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Today's tea is gyokuro, a high grade Japanese green tea. The shop I got it from calls it "Jade Dew," although I think that's just a name - I don't speak enough Japanese to know if there's a direct translation or if this is a specific cultivar. Regardless, gyokuro refers to a green tea grown under shade for an extended period of time, about three weeks, which is three times longer than that of a kabusecha. It's one of the highest grades of green tea available, and good gyokuro is a treat. I'll edit in some photos here in a bit. The flavor embodies umami in the absolute - I can feel the smooth savoriness in the center of my tongue that radiates outward to the very knife-edge of the palate, that indescribable sort of sweetness-without-sweetness sensation that a good tea can deliver. It's one of my favorites in both flavor and appearance. Gyokuro is tightly rolled into very fine needles that unfurl beautifully during the steeping process. The tea is a deep viridescent jade color when dry, absolutely packed with chlorophyll - these are presumptions on my part, but certainly this relates to the lengthy shade-growing process. Resteeping it releases some amino acids that produce gorgeous little rainbow bubbles in the tea's surface, which I don't think I can capture in a photo but I enjoy nonetheless. The brewed tea is a lovely fresh olive color with a full body; not as full as the matcha genmaicha I posted about above, but moreso than most greens. I generally try to save my gyokuro for days when I can afford to make it last, because it is quite expensive, owing to its quality and import cost - this tea that I have runs about $10 USD/oz. An ounce of gyokuro, however, does translate to a pretty good amount of tea - it's tightly packed and pretty light by weight. It's generally brewed at a lower temperature, although I've found it doesn't suffer too much at a higher temp, and I'm not an expert brewer. If you end up getting some of this, I do recommend taking the time to do it right, and make it worth it. Get some good leaf and set aside some time to really savor it. Photos: Dry leaf:  Initial steeping:  After 1-1.5 mins, first steeping:  The tea itself:  I never brew a green tea for more than 1:30 minutes, personally - I know some people who brew it for 5 minutes or more and enjoy the bitter flavor, but that's too much for me. I wish I had the time for a re-steeping today to show off the bubbles, but I don't. My cup is kind of a green-turquoise color so it lends a little bluishness to the tea, but it is very green in person. Heath fucked around with this message at 18:15 on Jan 20, 2020 |
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Jan 20, 2020 18:10
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Just want to add David’s gyokuro is not bad, but pricy. It’s a great one to get as your free 50g if you get enough frequent steeper points. I usually get their pheonix oolong though. It’s a decent one (I have yet to compare it to the ones on Teavivre). Though it sucks it’s only offered online.
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Jan 20, 2020 18:58
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confirm gyokuro ("jade dew" is a somewhat stylized direct translation) being a love-it/hate-it trip, it's completely wild that growers can squeeze that chicken-soupy flavor profile out of a normal-rear end tea bush. if you have the money to blow on what really is an outrageously expensive tea, you've gotta try it at least once.
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Jan 22, 2020 02:37
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Another thing I wish I had the money to blow on is making a batch of Shinobicha. I've had it twice and it's the weirdest sensation. Basically you take some high grade green tea and brew it over ice, literally - you place the leaf bare on ice and allow it to melt, and somehow the process distills the proteins out of the leaf and you end up with a small amount of very thick, highly concentrated green tea. It is pure umami, almost overpowering, coating your entire tongue and throat. It's not something I would drink often, for sure, but it's been a hell of a thing when I have had it. It is very costly to make since it takes a lot of good leaf and produces only a little tea and it takes hours. The taste of it evokes "corn" to me, although it isn't nearly as sweet as corn is. It's very hard to describe. My local tea shop brews some up for its yearly ceremony and I always look forward to it.
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Jan 22, 2020 02:51
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Tea newb here. Now that I have the disposable income, I figure I should treat myself to some better tea. Years ago I bought some tea from Silk Road as a present and that was the goon recommendation at the time. So what's up with Teavivre and why is everyone here singing high praises of it? Is it something like the quality/price ratio? Its prices are like 1/3 that of Silk Road, and assuming it's comparable quality, why does that price difference feel so shady? Should I just get one of their tea samplers to start figuring out what I might like?
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Jan 22, 2020 03:35
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Teavivre is in China where the tea is. They’re legit and have some good tea. Definitely get some samples, they’re worth it. I’ve ordered around and I’ve liked the Chinese greens here a lot. Prices are great too. Oolongs I’ve bought here were good too.
