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I have had this cake for a few years, but I only opened it today for the first time. Until now I would always go for the 2018 vintage. At some point, I should also do a side-by-side comparison.

The tea is really well-balanced and flavourful, and has a supple and smooth texture. At this price, one could hardly ask for more. The taste is quite sweet, but with many undertones – malt, wood, bitter, floral, citrus zest. The aftertaste has strong honey and apricot notes. A pleasant experience overall.

This tea is now in a transition period, and one of its highlights is the thick and smooth oily mouthfeel. Its aroma is sweet with notes of candy and compost, while the taste is floral sweet and bitter, the latter especially in the second half of the session. There are fravours of honey, nuts, flax seeds, apple, elderflower, roasted vegetables and others. The fragrant aftertaste also bring a long-lasting huigan.

Today I prepared this one with less focus on umami and I think I like it more that way overall, especially since it gives a more balanced tea at the expense of pungency and uniqueness.

This is a very light and floral Baozhong, which I don’t mind, but can’t help to wish for more punch. The aroma is creamy and floral with notes of osmanthus and vanilla. The taste is sweet and smooth with a milky aftertaste.

A very decent Assam tea with an interesting aftertaste. Its aroma is like honey and rosehip at first, moving towards chocolate and raspberry notes during the session. The taste is quite smooth and herbaceous for an Assam tea, but has the classic woody and malty backbone. The finish and aftertaste is bitter with notes of mint, taro and other root vegetables.

This is an engaging Nepalese tea thanks to its complexity and a creamy mouthfeel.

The dry leaves smell of caramel, roasted nuts, malt, sugarcane, while the wet leaf aroma reminds me of sahlep, hay, rose, and roasted barley. The taste is sweet and toasty with some floral notes as well as flavours of milk, honey, malt, chocolate and grains.

This is perhaps the best Nilgiri tea I have had. It is very aromatic and tasty with a buttery mouthfeel and a pungent and protracted aftertaste.

The strong dry leaf smell has notes of jasmine, courgette flowers, compost, burdock, and camphor. The last one persists during the session and is complemented by meaty, vegetal, and herbaceous aromas.

The taste is savoury, floral and bitter, while the aftertaste is more spicy and sweet. There are flavours of butter, vegetables such as rapini and courgette, and various spices.

The crisp sencha has a nice bitterness without it ever getting overwhelming. Its mouthfeel is very smooth and soft and its aroma is sweet and floral with notes of rice and seaweed. The taste is grassy, vegetal and milky. One specific flavour I noticed is also kohlrabi.

I haven’t had much Gyokuro in recent years. I prepared this one in my first session with it with the following parameters:
50ml/40°C/2.5min
80ml/40°C/1.5min
110ml/50°C/30s
130ml/55°C/1.5min
160ml/55°C/5min

It was also a bit of a test session, since later in the week I organized a tea party with a focus on Japanese teas, and this is one of the teas that I brewed up there. The above preparation was a bit too heavy early on tbh, but the tea holds up well to these high leaf/water ratios.

As one would expect, it gives a thick liquor with a super long aftertaste. The first infusion is an umami feast – very brothy with a sweet finish. The second one is much more balanced with a very oily texture and additional bitter and grassy flavours. Later steeps are then progressively more vegetal and bitter with much less umami.

This is only a second tea of this type that I have tried as far as I can remember. I would like to see more of Japanese oolongs on the market though.

The aroma of dry leaves is sweet and toasty with notes of nectar and grass. During the session, it is much more floral with hints of orchid and burdock among other associations.

It is a full bodied tea with a thick creamy mouthfeel. The taste is a little bit like a green Taiwanese oolong. It is sweet, vegetal and mineral with a little bit of bitterness, lending to a long and sweet aftertaste. There are strong marine and grassy flavours, as well as those of custard, kale, lemon balm, lime zest.