Tea At Sea

Smoooooth is the first impression. The leaves are dark green and wrap-curled into small beads with tails. I don’t notice much of a smell when I open the package. After brewing 2 tsp to 8oz at 200F for 3 minutes, it has a gentle creamy taste with a perhaps a little bit of honey flavor. It has a gentle milky aftertaste. Very pleasant. This tea is silky and mellow. I like just a little bit of stevia in it. It seems to bring out the flavor a bit more. It is definitely the kind of tea you want to sit and savor. Don’t throw this in the travel mug or tumbler… it would be a waste of the tea experience that can be found in this cup. For me it’s the perfect cup to sit and enjoy while I am snowbound with another 6 inches of snow outside (again!) I’m on my fourth resteep and it remains smooth and flavorful without tasting watery. Definitely a tea I will keep in my cupboard for when I need that relaxing moment, not just a cup of tea.
Oolongs have a long tradition of health benefits (obesity, diabetes, “hardening of the arteries”, high cholesterol and to boost the immune system) and I can certainly see that just the relaxation involved in drinking this tea would by healthy for everything ☺

I just received my samples last night and thanks to another snow day I can sit and enjoy this WOW this is really different! In a good way! I steeped at 208 for 3 min I am not good at describing tea specially for a tea with this much uniqueness I taste some fruity notes I would say it is brisk but no astringency at all . I believe this good be really good iced. I will test that out. But I am not sure I want to stop drinking this hot it is that good! I am going to try a second steep sure hope i get as much flavor! This is a must have in my cupboard I will be placing an order very soon! Probably today since I am snowed in!

This partially oxidized Camellia Sinensis really woke up my senses and connected me straight to the mountains they were grown on. Like a breath of fresh air, I really felt like they developed in high altitudes.
Very comforting and delicious, I highly recommend this tea to anyone who wants a clean, quality grown Oolong!

have i srsly not reviewed this tea before? i’m finally closing down on that last teaspoon (one more lovely steep session after this one!) of bulk tea that i bought oh so long ago. if i didn’t say it before, i’ll say it now: i love this tea. for whatever reasons, perhaps because it was my favorite of the first oolongs i tried, this one remains my standard THIS IS WHAT OOLONG SHOULD TASTE LIKE in my book. it is light, buttery, fragrant, extremely hard to mis-steep, and just all around NOM! now, there might be yummier, better teas out there, but in my experience those are all harder to brew well, are much fussier about water temp and length of steep time and the price of tea in china at any given moment. Tea at Sea’s Mountain Organic Indonesian Oolong is none of that. it just is. perfect. every time. get some. (i shall refill my stash within the month!)

Yum yum perfect first steeping…this should give me a great afternoon, which will be way better than my crappy tea-free morning.

this is the second half of the free sample they sent me, i guess i managed to rate this tea but not give any other impressions! at any rate, this is now one of my favorite oolongs. just the right amount of floral, just the right amount of greenery, just the right amount of round creamy goodness.

this is a good, good oolong. on my third steeping right now, and it has remained a delicious, deep, ever-changing flavorful cuppa the entire time. creamy and smooth, just a touch of floral (mostly in the scent, very light, not in the taste, just the way i like it). i will be coming back for more!

Really smooth/silky. It’s got a nice and clean finish without overwhelming my palate, which is something black teas can do. Little to now astringency on this one. Pretty nice!

I have a sad confession, I think I burned myself out making Perler bead creations over the holidays, I just made so many things so quickly (and not really out of inspiration, more necessity) that I am in a creative slump. Luckily I have felt inspired to make Lucky Stars, so I brought some down to my Tea Lair (which still needs a sign) to work on until the desire to play with pixels comes back. Luckily the desire to drink and write about tea is going strong, so let us journey down the path of the leaf.

Today’s tea is Mountain Organic Indonesian Oolong from Tea at Sea (who I would like to point out has some of the cutest packaging ever), according to their website this Oolong has an oxidation of 35%, was grown in the Halimun Mountains of Indonesia (at 800m above sea level no less) and is treated with spring water and mountain air. Fancy! The aroma is sweet, like honeyed bread with a distinct vegetal green bean undertone. There is also the faintest hint of orchids as well.

Once the tea has been rinsed and steeped the aroma of the unfurling leaves is significantly sweeter bringing out notes of creamy honey, orchids, and baking bread. This time the aroma that sneaks in as an afterthought is the vegetal. The liquid is also quite sweet, blending notes of cream, honey, and orchids. The aroma reminds me of a Jin Xuan, though not as sweet.

