This is obviously the best “green tea with jasmine” a for the rest very nice Chinese restaurant in Madrid, Spain can offer. I must admit it looks great : a bigger than usual paper envelope containing a piramide teabag. The piramide teabag doesn´t contain dust, but it´s not exactly big leaf either. Although the use by date lies still 1,5 years in the future, the teabag isn´t particularly aromatic, something I usually associate with Chinese jasmine tea. As I was first served the teapot and a teabag of mint tea (the green colour of the envelope is quite similar to the one of this jasmine tea), the water had already cooled a bit when I started steeping, definitely a good thing with this type of tea (the envelope says you should steep at 100ºC though). The steeped tea is better than what I expected from its fragrance (or the lack of it), and is actually quite alright to have instead of water or beer to accompany food. I think it lacks character to have on its own.
What is worrisome however : that even Chinese or Japanese restaurants (had a similar experience in a Japanese restaurant last week), claiming to serve authentic food, pay little attention to the quality of the tea they offer…or maybe they think that it´s more important to impress by the quality of the wrapping?
Flavors: Green, Jasmine
