have a whole coffee menu of fancy, specialty coffees but I ask for tea options and the waiter looks like I’ve shot him. Like, God forbid someone wants tea, of all things. So, I settled for this pretty crappy lemon herbal thing which they served to me in a really nice personal tea pot. Like, the pot was clearly deserving of much better offerings than LIPTON of all things.
Some tea is better than no tea, though – and since I largely ate various salad dishes up until dessert (where I switched to an alcoholic cream soda) the tangy, tart citrus worked well enough alongside the tomatoes and coleslaw that was going on with the rest of the meal. Though, I think the first ingredient of this was actually hibiscus and not lemon. Still moderately ok. I just expect better from a restaurant that’s gonna cost us $250 before tip at the end of the meal…
Cold Brew Sipdown (456)!
I’ve had this one a few times now – but I don’t think I’ve ever actually ordered it. It just kind of likes to show up in my AQTT orders. This time around, I decided to cold brew it though and see what that would do the the flavour.
I think this is the most rich and full bodied form I’ve ever drank this one in; it’s so potent and thick with a mouthfeel that’s incredibly velvety! The flavours are mighty intense too; really strong bergamot notes and a really jammy, sweet black currant undertone. I think bergamot and currant are actually a really nice pairing together because it’s two different sort of fruit flavours/elements (citrus and berries) coming together to create a single, almost elegant feeling fruit profile. Like, not to get snobby but neither bergamot or currant are exactly “common” sort of fruits. Like, you go to the grocery store and you get like apple, bananas, and oranges but if you were to walk out with a small carton of currants that would be like a fancy treat, right? Does that make sense!? At all!? The point is, they work really nicely together and come together to create this bold, sweet rich flavour that feels a lot classier/fancier than your common Earl Grey or just fruit tea in general.
Other note worthy things: it’s gonna a hella lingering aftertaste of bergamot that really sticks around after the finish, and there are some floral undertones of things like lavender as well that contribute to the overall profile in soft ways. Also, it’s a little Acai like too? But I think that’s just from the currant as well.
Once again, this was a pleasant revisit of this tea!
First tea of the day today!
Not sure how much tea drinking I’ll get in today, as it’s both Christmas Eve and my Mom’s birthday so we’re celebrating the holidays this mornings and then later this evening we’ll be going out for dinner and doing birthday things.
This was a nice tea to start the day with though; I got something smooth and medium bodied that was sweet but not overwhelmingly so either! Plus, the overall flavour was richer than last time which automatically made for an improved cup/experience. Of course, I paired this with a nice big handful of actual caramels so I did get quite a bit of sweetness from the candies. But mostly this was just a nice, lightly toasty/roasty sweet red apple flavour with cinnamon, nutmeg, caramel, and roasted nut undertone. Juicy tops notes! Very much a “baked apple” kind of flavour over a caramel apple, which I think I actually observed last time I tried this? Still, very enjoyable and a pleasant way to start off my morning today! If I don’t get a lot of tea drinking in today at least I’ll know that the cups I did get in were really good/solid ones!
Hot cuppa, with Christmas supper!
I over steeped this one a little bit in all the commotion of getting the table set for our big, fancy Christmas supper – and sadly you could definitely tell that the tea was burnt because it had a pretty bitter finishing note to it. Not intolerable, but absolutely present.
The rest of the tea was ok – more lemon than ginger, I’d say. Also, definitely the distinct taste of lemongrass on top of generic lemon as well. Christmas dinner involves so many different, strong flavours and dishes though that the taste of this was largely masked by everything else I was eating. So, I’m definitely going to have to revisit this when I can give it a lot more care in terms of steeping and attention when I’m drinking it. Until then, leaving this one unrated since I really didn’t get a proper tasting/representation of what it can offer in terms of flavour.
Latte!
I mean, this was bound to happen eventually because mint chocolate is the best pairing, made only better when you add milk to it to boost that creaminess! And that’s what this latte was; a sweet and highly smooth explosion of milk chocolate and cooling, crisp mint in your mouth! Simple in nature, and impactful in flavour.
It wouldn’t be Christmas if I didn’t have a “Christmas In…” tea to pull out and drink from Dammann Freres – and this year I’ve actually got two on hand, though this is definitely the preferred of the two…
I made this one up as a hot mug with lots of added milk, and basically just enjoyed sipping on it while the Fam Jam and I played some board games. It was very smooth, and silky both as a tea in general but because of the added creamy milk too. Mostly a chocolate orange flavour, with a little more weight on the orange and some underlying notes of prunes and floral elements. Sometimes I really get the “vodka” element in the blend, but I think adding just about anything to this one kind of masks it so no vodka with this cup. Still a really lovely dessert tea though!