The taste is sweet and floral, mixing orchid and honey with a midtaste of yeasty bread. The mouthfeel is at first creamy then fades to dry fairly quickly. As the tea cools it takes on a slightly savor, lettuce like taste with a mildly citrus aftertaste.

I decided to give this tea a second steeping, which is fun because it has been quite a while since I steeped an Oolong Western style with multiple steeping. The aroma is still quite sweet, but it has a slightly mineral note hiding beneath the sweetness. The taste is quite mineraly this time around, it makes it taste like spring water and new pennies. The aftertaste is vegetal and there is a whisper of honey and orchids. This tea is good, I am not going to fall over myself in awe of it (you know me and my obsession with Oolongs) but I could see myself buying this for an everyday Oolong, when I want a fix but don’t want to break out the really expensive stuff.

For photo and blog: http://ramblingbutterflythoughts.blogspot.com/2014/02/tea-at-sea-mountain-organic-indonesian.html

First off, this company has the most adorable packaging! Little sail boats and waves, so cute! As for the tea, I did like it quite a bit, but I think for me it was almost a little too floral tasting. I added a bit of cream to mine and ended up liking it much better that way. It was also pretty fun to watch how much the little green leaves unfurled into my IngenuiTEA, the thing looked like it was half full of leaves when I dispensed it into my cup!

2/8/14 Sipdown. 4ish g / 12oz/212F/4 min approx. Nice. Tasted like a proper green tea to me – grassy, a little buttery, slightly astringent.

2/1/14 First tea of the month. 3.6g/100ml gaiwan/185F water. Washed. A nori scent in the dry leaves, a vegetal umami. I’m on the third steep of this now, up to 15 seconds. It’s brewing pleasant and light. Just a nice green tea – nothing extraordinary about it, nothing to be embarrassed by. A good session tea, to a borrow beer term.

Where this tea is made of win is the packaging. This is the most cutely packaged tea I have ever seen. This is tea I would buy just to own the tin. This is tea I probably am going to buy, international shipping and all, just so I can own a tin. I am enslaved by the kawaii.

The Indonesian Green was just alright. Fairly standard green tea. Didn’t get any hints of the fruity flavor it mentioned.

I like Mountain organic Black tea from the same company better, but this is still much nicer than the other black tea I drank in the cafe.

I am not a big Black tea fan. But after trying the free samples, it impressed me and changed my view towards Black tea. This is the best Black tea I have tried so far. I think I am going to stay with this one!

I like this tea, as it has more flavour than other green tea I have tried. The tin is pretty useful and interesting.

This tea is not for me. Got some free samples but wasn’t impressed. Very light and requires a lot of steeping time to get the flavour out. Love the design though. I recommend the Organic Green from the same company.

Very normal Ceylon black tea. Not much better than Twinnings.

Very nice tea, really special. I love the design of the tins as well. Looks real original.

Best Organic Black Tea I have ever drank.

This is the same tasting note for the 3 Organic Teas from this company. I just felt I should add it here too.

I got 5 samples of their tea here in Nice, France even though it’s a Canadian company. The 5g samples from their Organic collection are amazing. I steeped a small teapot with the whole 5g like the guy at the booth said and the freshness is more than anticipated. It feels like the tea was picked this morning. Mountain Organic Indonesian Black Tea is my favourite of the three (Green, Black, Oolong). Used my new Breville tea maker set to 100 degrees for the black tea and 85 degrees for the green tea. The green tea smells a bit of seaweed and the ocean and tastes very light, smooth and refreshing while the black is a little sweet, strong and more full bodied. The Oolong was very nice but the ceylon Sencha was not what I expected. Never had Sencha from Sri Lanka before and I don’t think I will do it again but the Organic Black, Green and Oolong are a must try for every tea lover.

This is the same tasting note for the 3 Organic Teas from this company. I just felt I should add it here too.

I got 5 samples of their tea here in Nice, France even though it’s a Canadian company. The 5g samples from their Organic collection are amazing. I steeped a small teapot with the whole 5g like the guy at the booth said and the freshness is more than anticipated. It feels like the tea was picked this morning. Mountain Organic Indonesian Black Tea is my favourite of the three (Green, Black, Oolong). Used my new Breville tea maker set to 100 degrees for the black tea and 85 degrees for the green tea. The green tea smells a bit of seaweed and the ocean and tastes very light, smooth and refreshing while the black is a little sweet, strong and more full bodied. The Oolong was very nice but the ceylon Sencha was not what I expected. Never had Sencha from Sri Lanka before and I don’t think I will do it again but the Organic Black, Green and Oolong are a must try for every tea lover.