1557 Tasting Notes

70

Spring 2020 harvest.

Dark, damp earthy aroma mixed with a darker milk chocolate.

Malty and juicy, bitter flowers like lavender. Catches in the throat on the way down and leaves a sweet mineral finish. Salivary glands tingle – salty. Peach and orchid bloom from the throat while a vaguely minty and fruity wild blueberry persists in the mouth. Floral bittersweet and woody bite is ubiquitous from 4th steep on.

It was nice but… but what? Maybe the throat catch turned me off a little? Am I sad that the spice notes of the rinsed leaf don’t come through in taste?

Flavors: Biting, Bittersweet, Blueberry, Charcoal, Cinnamon, Coffee, Compost, Dark Chocolate, Fennel, Forest Floor, Juicy, Lavender, Malt, Malty, Milk Chocolate, Mineral, Mint, Orchid, Peach, Salty, Spices, Stonefruit, Woody

Preparation
Boiling 6 g 3 OZ / 100 ML
beerandbeancurd

Mmm, that feeling when the bottom falls out.

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April 2022 harvest

Chicken soup, sweet chestnuts and grassy. Viscous, round, bright and juicy. Good aroma, taste and texture. Not a delicate tea — it can handle 200F water just fine, creating a slightly different taste profile compared to the recommended 185F. More of a refreshing, brisk character prepared in a porcelain cup with steeper basket compared to a glass gaiwan.

This tea is over a year old and it is starting to get that dry grassy taste of aging Chinese greens but the overall flavor profile seems like a mix between regular green dragonwell and a yellow tea.

Interesting tea for sure and good but it never fully commanded my attention and appreciation. If this tea appears in Song Tea’s fresh harvest catalog next year, I might buy another bag to see how it tastes at peak freshness.

Flavors: Anise, Bright, Brisk, Chestnut, Chicken Soup, Chrysanthemum, Dry Grass, Earthy, Ginseng, Grassy, Juicy, Nutty, Roasted Nuts, Round, Savory, Sweet, Toasty, Viscous

Preparation
185 °F / 85 °C 0 min, 45 sec 4 g 5 OZ / 150 ML

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Spring 2022 harvest

Soft and nectary sweet gives way to dry feeling and tartaftertaste. Subtle and complex character. Main vibe is tropical fruity-nectar, floral like Angel’s Trumpet and slightly vegetal cucumber mixed with spicy-dry pastoral associations — so many nuances once could pick the tastes apart as a hundred different variations. This is a really nice silver needle. I’m pretty sure this doesn’t contain caffeine or contains very little though I’m not positive.

I most enjoy going very light on leaf in a glass gaiwan. A good tea to mix with blue lotus flower in a large glass pot.

Flavors: Bark, Cream, Cucumber, Drying, Eucalyptus, Floral, Flowers, Fur, Honeydew, Hot Hay, Leather, Lemon, Lychee, Marshmallow, Mushrooms, Musk, Nectar, Nuts, Oats, Pear, Soft, Spicy, Sugarcane, Sweet, Tart, Tropical, Vanilla

Preparation
185 °F / 85 °C 1 min, 0 sec 3 g 5 OZ / 150 ML

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Random teabag pulled from my aunt’s stash.

Groggy first cup of the day earlier this week so I don’t remember much. It was good. Not great, but solid. Lemon myrtle is my favorite ‘lemony herb’ compared to lemon balm and lemongrass. It doesn’t have whatever lemongrass does that can sometimes downright turn me off. This tastes of a high, green, lemony note and is ginger spicy and echinacea-y (if you know, you know). Full body from the echinacea and sweet licorice root but ultimately gulpable.

Flavors: Citrusy, Ginger, Green, Lemongrass, Licorice Root, Roots, Spicy, Sweet

Preparation
Boiling 8 min or more

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94

2021 harvest so 2 years rested.

Sharing a pot on an overcast, cold and breezy morning. Like a glass of heathery, smokey scotch for breakfast. It takes me places but also grounds me right here. This is an expertly smoked tea made with high quality leaf.

Flavors: Apple, Campfire, Cedar, Chamomile, Floral, Leather, Orchid, Peat, Pine, Scotch, Smoked, Wet Rocks

Preparation
200 °F / 93 °C 5 g 17 OZ / 500 ML

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60
drank A1 Rou Gui 肉桂 by Old Ways Tea
1557 tasting notes

2020 harvest freshly opened is smooth but for someone who likes to be shown strength in one or more facets, it is ultimately nothing memorable. I was hoping for more of a caffeinated yancha before heading into a mandatory work meeting tonight that starts in 12 minutes…

Flavors: Charcoal, Cream, Floral, Honeysuckle, Mineral, Peach, Plum, Roasted, Smooth, Spices, Sweet, Tangy, Wet Wood

Preparation
Boiling 6 g 3 OZ / 100 ML
ashmanra

Forgot our time difference and was momentarily horrified that they would call a meeting that late!

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SWEATY MUSTY FEET and HERBS and LICORICE ROOT

why do i torture myself

in other news, I’M GOING to CHINA!

Flavors: Earthy, Herbaceous, Licorice Root, Musty, Sweet, Tangy

Kaylee

That’s awesome! About China, not the musty feet.

Leafhopper

Yeah, valerian is gross. It also gives me weird dreams.

That trip sounds really exciting! Which parts of China will you be visiting? If I went to China or Taiwan, I’d toss out everything in my suitcase at the end of the trip and bring back as much tea as I could carry!

gmathis

Absolutely cannot wait to read your travelogues!

ashmanra

For reals? That’s awesome!!

