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Brewed it in the Breville this time. 10 g for 1000 ml water 170 F for 3:30 basket cycle. I’m generally hesitant to steep anything but black tea in the Breville. It’s still not anything spectacular (at this point, being a spring 2015), but it turned out better than I expected steeping it this way. Decent flavor, a tiny bit of sweetness and not much astringency.

I’m continuing on my Keemun craze. It all started with one innocent sample of Keemun Xiang Luo, and next thing I know I’m back to the tea shop to buy more because it was incredible. Then came the thought, “I bet this would go great with Stilton”, so over to the cheese shop I went. The pairing worked with a cheese other than the Stilton (actually Shropshire) as I thought it would, but I knew with the right Keemun it would work. So, back to the tea shop I went for more. I got some Mao Feng (this one) for the pairing, some Ho Ya A so I wouldn’t drink all of the Xiang Luo (they’re similar and the Ho Ya A is easier to get) and some basic Keemun (the Imperial) because once that Keemun spiral sucks you in…

Of the Keemuns I have, this is the boldest of the bunch. There is a definite smoky, roasted flavor. People who like dark roast coffee would find it familiar. Going hand in hand are other dark roasted flavors, mostly dark chocolate, but also some notes of tobacco. It has a smooth thick body, which given the taste, reminds me of a stout style beer. There is a little bit of a tannic bite, but just a little, possibly adding to what seems to be an afternote of spice.

Colston Bassett Shropshire was the cheese I initially had in mind when I was drinking the Xiang Luo for a Keemun pairing, but it didn’t work. The Xiang Luo just wasn’t forward enough, lacked in too many areas and just wasn’t quite right in others. The Moa Feng that I’m drinking right now has the bravado to stand up to the Shropshire. Harsher notes from the cheese or the tea were balanced by the other, new flavors were formed. A brightness formed that wasn’t initially there. Hidden flavors of dried fig and apple were revealed. Even the texture, became all around more fudgey. So far the pairing was great… but my favorite (and the most unexpected part) was the rind with the tea! The rind on this cheese is 100% edible, but it’s often strong to the point where you wouldn’t want to eat it, and the piece I’m eating is certainly close to that point, and by itself was pretty nasty. Talk about a balancing act. (when I talk about eating the rind, I’m eating it as part of a bite containing the interior of the cheese.) The tea completely washes away the harsh volatile flavors in the rind. The predominant flavors left are roasted peanuts, almonds, and chocolate. If nutella were made with almonds and peanuts instead of hazelnuts, it would taste like this. Finally, the pairing I was going for worked, and now the Keemun spiral can come to an end.

I steeped the tea western style in a ForLife brand steeping basket/cup combo. I used 8.9g leaves, 14 oz water, 202 F for 4 mins. I like a heavy brew with Keemun.

I found an old almost empty bag of this, way in the back of a cabinet. It is almost 2 years old at this point, so a fair review wouldn’t be possible. From what I recall it was a simple and delicious tea. I remember it having a really pleasant sweetness, but not much beyond that, other than that it was really affordable. I brewed some up today out of curiosity, and as expected it had suffered and wasn’t what it once was. I’m mostly adding this note to remind myself to get it when the spring 2016 comes around.

I ran out of this tea a couple weeks ago and forgot to review it, and they’re not selling it right now, but I don’t want to forget it. Absolutely delicious. It was almost all golden tips. I remember it being super smooth and rich. I never had trouble with over steeping or bitterness. Amazing value for a top quality tea. If they ever get it in again, I’m jumping on it, especially for the price.

Having some midday green. Maybe not fair to describe this one right now, because the 2016 should be coming out relatively soon. I’ll try to get some when the new batch comes in to be fair. The little dry leaves are a dark green with a tan tinge. After steeping the leaves expand a great deal and become a forest green with some rust colored streaks running through them occasionally. I’d almost say those rust colored spots look like oxidation but the taste of the tea doesn’t reflect that. The flavors are vegetal, mostly spinach but also a noticeable amount Nori seaweed (but not fishy). It is thin bodied, and leaves my mouth feeling dry, the same way that spinach would.

I brewed it in a 130ml easy giawan, at 170F, 6.5g leaf. Steeps lasted anywhere between 5 and 30 seconds. I got at least 10 steeps out of it.

