Black tea from Iwata, Benihikari cultivar, 1st flush

Thank you Derk! Here’s my input-I’m going to have a hard time going into this tea blind since I’ve read your note and the description from the website, so here it goes.

I brew this in my gong fu 2 go, and intuitively make it. I did about 25-30 seconds in the first brew with about two thirds of the bag. I immediately noticed a geranium-lilac aroma coming from the cup, and drinking it up, chestnut or even butternut squash coats the palette. There’s some brown sugar sweetness here and there, and some woodsiness. It’s not as woody as other Japanese Teas I’ve had. Instead, it’s more floral and smooth bordering on some oolong qualities. How the florals flatten on my tongue, and then rise into my sinuses remind me of quality Baozhong flower notes, and even has the same kind of gold floral malt some of them have. The savory qualities make it lean more black, but the mouthfeel does interesting things, starting low, creamy, then cooling up into a sweetness with piquant bitter hints. Middle steeps were more floral, more rosy, but lilac, squash, brown sugar, and light wood hit my brain the most. Later steeps, 4 and 5, were sweeter/lighter towards squash and sugar, maybe cinnamon, and the last brew was sweet, light, and the most woodsy.

I’m not too sure about some of the fruitier notes described, but I can see them because the teas naturally sweet and has the kind of acidic bite strawberries might have. Camphor is something I immediately get to approximate the sweet wood cooling oil quality of the tea. I’m leaning towards petrichor in terms of mood and feel. Cinnamon is a little bit more psychological. I see it more in the later steeps than in the earlier ones, though I’m not sure if I’d peg that as a note comparing it to cinnamon in teas and Rou Guis.

I really like this one, and enjoyed it more than the Tsushima black a little bit because this one was more easy going. I still have one Japanese black to try out along with others, but I enjoyed this one. More experienced drinkers would be better with this one than newbs because it might just taste like a savory floral tea to them. I hope my input was decent derk!

April 28th, 2021 harvest, grown without pesticides

Second time this has happened in the middle of typing a glowing review of this tea — backspaced myself out of the pop-up window and lost it all.

In my frustration, I feel like I need some closure so I’m posting a little bit for now:

What a gorgeous Japanese black tea! It blows away all past encounters with Japanese blacks, all of which deeply offended my stomach. This leaf is so clean and pure.

I’ll come back with a full review later after typing it up in another platform :P