Marshall Weber

Have fun! Buy lots of tea

Kaylee

Literally we brought four suitcases to Taiwan and three of them were empty. They were all BURSTING on the way back, and there’s definitely still stuff I would have gotten if I could.

derk

Tea will for sure be coming back with me as the whole month there will be spent in tea fields in in Hubei province. One River Tea sent out a mailer for a summer volunteer opportunity that I’m taking advantage of while I can.

beerandbeancurd

OMFG! derk!!! Ahhhhh, I’m so so so excited for your experience and learning and heart. Yaaaasssssssss <3

Leafhopper

Agreed! That sounds like a wonderful learning opportunity!

Cameron B.

Yassss so exciting! Can’t wait to hear about it!

tea-sipper

Late to read this awesome note, but wow! I hope your visit time in China is the best!

derk

Thanks tea-sipper! I’m about 3 weeks away from departure. I’m concerned that my visa application will be denied. Since re-opening to international travel, China has created a stringent application process for Americans (and maybe others?). Guess I’ll find out early next week! It’s been a very stressful process!!

tea-sipper

I was a little worried something like that might happen BUT I hope everything goes as smooth as possible so you can visit some awesome tea gardens!

beerandbeancurd

Sending allllllllll the bureaucratic gobbledygook sweep-away vibes toward every dank cubicle those papers meet. Go go, little portal openers.

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This 2022 is now the third harvest I’ve had of this tea. I don’t know why I go through infrequent spurts of buying Assam blacks. Probably a desire to want to like them and understand them. But they’re usually too strong for me.

This is a great tea, one I would definitely recommend for Assam tea lovers. Balanced heft and smoothness with deep, rich flavor that’s lightened by complementary astringency and tiny prickles of bitterness. Tangy fruity, leathery, dark woody and smooth malty. Soft chocolate-hay-peanut aroma. Overleafs well. Glad I tried it again but also not upset to see it go.

Flavors: Brown Toast, Chocolate, Cream, Dark Wood, Dried Fruit, Fig, Hay, Leather, Malt, Molasses, Peanut, Red Currant, Rich, Smooth, Tangy

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90

First ever tamaryokucha style green tea, and I believe it’s 2023 shincha, courtesy of Thés du Japon. Thank you!

This morning’s cups were damn near perfect. Half the sample – 4g – went into the steeper basket with cooled water from the work dispenser, steeped for maybe a minute. White beany and vegetal, full-bodied and round with sweet umami, not a lick of bitterness or astringency. Refreshing and engaging but mellow. Second much like the first. Third steep, brewed without cooling the water, was dark and cloudy; it tasted like the smell of the clumps of young, wet grass that stick to the bottom of the lawnmower. Wow, those were some great cups of tea. I have the rest of the sample set aside for brewing in a small pot.

Like gyokuro-lite. I dig this much more than gyokuro. More balanced.

Flavors: Beans, Freshly Cut Grass, Round, Sweet, Umami, Vegetables, Vegetal

Preparation
1 min, 0 sec 4 g 10 OZ / 300 ML
Marshall Weber

Love the descriptors in the note. Sounds like a tea I’d like a lot – I need to try it!

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drank Random Steepings by Various Artists
1557 tasting notes

Another tea from a bazaar in Istabul, this one clearly written in English as “Relax Tea.” Looks similar to this https://www.grandturkishbazaar.com/product/turkish-relax-tea-mix/ but a little different. Contains whole hibiscus flowers, red/pink/white rosebuds, lemon verbena, orange peel or lemon peel, chamomile and rosehips.

Anything with hibiscus for me is not relaxing because of the sour flavor, though I do enjoy it on hot afternoons. I suppose in that context it is relaxing, but before bedding down, notsomuch. I’m not too keen on the mix in general, aromawise. Rose can either be heavenly or irritating, and I think I finally figured out why: I like rose to be tempered by warm spices or mellowed by creaminess, for instance, being incorporated into milk oolong. This herbal tea is too high-note, too perfumey. The hibiscus amplifies the citrus peel and I simply don’t enjoy that whole combination with all the rosebuds.

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Bio

This place, like the rest of the internet, is dead and overrun with bots. And thus I step away.

Eventual tea farmer. If you are a tea grower, want to grow your own plants or are simply curious, please follow me so we can chat.

I most enjoy loose-leaf, unflavored teas and tisanes. Teabags have their place. Some of my favorite teas have a profound effect on mind and body rather than having a specific flavor profile. Terpene fiend.

Favorite teas generally come from China (all provinces), Taiwan, India (Nilgiri and Manipur). Frequently enjoyed though less sipped are teas from Georgia, Japan, Nepal and Darjeeling. While I’m not actively on the hunt, a goal of mine is to try tea from every country that makes it available to the North American market. This is to gain a vague understanding of how Camellia sinensis performs in different climates. I realize that borders are arbitrary and some countries are huge with many climates and tea-growing regions.

I’m convinced European countries make the best herbal teas.

Personal Rating Scale:

100-90: A tea I can lose myself into. Something about it makes me slow down and appreciate not only the tea but all of life or a moment in time. If it’s a bagged or herbal tea, it’s of standout quality in comparison to similar items.

89-80: Fits my profile well enough to buy again.

79-70: Not a preferred tea. I might buy more or try a different harvest. Would gladly have a cup if offered.

69-60: Not necessarily a bad tea but one that I won’t buy again. Would have a cup if offered.

59-1: Lacking several elements, strangely clunky, possess off flavors/aroma/texture or something about it makes me not want to finish.

Unrated: Haven’t made up my mind or some other reason. If it’s pu’er, I likely think it needs more age.

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California, USA

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