A standard Keemun, nothing fancy, no bells and whistles, just solid, good old tasty tea from the Keemun family. I’m not calling it simple to detract from it, I say that because I find some Keemuns to be very complex, and contemplative. The backbone of this one is a malty flavor, the kind of malty flavor that I find to be the commonality throughout the black tea world, that which makes a black tea taste “black tea-ish”! I don’t really know how else to describe it. (albeit common to most black teas, isn’t always the back bone.) There are little hints of smokiness, and dark chocolate, but there’s no question that those flavors are in the background. The bitterness is halfway between standard black tea tannin and the sort of bitterness that the high grade Keemuns have, which is along the lines of bitter chocolate for me. (definitely a good thing) It is medium bodied and very smooth. Overall, great quality for something in its price range.

This isn’t really something something that I’d use for a tea and cheese pairing class, but since I’m eating cheese with breakfast, I might as well talk about it. Of course basic brie tasted good with it. It gives you that typical milk in black tea flavor, but also brings out the dark chocolate note a little bit, while subduing the little bit of smokiness it has. I also tried it with a Spanish (Navarra) sheep cheese called Roncal. It reveals the orchid flavor that Premium Steap lists in their description, but it’s still not incredibly detectable. The tea also helps bring out some of the fruit in the cheese, as it’s far from the fruitiest cheese out there.

I can’t wait until summertime. This will be great as an iced tea. It would also be at home with a big breakfast of bacon, fried eggs, buttered toast, and sausage… and lets throw some scrapple in there because I’m in Philly!

I steeped it in an automatic Breville for 4 min, basket rotation, 205 F, 9g leaf, 700 ml water.

I’ve always liked Keemuns a whole lot, but for some reason I haven’t had one in years. Peg (the owner) at Premium Steap gave me a sample of this, simply saying that I’ll probably like it (she knows my tastes) and it doesn’t come around too often. Yes, she was 100% right, and yes I went back to buy a whole bunch of it before it was all gone.

First off, I’ll say that this tea is extremely forgiving. Got distracted while steeping? Not a problem. Accidentally put too much leaf in the pot? Don’t fret. I’ve steeped this in a Breville, a Gaiwan, and a ForLife steeping cup/basket. At temperatures ranging from 90C to boiling. Different water to leaf ratios (more leaf = better for me). It’s really just a matter of preference. It’s not like many Blacks where if you’re off by a little bit on your measurements it’ll feel like someone shoved an unripe quince in your mouth.

The bitterness that you get here is along the lines of what you would find in dark chocolate. As a matter of fact, there is a whole lot about this tea that is along the lines of dark chocolate. The flavor is like those Taza Mexican Chocolate disks, where the chocolate is ground and grittier. The secondary flavor in here is of dried blueberries. There also is also a little smokiness and maltiness hanging out with some spices (cinnamon?) in the background.

The texture is super soft while the liquor is in your mouth. The finish leaves a mild pleasant feeling of dryness on the tongue, that wants to be quenched with another sip of tea… which unfortunately means the cup of tea disappears way faster than I want it to!

Overall a complex, well balanced and smooth tea. Even though there are a whole bunch of flavors going on here, some more predominant than others, they all meld together beautifully, and the texture matches perfectly. I love how it can taste so interesting and full without being harsh and aggressive. This tea is delicious on its own and doesn’t need anything to help balance it, but why would I stop that from letting me taste it alongside some cheeses!

I tried it out with Colston Bassett Shropshire Blue, Etivaz, Birchrun Blue, Roncal, basic brie, Idiazabal, and Chiriboga Blue. I see a trend developing for plain old, nothing special, double creme brie… it’s good with just about all black teas, or at least, is certainly never bad. In this instance the combo went to the world of milk chocolate, very tasty but not mindblowing. I thought that the Etivaz, a super funky alpine style, had a chance of being extremey weird with it, but I like to experiment. It turns out that the wet woodland funk, was nicely balanced by the tea. The tea was overpowered, so definitely not a go to pairing but they didn’t clash, as I thought they might… it’s all in the name of science ;-) There weren’t any clashes from the lot, but the one that I thought would be a home run wasn’t. Years ago, I remember having a Keemun (Moa Fung or Ho Ya A, I don’t remember) with Colston Bassett Stilton, and it being an amazing pairing. (Basically, Shropshire and Stilton are the same thing, the difference being one has a yellow background color, the other white. Yay for annatto.) When I went to the store, the Shropshire had more of the flavor that would work with this pairing. It was good but definitely not the melding of worlds that I remembered. The tea just didn’t have the machismo to stand up to the cheese.

