Ume Vert

I decided to cold brew this last night and it made for a delightful iced beverage this morning. Like I mentioned before my tea label says this is a blend of white and green tea with apricot and not the plum flavor mentioned above. If you like flavored green teas Lupicia is worth checking out…

see previous notes if interested.

….had this earlier today. No time for tasting notes. Tastes nothing like the description….

Tea party time has increased my cupboard from 175 teas to 266 and counting….. Damnit. Lol

Quick note! Smells deliciously like crisp, fresh green apple skin. Unfortunately, flavour does not follow. I’m finding it kind of bitter (maybe not enough water?)

ETA: This was the bagged version of this tea from Lupicia (if there is an unbagged version), a sample from our 2012/2013 Happy Bag. Split a cup with Sil because we both wanted to try this tea. As I said, the aroma was divine! But the flavour was bitter, and I don’t think I oversteeped. I did try adding more water as well, and that didn’t help a great deal. The green base wasn’t really the issue here; I think the flavouring was what was coming off as bitter to me. The base was actually pleasant. I do so wish the tea had tasted like crisp, fresh, tart apple skin, because that would have been my perfect apple tea :(

I’ve tried this both hot and cold and either way, it doesn’t quite do it for me. I mean, it’s nice… and I really like the tart aspect. Reminds me of apples… not plums btw!
but, well… I can’t seem to wrap my head around it. Oh well. I can see how some would certainly fall in love :)
Big thanks to Amy Oh for the sample!!

EDIT: I made another cup, ages ago and it wasn’t half bad. My tastes must have changed!

Today is Lupicia sample day! The second sample sachet of this. Once again, the plum is really obvious, and not fake plum at all. Its not my favorite thing I’ve got from Lupicia, but its a nice flavored green.

The amaretto discussion we had in CrowKettle’s comment field for this post: http://steepster.com/CrowKettle/posts/227481 made me think of Ume Vert. This really is all bitter-almondy plum pits and tongue-tip plum tartness and I still love it. A lot of people seem to have enjoyed it iced. It’s not the first choice I’d think of, but I guess I have to try now.

Cold, crisp, plum pit almonds?

We’ll see.

Knocking this down five points because it doesn’t age as well as Lupicia’s less subtle teas.

I received this as a free sample with the September 2012 mailer.

It’s confusing because the description says it’s a white tea, but the website says green, and it has the word “vert” in the title, so… who knows.

What I do know is that the “ume” in the title is the ume from “umeboshi.” Ume isn’t your typical Western purple plum, but this tart, green apricot/plum sort of thing that is often dried/pickled as red umeboshi. It’s supposed to be very good for recovery after sports. I like it with rice, but sometimes it’s made with a very bitter spice, and that’s what I was picking up on with this tea. I finished my cup, but I wouldn’t be too excited if I had ordered a whole container. There are too many other great teas from Lupicia!

If you love umeboshi though, you will love this tea!

Sipdown! (2 | 254)

This was gifted to me by Mastress Alita, thank you! :)

It’s a very interesting tea. I find it common in ume-flavored things for there to be a strong shiso taste, and the same applies here. It’s more shiso to me than ume. There is definitely a bit of savory plum in the background, but the basil-esque shiso is in the forefront. The combination is actually quite nice with the higher quality sencha they used, which gives it a full texture and adds to that savory quality.

I do wish there was more of the actual ume flavor, I think a stronger fruity-tart presence would really help to balance things. But I still really enjoyed sipping through the packet, and would consider ordering it again in the future.

Dry, and steeping, it smells like sweet candy. If you’ve ever had a Japanese instant ume drink, you’ll know what I mean. It’s plum, but it’s not like the plum I’m used to.

Drinking it, there isn’t a lot of flavour. It’s fruity, a little sweet-tart like sour candies. I was concerned about oversteeping it, but maybe I should have left it a little longer.

I got this when I visited Sil, and I’m glad to have tried it. I think VariaTEA is the one who dropped this one off. :)

This is a very old sample, from Rii I think, and it may have deteriorated some while it languished in my tea basket. Anyway—at 2.5 minutes, it came out slightly astringent, even bitter. I think the base is a sencha, and it overtook the tart plum flavoring (though there was a great plummy aftertaste, and points for natural-tasting fruit flavor). I decided to try what was left of my sample as a cold brew, and I’m glad I did. The plum was more prominent, and the base smoother and less assertive. While this wasn’t one of my favorites from Lupicia, it was very pleasant iced, and I’m glad I had a chance to try it.