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Third steeping: I tried it with four ounces water and two ounces hemp milk, and a teaspoon vanilla sugar as dessert. Just that little bit of sugar and milk made it so sweet and rich I had to leave half the cup for a while just to finish it. But it was too good to leave at a thrid steeping, so I poured some milk and water in with the leaves and tucked it in the fridged to try iced tomorrow. Yep, nothing like iced oolong for the sweltering 28 F snow day ahead!
As amazing as this oolong is I don’t see myself needing this one on hand all the time. Just frequently. Perhaps it’s just not the milk oolong for me or perhaps I need to brew it a little stronger for my tastes or in a way that adds some of Ti Kuan Yin greeness.
Either way Meghann deserves a pot of gold, three wishes and the keys to the city.

In need of a sketching friendly snack and in awe of the first steeping, I made garlic vanilla popcorn to match my tea. What? Garlic and vanilla pair amazingly wheither prepaired sweet or savory. Try it! Last night’s endevor is one of the best popcorn recipes ever! Quick too. I made while cooling the second infusion. Much to my surprise I couldn’t smell the tea leaves in the pot already. Closer sniff realed that I could, but it smelt identical to the popcorn. They unfurled nicely too, which I love about Ti Kuan Yins. A couple leaves were light yellow like the popcorn. Absent mindedly I wondered if they tasted like it too.
So I ate a leaf. Stopped. Then I ate a few kernals of popcorn. Ate another leaf. Ate another kernal. The difference in taste was largely in moisture.
To continue my dignified straight-from-the-teapot snacking, I poured some hemp milk in a sauce bowl and dunked popcorn in. And it tasted exactly like the tea!
Unbelievable. This tea even tastes like popcorn. Rich hemp milk and buttery vanilla roasted garilc popcorn. This is definately the tea to convert all latte addicts.

Dry aroma: Movie buttered popcorn, Ti Kuan Yin smell, (a hint of spearmint? Maybe that’s from being next to a bag of Grasshopper for day….), black pepper, butter, milk chocolate, burnt popcorn, genmaicha
The movie butter is only in the aroma. The first sip is swoon worthy splash of real sweet butter and other people are wrong here-milk. Hemp milk specifically. Ooh, I love hemp milk.
I let it cool quite a bit before drinking so it felt thin and hydrating, a lot like hemp milk that hadn’t been shaken in a while .After the first sip the butter mellows a bit to silky smooth vanilla, and tones of other planter variety orchids. This makes extremely happy as I planned on painting some orchids tomorrow. I’ll have to keep the bag by my desk for good luck, eh? ;)
Ooh, I can’t wait to try the second steep later.

Best. Oolong. Ever! Another day making sample from the generous Meghann M who saw this on my shopping list and sent it. Miles de gracias.

Trying this iced~! So of course this was the last song on my painting playlist. =)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CgNEDbiHqF4

Something Cool by Jennifer Zarine from Fresh Made Cuppa Tea

I actually was listening to June Christy’s version but this came up when I searched for a matching video. I think Zarine’s got better pacing and music but Christy’s voice is unbeatable.

I Tbsp leaf, 1 Tbsp raw honey, 1/4 tsp hibiscus, and eight rosehips
12 0z for five hours.
Ooh, this is a bit better iced. I didn’t add any Bai Mu to give tea a chance to peek out from under the mountain of strawberries and flowers but the poor leaves remained entombed. Ah, well. Still a nice, refreshing rise in blood sugar before dinner.

So for pre-painting pick-me-up, this tea, some raw chocolate, a honeydate and coconut yogurt.
I wanted to save today’s sugar budget for my glass of iced Garden Aria for pre-painting pick-me-up. I just got some great rosebuds and honey dates, which are apparently used to flavor/sweeten tea and are good for digestion. So three rosebuds and a crushed honeydate with 1 1/4 tsp.
?…!

