Phoenix Pearl

Backlog…didn’t really look like pearls much, and I found the flavour lacking, by comparison to other black pearl teas like Teavivre’s Fengquing Dragon Pearls. Those were rich, this was thin. Maybe it was my brew. I have more sample from Cavocorax so maybe a steeping down the road will yield a better brew.

I’ve seen cocoa in tasting notes for black teas many a time, but none of the others, besides this tea, have really delivered for me. The cocoa flavors and sweetness hit you with the first brew and continue on throughout subsequent infusions, carrying a warm ceylon cinnamon body taste with subtle hints of licorice. There’s no real signs of major astringency, even brewing gaiwan style, holding a good flavor for 8 infusions if not more. Overall this tea has been another really positive experience in my foray into Yunnan black teas, with it being in one of the best in comparison to the others I have tried.

I recently discovered a cache of Zen Tea samples from 2015, and I’ll be reviewing them in the next few weeks. I seem to have bucked the trend by brewing this one gongfu style. I steeped 5 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 195F for 10, 12, 15, 17, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.

The small, loosely rolled, often downy snails are really pretty! The first steep has notes of caramel, earth, cocoa, malt, and wood. For such a powerful tea, there’s not much astringency, though a bit does appear in the aftertaste. The astringency gets more intense in the second steep, while all the other flavours stay the same. (Maybe I used more tea than I realized and I need to decrease my steep time.)

The third steep incorporates honey, grain, and a hint of smoke into the existing flavour, and has calmed down in terms of astringency. Surprisingly, though the cocoa is definitely there, it’s never too prominent, although it does get stronger in steep four. This tea goes for a few more rounds before petering out around steep nine.

Though this isn’t the most complex tea in the world, it’s rich and satisfying, and changes interestingly as the pearls unfold. Like most of Zen Tea’s offerings, it’s also well priced. It would have been even better if the cocoa had been a bit stronger.

Steep 1: 300 mL 95 deg. C water, 45ish seconds
-Earthy, similar to a good puerh
-bittersweet cocoa, woody, lots of tannin (a bit bitter and overly tannic, maybe try a shorter steep time)

Steep 2:300 mL, 95 deg. C, 15 seconds
-very aromatic, it smells like a Chinese black with some honey and cocoa in the background
-less Earthy, still slightly bitter

Steep 3: 300 mL, 10 seconds
-still very flavourful, more cocoa
-hints of wood
-honey (but I wouldn’t say it is very sweet)

Yeah, I can see why these are rated so highly. They are delicious. Malty, slightly sweet, slightly citrus-y and bright, very smooth. I’m happy that I discovered Zen tea before they stopped selling actual tea but also sad that I discovered them this late in the game. Everything I have tried so far has been really top notch.

Here’s Hoping TTB

Mmm, so good! After 3 minutes, the tea was a deep coffee brown and I was thinking I’d over-steeped and would need to add milk to offset the bitterness. But not so. This was a cup of smooth, full-bodied, malty deliciousness! I’ve been so impressed with most of the samples I’ve tried from Zen Tea. Definitely going to have to place an order one of these days!

GCTTB

So this is one of the teas that had just one teaspoon left so I pulled it from the box and honestly I am very glad I did. This is a lovely black tea. Sweet and bready with notes of caramel and perhaps even the slightest bit of smoke.

So smooth, from start to finish. Chocolate, bread, malt. Exactly what I needed today.

Yesterday was another clearing, shuffling, sorting kind of day. I am attempting to make space in what is/was my office for an army cot so that I can see whether I will be woken and kept awake by my neighbours—on both sides, omg—in that space as well.

As is, I am woken btwn 3 and 4 by some sort of electro-magnetic current and kept awake from then until whenever, usual 7 am, just in time for the condo construction to start.

I’ve tried going to bed at 7 and 8 and 9 pm to be able to get some rest, but nope. On one side, the neighbours trail past my bedroom with gangs of friends and family and tenants, each with buzzing, pinging cellphones, roaming currents, whatever, and two big scary barking dogs. These people all work shifts, so there is always action in the night and early morning. They also seem to have an overwhelming number of big screens on through the night which somehow affect my brain and its ability to shutdown/stay in shutdown mode. When they turn them on, especially in the night, it is like a massive electrical surge in my space (though we are not connected).

On the other side, it’s a young family with two kids and their extended family and friends. They all seem to have an exercise addiction—elliptical, wii, various workouts on old wooden floors with programs connecting devices and ear buds and whatever else through Bluetooth and/or wifi. The husband comes home at 3 or 5 am and he and his partner yell at each other in the quiet night. Not often with the fighting, but whatever. Maybe coming home at 3 or 5 is usual though. Then, of course, early waking and more exercise, of one kind or another. These people don’t seem to sleep in the night either.

Ugh.

Ok, maybe this is more a life review than a tea review.

Back to the point, every time I shuffle things around at home, I shuffle around my tea order/disorder. New forgotten ones come into focus.

And here we are.

This one is so lovely. I am grateful that it is deliciously here to soothe, motivate, and uplift me.

Onward!

I’m going to have to try this again, Evol. I attempted to gong fu it sipping on a lightly sweet and woodsy splash, then decided to make it western. It was a decidedly black black tea with some the tannin and malt qualities that I’ve gotten from an Assam, but with the Yunnan sweet potato hints along with more of that sweet wood quality. That was at 3 minutes, and much the same in the later flash steeps I had of it.

Like I said, I’ll have to try it again to get more cocoa.

Here’s Hoping Traveling Tea Box

Another wonderful black tea! Nice notes of cocoa, and baked bread abound in these lovely little pearls. I infused them 6 six times (all day!) I did however brew these at 180 degrees, which is slightly less than the requested temperature I believe. I was able to watch the leaves unfurl a bit each time which was really quite lovely. It was interesting to see a black tea pretending to be a green oolong. You know what I mean. Hehe.