This is a black tea of finesse, and Chiriboga Blue had the finesse and subtlety to match. I’m so happy that my cheesemonger suggested it. It’s young and subdued, with a lactic tart canvas, very yeasty upfront, the blue flavor is mild but metallic, and there is a hidden white wine flavor in the finish. This pairing wasn’t one that created new flavors out of the blue, as some do. (I just noticed the pun after typing that.) It subdues some flavors and amplifies others to refine all of the wonderful characteristics shine. Tartness and bitterness are more nuanced and smooth, yeast flavors integrating more with wine flavors, berries brighter, chocolate more refined, etc… It was like having a dessert of mixed berries with mascarpone and dark chocolate shavings on top, and just a dusting of spice (no sugar added, the ingredients standing out on their own) and washing it down with an easygoing white wine. Simple, elegant and delicious.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BDQxwI4kXx5/?taken-by=thecheesenerd (brie not pictured)

This tea reminds me a little of a decent Longjing. I brewed this half way between a Western style, and Gongfu style by using a a Forlife brewing basket in a 16 oz cup with 7g of leaves, filling it about 1/3 of the way. Just a little more than covered the leaves, so about 200 ml. I did a super quick rinse and got decent flavor out of it for about 5 brews and a ghost of itself (albeit, still tasty) after that.
At lower temperatures(160F-165F), on the first couple of steeps, it starts with a light floral flavor. Something that I find desirable and that I associate with greener Oolongs. This flavor seems to dissipate after a couple minutes of hanging around in the cup. At that point it has more of a vegital sweetness, with a tiny touch of bitterness. Like freshly picked asparagus that has been thrown on the grill just long enough to eliminate its raw astringency, and pick up a the slightest hint of grill marks.
At higher temperatures(180-185), there is no floral element to it. The predominant flavor is vegital, the sweetness of lower temperatures replaced by stronger tones of uncooked veggies. There is also a touch of Nori, similar to that of a Japanese green. but just a touch. I like the result of the higher temperature steep but my preference is definitely for the lower temperature.

For cheese pairing, I mostly used the lower temperature steeps. No home runs, but there were two pairings that were good and point towards pairings that may be great.
The first was a goat cheese from the Liore Valley called Valancay. This is the pasteurized version that they send to the USA. (It’s illegal to import raw milk cheeses aged under 60 days here.) It’s a pyramid shaped cheese, covered in ash. This piece was aged just the slightest bit (the age makes a big difference with this one.) There is a yeasty element to the cheese, that starts to form a white wine flavor (along the lines of Vouvray or Voignier) from the paring. The cheese does overpower the tea a little. I’m pretty sure that if an extremely fresh goat, (If you can get a raw pasture raised one, where the goats weren’t eating anything too strange, that would be best) just a couple of days age, were used, it would would bring this pairing to its full potential.
The second hopeful was a couple of washed rind cheeses. Delice de Jura is a pasteurized version of the raw milk Reblechon AOC, which is contraband in the USA (once again, thanks FDA.) It acualy tastes halfway between a real Reblochon and the stronger Alsatian Munster, as the wash rind flavor is more prominent than in Reblochon, and it lacks the thin white mold that covers real Reblochon. The pairing brings out the sweet vegital flavors in the tea. I also tried the tea with Le Burgond, a raw cow’s milk semi-soft cheese made in the style of Morbier, but from Burgundy instead of the Jura, where Morbier is from. (Similar to Raclette or Fontina Val d’Aosta) The tea brought out a nuttiness in the cheese. It was a decent pairing, but nothing that floored me. Once again the cheese being a little bit too powerful for the cheese. This leads me to think that the ideal pairing would be real Reblochon AOC. I would go for one that is on the younger side, right before the youthful lactic acidity has left it completely. So, I humbly request that someone out there, in a country that doesn’t have twisted regulations on raw milk cheese, give my suggested paring a try for me!
I also tried this with basic double creme Brie, 3 yr Gouda, Roncal DO, and Idiazabl DO. No flavors mingling there, with the Idiazabal being a bit odd of a combination, not in a good way.