Oh, and some jazz for your leaf juice.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M51UqyWpYko&feature=related

Yesterday (and today, for that matter) was a gloomy snowday…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCEJtUNe90A (Emilie Autumn’s version is too haunting to hear between the dark, the cold, and BBC. What a recipe for night terrors. )
Last night was BBC News about Tuscon and Teavana’s Garden Aria, this time perfected with a pinch of hibiscus, two rose hips, and Tangerine Bai Mu Dan. Very complex and full. It didn’t take much to weave a little tea taste back into this fruit basket.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dsngKEtA-k
I need to focus and finish this drawing before we move next week. I’m getting too nit-picky for the level of detail I should allow myself at this stage. It’s very counterproductive.

I really love that little store; they are an amazing source of health and tea relief in this wasteland Ohio. I’m not a big fan of chrysanthemum, but Tao has enchanted me into loving very impossible things before. So I picked up a couple ounces and scurried home. And surprise! Tao doesn’this tuocha doesn’t even sell on their site! O= Bless their magic restocked.

Twenty second boiling rinse.
First steep: Brewing it like the rose first, two minutes and 5oz 212 F water. Light aroma, some oceanic pu-erh scent with chrysanthemum underneath. Tastes very earthy with chrysanthemum loudly taking over but wakame and sunflower make it interesting. It gets much thicker as it cools, almost gel like. You really don’t like being treated like your rosy sibling, eh? Noted.

Second steep: 3 minutes, 200 F
Still too light. The chrysanthemum has settled down and let everything start to harmonize. Thick but light, tastes land feels just like coconut milk, straw pu-erh, and air from a nearby beach. I don’t like chrysanthemum much but this is delicious. Once again the second cup is the best, under steeped or not! And I know exactly what this tea is for!

Third: 4 min 30 seconds, 200 F
Oops. Got a tad distracted and it’s definitely a smidge over-steeped.
Fourth steeping: Chrysanthemum’s all gone, just like in the rose tuocha. It’s a little darker and made of pure pu-erh tastes, like a lakebed. Much thinner as well. Very relaxing and the perfect end to a good transformation of tuocha but…

Fifth steeping: 5 minutes 212 F water
Yeah, it’s done at four. Even if I had extra chrysanthemum to pop in like I did the rose, the pu-erh has lost too much. No lakebed, no beach, just lake water.
Every tea has its purpose and each of Tao‘s tuocha have made theirs very clear to me; this one is definitely for chilly spring days , steeped throughout the morning to remain refreshed and focused on a good start to a project. Given how soon I start art school, this tea is another perfectly timed find for which I am very grateful.
Glancing out at the literal blizzard that just began, inexplicably grateful. Shudder I might go through another of these today.
Long post short: I love Steepster, I love tuocha, I love my magic health food store that thinks it’s a Tao of Tea store. This tea has simple, cleaner tastes than Tao’s other tuocha that could win over some on the ‘”weird” taste of chrysanthemum, but I can’t see myself drinking this past lunch. Very good for getting going early and all the way to lunch.

Edit: XD Oh wow this all fits so perfectly! So glad I checked the dashboard before I got back to things.
In response to TeaEqualsBliss’s song-and tea matching challenge: This song from my favorite video game is appropriate to both my situation and it sounds like the scene I imagine while drinking this tea.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3H56O1iP9Q

I usully save whites for late night headaches/ and iced tea but I’ve been dying to try this one.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvUxHkdzx6I
Amapola is a red hibiscus, one of the main smells that I get from this tea and what i hoped it would taste like.
This is a very nice, light tea that’s bizarrely peachy with hints of apricot. Cherry and strawberry too. I might try it iced once or twice. Very little rose and hibiscus, but I have large jars of both to boost it. On its own it fills the role of honey friendly throat soother nicely.
Thanks to AmazonV for this.

I let the water get too cold this afternoon but it dissolved well enough to help me focus.