84
drank Ali Shan by Adagio Teas
243 tasting notes

You ever have so many teas that you want to try that you do not remember them by name? Yea, me too. Anyway, this one was a sample from Ricky, thank you (!) and I have to say that I will DEFINITELY be purchasing this with my next Adagio order.

The leaves are tightly curled oolong, they are dark green but brew a pale slightly golden liquor. The aroma of the leaves is plain, simple, not complicated, almost a faint green tea smell. An interesting note is that I usually pour hot near-boiling water into a smaller teapot that I carry with me around the house, immediately after pouring water into the infusion basket and over the tea, a sweet, almost minty aroma was released. Now ecstatic, I let the tea infuse for four minutes (no additives). Unfortunately, by the end of my brew, that minty sweet aroma was gone and replaced with a mellow vegetal note.

The flavor is surprising, it is gentle, a bit vegetal, a little buttery, with a tiny hint of sweetness at the very end and the cool mouth-feel of a minty tea. Delicious.

Second infusion, two minutes, no additives. I did not get the minty smell again, but it was more pronounced in the tea itself. Still buttery, light, vegetal with slightly more mint. Overall, very enjoyable tea.

Preparation
4 min, 0 sec
Ricky

Agreed, this is a good one from Adagio. I recall TeaEqualsBliss stated that Norbu had one that was even more delicious!

Cinoi

OoOoOhhh, I will have to look into it, for now though Adagio is super convenient in NJ. Haha

Ricky

=P Do you march up to their warehouse =]

SoccerMom

I am going to order this. It’s sound yum!

Cinoi

I should, I know where it is, haha, but I can order my tea, regular shipping and have it the next day. So all immediate cravings are fulfilled.

TeaEqualsBliss

I love me some Ali Shan!

teatortoise

If you use more leaf, so that you can steep much shorter times, the short steeps retain that sweet, fragrant taste, and it never becomes vegetal. At first, that frustrated me. I wanted to taste what I was smelling. Shorter steeps are sweet and crisp.

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Comments

Ricky

Agreed, this is a good one from Adagio. I recall TeaEqualsBliss stated that Norbu had one that was even more delicious!

Cinoi

OoOoOhhh, I will have to look into it, for now though Adagio is super convenient in NJ. Haha

Ricky

=P Do you march up to their warehouse =]

SoccerMom

I am going to order this. It’s sound yum!

Cinoi

I should, I know where it is, haha, but I can order my tea, regular shipping and have it the next day. So all immediate cravings are fulfilled.

TeaEqualsBliss

I love me some Ali Shan!

teatortoise

If you use more leaf, so that you can steep much shorter times, the short steeps retain that sweet, fragrant taste, and it never becomes vegetal. At first, that frustrated me. I wanted to taste what I was smelling. Shorter steeps are sweet and crisp.

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Bio

I am a sarcastic perfectionist, a computer nerd, a game geek, an avid reader, a gadget guru, a wine (and tea) enthusiast, and (in my spare time) a chemist.

As I mentioned, I am a chemist, research and development to be exact, so when evaluating tea, it is much like evaluating my products: I will find the flaws and do my very best to fix them because it is what I love to do. Along those lines, nothing is perfect, but can have perfect qualities, I will highlight those also.

I made a preliminary guide to my rating scale:
0-19 – Did not like anything about the tea, feel it cannot be saved without being reformulated.
20-40 – Did not like the tea, it can be saved with extreme amounts of tweaking (i.e., sugar, milk, honey and or blending with another tea)
41-60 – Neutral about the tea, it can be helped or hurt by additives or blends, varied temperatures and steep times
61-70 – Decent tea, needs a little bit of help to get it in the place I like it, but definitely not out of reach
71-80 – Quality tea, liked it, will try again
81-90 – Really enjoyed the tea, high quality, will continue to drink the tea, not looking for something better
91-100 – Loved the tea, will continue to brew and drink and spread the word about the tea to everyone

Location

NJ

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