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130mL, 4g, brita water

Leaves dry: smell of a strong buttery green, peas, and with hints of floral and citrus. Overall nice pale yellow infusions.

Decided to keep brewing temps at 166 or below. Based on my own experiences with green teas, under extracted greens are okay, over extracted greens are far less so, and it is far easier to mess up greens than oolongs. Aside from cold brew prep, green teas I feel are decidedly more high maintenance (or as high maintenance as teas get) than oolongs that I can toss in a thermos and forget about until drinking.

5s: leaves smell roasted green, but also malty? Not unpleasant, but interesting. As expected, first cup not very strong. Pleasant light green.

15s: I’ve figured out the smell. It’s like Chinese chestnuts after they’re steamed, slightly sweet and nutty, but add a pinch of buttery roasted green tea and you’ve nailed this tea’s aroma. Very pleasant aftertaste.

40s: similar smell, with the chestnut note becoming even stronger. a little sharper, slightly bitter and dry finish-so tannins? Not bad, even refreshingly crisp and sweet aftertaste, but generally I prefer mellow flavors, so this right here is why I will never opt to steep a green tea for over 1-2 minutes unless it’s for cold brew.

Didn’t have time to continue this session unfortunately, but this was a fun tea! I don’t really like greens because they’re more high-maintenance/fussy and it’s harder to brew a good cup, but this is one I’d brew again if I was in the mood.

Got this as a free sample with my White2Tea order. This is my first time drinking a white tea coin, so I don’t have anything to compare it to in particular. As others have noted, it was indeed packed tightly. 4 steeps in, the coin was still not coming apart properly, so I took a paring knife and pried it apart, which didn’t change the flavor much for me, so I guess it’s fine. Overall, a good mellow daily I would think, though it was not interesting enough for me to consider buying more. I used Brita filtered water, with temps right off the boil, and discarded the first steep. It never got bitter, but left a little bit of a dry mouthfeel afterwards each time. The infusions turned out a little darker than I expected, with times from 10s to several min towards the end.

Not sure if this affected my brew, but I dropped my gaiwan lid and it shattered, so I was left with no lid during my session.

Got this as part of the sample pack from Beantown. Tastes exactly the same as the Harney and Son’s Earl Grey tea bags in the little light sky blue sachets, nothing special here.

Got this as part of the sample pack from Beantown. My cup turned out pretty bitter so I couldn’t pick out any of the notes they described, but it was palatable with milk and sugar added.

Cai Cong Anxi Oolong
5g, brita water, 130 mL gaiwan
Spring 2020, Master Zhang collection

私房茶 (private tea? my Chinese is pretty shoddy)/怡龙YL12-J40 (these were both on the packaging and the 2nd part likely indicates a specific line, but in my experience, many small packets of Chinese teas are packed similarly enough that if you can’t remember the vendor, it’s hard to find the same tea ever again).

Leaves and tea both more floral smelling than I expected. Brews a very nice clear yellow. Vegetal, sweet notes. Had gongfu steepings with breakfast (irreverent, but I’ve been generally disappointed with the other Verdant 5 for 5 samples that I’ve tried so far so didn’t bother too hard with this one) so probably didn’t catch everything. What a way to usher in the new year lol.

I was in a rush for an appointment and left the rest in a thermos. I’m disappointed to note that the infusion ended up having a very bitter mouthfeel, but I added more water to dilute it and we were back in business. So lesson learned there.

My aunt sent me a pack of very lightly roasted Tie Guan Yin where I wasn’t sure if it was actually Tie Guan Yin, and this was somewhat similar to that, but much clearer infusions instead of the muddy yellow I got from that, and this was much sweeter overall. However, with the initial thermos infusion, this turned out much more bitter than that one did, so I’m not sure why that is. If anyone else tries this tea grandpa style brew, I’d be curious to hear your results vs. gongfu brewing!

So far this is the only one of the verdant 5 for 5s (haven’t tried the Laoshan black yet though since i’ve heard it’s the best out of the lot) that I’d actually consider purchasing in the future once I run out of my current stash. It’s pretty mellow and seems like it’d make for a steady daily.

4/5 stars

Not sure what happened with this one. I didn’t read the reviews of this beforehand, but treated it as a green tea from the get go so it doesn’t seem to be an issue with my brewing temps (as it seems from a glance that other reviewers used even higher temps) but out of the 4/5 5 for 5 samples I’ve tried from Verdant now, this was by far the worst. From reading the reviews, I’m not even sure I had the same tea as other reviewers (perhaps the quality changed drastically in the last few years or a bad batch?). Even the last infusion from the leaves that I tossed into a thermos for a grandpa brew came out starting like a green and ending with a terribly bitter note. Palatable, but never something I’d willingly repurchase.

Reserve Laoshan Green Oolong
He family collection spring 2020
5 g, brita water, 176F, 130mL

Leaves: smell very green sweet matcha buttery type of feeling. A small amount of small leaves are crushed but most survived and are in little coiled shapes.

1st 10s: a little cloudy yellow infusion. Same smell but add a bit of roasted smell to it. Tastes rather unremarkable, a little bit of burnt matcha with a hint of sweet.

