Green Tea with Natural Jasmine Petals

I don’t have much to say about this scented green tea. The jasmine scent is not bad but I’ve had better, more fragrant jasmine tea before. It’s one of those generic bagged jasmine teas that you will probably forget after a day.

Strong jasmine aroma with solid straw notes of green tea.
Slight astringency, slight bitterness, straw, hay.
Not bad, not especially good. Just drinkable.

the jasmine is flavourful but the green tea part is overly strong; perhaps i should have steeped it less than three minutes. i do love the scent of jasmine that meets my nose as i lift the mug to my lips.

Skype asks, ‘Does Skype power your passion?’ (white text on pink background) and I admit that the only time I can talk forever on the phone is when I’m in love with the person on the other end, because otherwise I get bored.

M was here, and wanted tea instead of alcohol (wait, what just happened and how) so I managed to find this. I picked it up at the grocery store as some kind of emergency tea when I was here for a couple of days in the fall, and mostly tealess. I guess that worked out well, for what could be more of an emergency than me saying, ‘But there is PEACH VODKA,’ and the other person shaking their head in response?

This is simple and reliable – I steeped it at something like 90C for 2 minutes, dropping a few tea bags into the pot, and there was no bitterness or astringency. It’s a very flat jasmine, none of the personality, deep scent, or floral exuberance I tend to prefer. I like over-the-top jasmines, I really do.

What brings the grade down in this case, though, is that it’s a little papery – a little too obviously a bagged tea. I will have no problem finishing the rest of this box up, and I might even get some more to keep around for emergencies, like if Sil shows up like a ninja and sips my other 156 teas down in the night… but it’s not something I’d ever crave.

[Purchased at Luthagens Livs in Uppsala, fall 2013.]