Golden Fleece

It’s been hot here for the last couple of weeks and I haven’t been drinking much hot tea. It was significantly cooler today, and I drank a BUNCH of hot teas.
I feel like I’ve been writing negative or just ok tasting notes all day. Wanted to end the day with something GOOD.
This is beyond good – this is a great tea. It’s beautiful to look at and it’s beautiful to drink. There are tons of tasting notes about it, so I’m not going to go into long boring details. It’s just a great sweet potato, grainy style black tea.
This makes me happy tonight. :))

This was sent to me by the generous MzPriss. It wasn’t even a swap, she just sent it out of the kindness of her heart, aww… Sorry it took me so long to try it! :P It’s been a while since I had one of these giant golden fuzzbud (™?) Yunnans. This tea is composed entirely of huge, fat, golden buds that are super fuzzy. Dry scent is very sweet with a ton of honey and apricot and a little hint of cinnamon. The recommended steep was 1 minute but I found it too light for my tastes and let it go for an extra minute.

Mm, it smells like pastry with honey and golden raisins! The taste… Definitely a lot of fluffy, buttery pastry. There’s an inherent creaminess that, combined with the slight grain note, reminds me of soy milk. I also get a very mild sweet potato flavor, definitely with a little bit of butter and honey mixed in. I’m actually a little bit sad that I don’t get that interesting cinnamon scent in the taste… I did a second steep at 4 minutes and it came out very similar to the first with a little bit of a stronger grain note.

Overall, yes this tea is good. However, the price is way too steep in my opinion. I have had very similar teas from Yunnan Sourcing, and they have several other fuzzbud™ Yunnan teas that I haven’t tried yet. And the price is less than half of this tea! So it seems a bit excessive to me, but to each their own. :P

Cold brewed, and well, here’s the first 100.

I can’t really begin to describe this—how it seems to keep unfurling and evolving into something completely different, time upon time, even in the same sip. There was a richness I had never tasted in a tea (or anything) before, for a moment my only thought was, I don’t even know how to deal with something like this. I can try to list the notes of pumpkin, sweet potato, earth, light florals, buttery mouthfeel, etc, but separately these descriptors all seem inadequate. Cold brewing is almost cheating.

To be quite honest, prior to this tasting I had thought I would never understand the poetic nature of some of the previous reviews. But right now, I feel like they are all substantiated.

I’m not sure what to make of this! I was expecting something a little different based on the reviews and description.

Method: about 1tbsp (sounds like a lot, but these are small, pointy leaves), 8 oz, 205 degrees, 2 minutes, ForLife brew in mug strainer

Dry Leaf Aroma: This smells like a malted campfire.

Brewing Aroma: More campfire

Flavor: I think this tastes a little like dark malt. There’s some sweetness, which seems to be confusing my taste buds. On the one hand, it tastes a little smoky, but then there’s this lovely sweetness that comes charging through. I’m going to leave this note here for now, and then I am going to try this with a series of very short steeps, and compare. I didn’t dislike it… I’m just not sure exactly what to think!

I really thought I would like this one much better, it gets such good reviews.
It is very good and tastey like sweet potatoes and cinnamon to me and sweet.
BUT I feel like i was expecting Thor and Loki showed up.
Still a very good Tea, maybe i should have tried other harvests and maybe i’ll try it again, it will be better next time around :)

(From the UTTB.)

Gosh…I feel like I shouldn’t even be writing about this tea. It’s indescribably lovely. It’s exquisite and refined. It’s vanilla and brown sugar, spice and baked bread. There’s a wonderful natural sweetness to it that’s making my eyes roll back in my head. The first two steeps were a minute long and they were very subdued, in my opinion. I would have liked them to be stronger…but there was the promise of greatness there. Third steep was two minutes. Now I feel like we’ve gotten past the paltry pleasantries, the “hello, how are you”s, and we’ve started to really get to know each other. How could I describe the taste or the texture of the tea? All descriptive words are coming up short. It’s soft and silky. Some people are saying “creamy” but I don’t think I would use it to describe the way the tea liquor feels. More like…the way it makes your mouth feel after you’ve swirled it around your teeth and swallowed. There’s a chocolate maltiness that begins to emerge, slowly, as you continue steeping. Restrained and intriguing. It’s heavenly. Yet, despite all its breathtaking loveliness, it’s a very humble cup! It’s the kid in the corner of the classroom who you didn’t know was a poet and a genius because he speaks so softly. I don’t know what I did to deserve this moment with these leaves. If it maintains flavor for as long as others have said, I’ll be holding on to these leaves for days, stretching out these moments as long as I can. I’ll listen to the secrets they unfold and hope that one day, I’ll be able to put them into words…

I received a sample of this from MzPriss Thank you so much for including some of this very rare tea.

I am going to wait to write about this one until my next cup. I had a start of a nasty cold with my first tasting. I knew I should have waited, but I was so excited to try this tea that I went for it anyway. All teas that I did that day seemed off so I hope this one was included in that list.

The dry leaf is beautiful: short and fluffy with a rich golden colour. It gives off sweet potato, hay and corn. The liquor is almost the exact same colour as honey. My cup gives off a beautiful aroma of green beans, corn, and sweet potato. All the elements of the smell are present in the taste, with the addition of cocoa and malt. I have read that many people have picked up some spices as well, but I did not. It is a wonderful tea that I would definitely buy.

Thank you caile for the generous sample!

From TTTTB: I didn’t plan things out well this morning. By the time this cooled enough to drink it was nearly time for me to head out. I was able to take a couple sips and have decided that it’s not for me. I am realizing that there are many black teas I do not enjoy.

This tea truly is something unique thank you verdant for the opportunity to buy this wonderful tea. It has some very interesting aromas and on top of that tastes phenomenal.
The tea buds are just breathtaking beautiful.

This tea brew multiple cup using western style and boiling water.
I can manage to get around 7 solid steeping’s from 2 grams.
15 seconds for the first and about 5-10 seconds per additional cup.
For the 7th steep I usually let that cold steep overnight or for 12 hours.

The first two steeping’s are very smooth and with almost a silky mouthfeel. Reminds me very similar to raw sugar, and sweet potatoes.
The third and fourth steeping’s are much less sweet like raw sugar the taste is more alike honey and has some unidentifiable spice aspect to it.
Still very smooth for a black tea absolutely no astringency.

This tea really sucks me in and I have made it my morning go to.
it’s hard not to want to drink down a cup faster than one can steep it. Wonderfully energizing, warming, and relaxing; three qualities that suit this tea well for me and my tastes.