2nd steeping 10s 165F: similar to before but tastes more bitter

3rd steeping 7s 156F: same as before

Stopping here and tossing leaves in a thermos for grandpa brewing. In sum: smells and tastes like a burnt matcha, even with relatively low brewing temps. Passing on this one. Nothing particularly oolong like in the generic sense. My infusions never cleared up and were always a cloudy light yellow.

1.5/5 stars

update 5/2: found a small stash and drank through them and now i can say I find this revolting. Not sure what flipped the switch, but I don’t want this stuff ever again.

my school stopped stocking this but I used to like to brew this for the color alone. It’s a very pretty dark wine-like color. Smells okay. Taste-wise, all I can pick out is that it’s just sour and sometimes I’d be in the mood for it. But previously for a free school provided tea, whatever. Would I purchase it on my own though? probably not.

3.25/5

side note: For these teas, I’m not sure why they always say boiling water and 5 min steep because taste/appearance-wise to me, there was never difference whether I used 180F or 210F water, or whether I steeped for 5 min. or 2 min. Because the particles are so small, it steeps almost immediately anyway, which is pretty obvious as soon as you pour the water on top.

my school used to stock this but they didn’t this year :(

At any rate, I drank some almost every other day of the semester last year. Nothing particularly noteworthy (not that I’ve got other chamomiles to compare it to I suppose?), but calming and caffeine free, so I would drink this during the late nights stuck at my desk or the times when I couldn’t fall asleep instead of the strongly caffeinated black and oolong teas my parents sent me off with.

4/5

It’s not like I would drink it because it’s delicious, but it made the water much more bearable. and it’s probably placebo effect, but having it did make me feel like I was getting better rest sometimes

Also received as part of Verdant’s 5 for 5 promo. My packet was from Autumn 2020. This was the first time I’ve tried a Sheng Pu’er, and I really enjoyed it! It’s a cold, snowy-turned rainy day here, and I got out of bed feeling a little under the weather, so I decided to make some of this. I did gaiwan steeps of varying times (though I kept water temp. at or below 177F) poured into a big mug, so no exact tasting notes. But overall, brews like a nice clean green tea with a nice aftertaste and mouthfeel, and was comforting to have. Thanks to everyone who noted before on the lower temps! I would’ve liked this tea a lot less if it was bitter.

Probably not a tea I’d purchase again given nothing particularly stood out to me, but that could also be due to me not feeling too great today. But as part of the 5 for 5, I enjoyed it much more than the Shu Pu’er.

3.25/5 stars

Little Red Cup Co. Lapsang Souchong Tea

正山小种茶/拉普山小种茶

3.2g (bit over double the suggested amount from LRC since I wanted to gaiwan brew) tea, Brita filtered water, 120 mL gaiwan (figured out by now that overfilling my gaiwan was why I always kept spilling everywhere when pouring…), temp. right off the boil

dry leaves: like a burnt fire, but sweet haha. Wonderfully fragrant if you’re a fan of the campfire vibes!

3s flash steep: leaves: hay/straw, something sour, pine, smokey
Tea: smells fruity
Taste: sweet, then smokey and bitter (like a certain traditional Chinese medicine taken for stomach pain…), then lychee fruit aftertaste
I try my best not to peek at notes ahead of time, but I failed this time and I agree with the packet label that the lingering fruit note is very lychee-like. I guess this is a trade off with reading and not reading notes beforehand. I do believe that it can be easy to read notes into teas that maybe aren’t there sometimes (granted I’m not a tea sommelier of any sort), but then without seeing LRC’s lychee note, the best I could’ve offered was fruit of some kind.

7s: leaves: grassy, smoky, similar to earlier
Tea: more fruity smell now
Taste: bitter then sweet

14s: leaves: more grassy and medicinal
Tea: similar smell
Taste: a little sour (acidic?), bitter then sweet

25s: leaves and tea: similar to before
Taste: similar to before then somewhat more grassy but also more sweet aftertaste

1 min: usually wouldn’t kick it up to 1 min so soon, but busy day today. Leaves similar to before. Tea is increasingly fruity.
Taste: similar

I’m sure you could do extra steepings, but past this point I’m sure the differences would probably be more minute.

Overall, this tea is worth a try for the novelty of the aftertaste alone. It’s not immediately gratifying like the aftertaste of a good Oolong, but compared with the immediate taste of the tea, it is incredibly pleasant (nothing I can recall that I’ve tried compares to it exactly). I’ve never had a Lapsang Souchong before, so I’m curious if this is representative of the category as a whole. The smell of the dry leaves is very strong, and I personally like the campfire sort of vibe it invokes. Because the taste of the tea itself (excepting the aftertaste) is rather invoking of the stomach pain TCM I’ve had to take in the past (thanks mom and dad), I wouldn’t purchase any more of this tea, but I can definitely see why others like it! :)

3.75 stars/5 stars

edit: I had some leftover that I left sitting in a mug at my desk and wow this is fragrant enough to smell at my desk! Campfire in a cup indeed.