Pure Buds Black

This is the newest crop of Pure Bud, & I’d like to thank Garret for sending me a generous sample of it! I’m short on words to describe teas today, but this tea isn’t short of flavor, with a rich mouthfeel & the flavor of an excellent whole grain toast. It’s both sweet & savory, & the dry leaf is really pretty, I might add.

SIPDOWN TIME! This is a bit more “crusty” than the other cup I had…but it’s quite nice! Teas like this are making my day (as well as my many deadlines) possible!

I steeped this in my gaiwan and am blown away with how amazing it tastes. It has a delicious malty tone to it, sweet … but not too sweet. Very smooth, rich and robust. Notes of cocoa, but not an overly sweet cocoa taste. A fruit note in the background that is both sweet and sour. Slightly creamy, and absolutely wonderful… LOVE!

Another generous free sample from Mandala, packed with my last order. They are so nice.

As always, the dry leaf is long, unbroken, and beautiful, a light warm golden yellow. This one’s sweet but with a light airy sort of flavor. Slightly fruity in a bright way, but also quite silky, not at all fruit-tart astringent. There’s some dry wood fuzziness in the texture, a little powdery like sawdust—might sound ick to many but I like it just fine. I think this would be a good one to enjoy on one of the first sunny mornings of spring.

I like this tea. I really, really like it. I’m pretty challenged at describing black teas, since my favorites all seem to be varying proportions of ‘sweet,’ ‘malty,’ ‘smooth,’ and ‘raspy.’ And I like all of those things. I guess the trait my top three have is that those qualities are also ‘balanced.’ I’ve started my black tea explorations with Mandala, and my top three are this, Golden Needle, and Black Beauty. I think I slightly prefer Black Beauty to this because it has less astringency, though Pure Bud is gentle too. I will absolutely finish up this deliciousness, but I think one of the others will be my house black tea, at least for now.

Really nice flavors throughout the infusions. Sweet Potatoes, baked bread, sugar cane, dark cherry, hints of cocoa and caramel, malty, earthy, honey, mineral, and stonefruits. Slightly astringent.

Gaiwan 208 ˚ F, 110 ml, 6g, quick rinse, 6 infusions: 10s, 15s, 20s, 30s, 1 min., 2 min.

Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. :) I made a huge bowl of soup and watched The Irishman which I enjoyed and also The Crown Season 3. It sucks being away from my whole family who are in Southern California but I enjoy my peaceful evenings with games, knitting, and movies very much!

A very shiny buddy tea! The small golden tendrils give off a faint baked bread aroma with some salted caramel and malt. I am not big on Dianhong, but I do like the gold buds. I warmed my bowl up and slipped some inside. The aroma expands into some dark cherry, cocoa, and a woody tang. I washed once and sipped away. This is a good red tea, for it lies somewhere in between bitter/woody and sweet/cocoa. It has a good malt base with some woodiness but with a sooth baked bread taste. The astringent tone is just slight, and it shows up in the aftertaste. The next steeping brings on some yam notes with a wood shaving dryness. The tea is decent. I am more keen to the flavor sweet bombs, but this is still a fair tea.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BPqBPaXgmwJ/?taken-by=haveteawilltravel

Thanks scribbles for the lovely sample!

This is such a pretty tea. And pretty freaking delicious. The happy orange liquor is thick, and looks like clear liquid sweet potatoes. I taste roasted sweet potatoes, a hot slice of fresh baked bread, as well as perhaps a light dusting of cocoa. This tea is some serious NOMS. All the little golden fuzzies pack a punch, and got me bouncing off the walls. This was my breakfast tea today, maybe I should have eaten something with this because I am SO friggin wired. heh.
This holds up to many, many steeping in my lil’ gaiwan, so I will be obnoxiously hyped all day longggg :P

Got this as a free sample with a Mandala order a while ago and am just now getting around to trying it. It is pretty good, only slightly malty. I am getting another note too, one I think is generally described as baked bread, quite flavorful.

I brewed this once in an 18oz teapot with the sample, around 6g and boiling water for 1 min.

Ohhhhhhh wow. This is freaking amazing. SO sweet (I could smell the sweetness while it was brewing!), light, malty, a bit of chocolate, but SO MUCH sweet. But that perfect sort of delicious sweet that’s not cloying or anything, just really decadent. And the tea is so smooth, too. A serious treat. Agh. I envision a solid Mandala order in the future, because so far, I’ve been very impressed. I believe I’ve had varying teas from golden tips/buds before, but nothing like this. And I even oversteeped this, based on my typical parameters.

Thanks for sharing all these absolute gems with me, Sil!