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Jan 22, 2020 04:26
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facepalmolive posted:Tea newb here. Now that I have the disposable income, I figure I should treat myself to some better tea. There’s way less markup when you buy tea directly from China. The other major Chinese tea company that sells direct to customers internationally is YunnanSourcing.com and they have even less markup on their teas because they’re not figuring in the flat-rate shipping into their prices the way Teavivre does. Getting tea shipped direct from China would probably cost more if epacket shipping weren’t priced to favor imports from China, but that’s a whole huge International trade issue I won’t get into. My local small tea shop https://mrmaxeystea.com/ is really good about not price gouging. The golden snail I can get from Teavivire for $11.50 CAD per 100g, they sell for about $16.50 CAD per 100g. Not a huge markup at all. David’s Tea in comparison massively marks up their teas to the point where you’re only getting value for your money if you buy their teas on sale. I still buy from both, the former because they have a lot of great high-end teas the owner buys directly from the tea farmers or ethical tea co-ops in India. The latter because David’s has some damned good non-caffeinated blends and nice teaware. Also, I’ve come to trust Teavivre even with the occasional shipping mishaps that have happened because their customer service is great and they’re really good about fixing their mistakes. I once ended up with 500g of jasmine oolong and 200g of osmanthus oolong for free because my package accidentally got mixed up with someone else’s, which arrived at the same time as my actual order because they reshipped it out express. Hope that person in Australia likes pu-erh! (I’m not too keen on jasmine unfortunately, but the osmanthus is great) Stuporstar fucked around with this message at 04:46 on Jan 22, 2020 |
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Jan 22, 2020 04:32
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Stuporstar posted:Getting tea shipped direct from China would probably cost more if epacket shipping weren’t priced to favor imports from China, but that’s a whole huge International trade issue I won’t get into. Ah okay, that makes a lot of sense! Exports vs. whatever-the-hell-aliexpress-is-doing-to-give-us-dirt-cheap-poo poo. I understand epacket shipping will always carry a risk through no real fault of their own; glad to hear their customer service is good. I'll stick with Teavivre samplers then, as I'm assuming (given the name) that YunnanSourcing is probably more puer-focused? I haven't quite acquired a taste for puer yet -- it still tastes like musk/dirt to me, but then again I've probably just had bad ones.
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Jan 22, 2020 06:38
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facepalmolive posted:I'll stick with Teavivre samplers then, as I'm assuming (given the name) that YunnanSourcing is probably more puer-focused? I haven't quite acquired a taste for puer yet -- it still tastes like musk/dirt to me, but then again I've probably just had bad ones. Yunnan Sourcing actually has huge selection of every type of tea from nearly every region of China and they also have Taiwan Sourcing for all the teas in Taiwan. Their selection is so huge though, even I find it daunting. Teavivre has a smaller selection but a really well curated one, and the low flat rate shipping is great when you’re ordering a ton of samples. If you’re unsure about pu-erh, this dark tea (processed like pu-erh, but not from the pu-erh regions) is a great one to try https://www.teavivre.com/guangxi-liu-bao-cha-dark-tea.html It has a bit of the puerh umami but is heavier on the fruit flavors like ripe plum.
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Jan 22, 2020 07:46
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Wow both Yunnan Sourcing and Teavivre are awesome haha, I've mainly ordered my tea from TeaGschwendner, but I can easily see myself ordering a whole bunch from Yunnan, they have tangerine stuffed tea! It's crazy.
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Jan 22, 2020 18:00
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Today's tea is a Pu-erh called Sticky Rice, so-named for its distinctly ricey aroma. Pu-erhs are typically available pressed into a large cake from which a piece is broken off and steeped, or as single-serving individual cakes, or as loose leaf. This variety is of the individual serving size, which is about a tablespoon worth of leaf packed into a fragrant little nugget. The flavor isn't too hard to picture: You've had rice? You've had Sticky Rice. As such, it makes a perfect accompaniment for sushi, and I personally love it as a counterbalance to the flavor of the pickled ginger. Like most Pu-erhs, it is rich, robust and very dark. I do a very light brew on this one, only about 30 seconds to a minute in boiling water, because it is quite strong. I love pouring the water over the cake and watching it disintegrate and seeing how the water quickly browns. Aside from the water being physically hotter, the rich flavor and aroma combine to form a sort of "warm blanket" feeling, making for a good Autumn and Winter drink. The individually wrapped cake:  A steeping of about 50 seconds. You can see just a touch of green still in it.  The brewed cup. 50 seconds gets you some impenetrable darkness. You can see a little steam around the rim. 
Heath fucked around with this message at 00:25 on Jan 23, 2020 |
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Jan 23, 2020 00:21
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sticky rice herb-pu is really great. it’s a shame YS’s cake was only 100g
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Jan 23, 2020 09:41
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I'm looking at a looong-rear end business trip around the world, so thought I might as well squeeze in as much tourist stuff as I can. London, UK Bangalore, India Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Singapore Tokyo, Japan (all of this may fall through if the norovirus derails the trip but for now it's happening) If there's anything tea-related -- and unlikely to be found in the US -- you can recommend, please fire away. I'm thinking tea shops or houses, since those are what's most likely to be available to me within a walking distance from hotels and offices. In case it helps, I mostly drink black teas (including pu-erh) and my preparation approach is minimal (Finum brewing basket, electric kettle, sweetener). Bringing back pots and cups is probably not in the cards, esp. since I doubt they'd survive the trip.
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Jan 28, 2020 15:33
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Today's drink is Russian Caravan, a smokey black tea blend. While I'm not generally the biggest black tea fan, I do enjoy some lapsang souchong, which is the principal component of this blend. If you're not familiar, lapsang is a black tea originating in the Wuyi region of China, which is smoked over pine wood fire. The smoking adds a potent and delicious aroma to the tea and gives it a hefty body; Russian Caravan takes lapsang and adds some oolong and keemun teas, broadening the flavor profile and giving the brew a malty taste and a very slight lingering sweetness. Its name is derived from the caravans that brought tea leaves from Asia into Europe through Russia. Supposedly, the nature of the journey and the storage methods used contributed to the aging of the tea in such a way that produces its unique flavor: Wikipedia quoting 'The Dublin Review' in 1888 posted:The southern route by Odessa is far cheaper, but the tea is supposed to suffer in flavour in its transit through the tropical seas, while it improves in its passage through the cold dry climate of Mongolia and Siberia, by losing that unpleasant taste of firing [whereby tea was dried using direct heat]. As Russian epicures believe that a peculiar delicacy of flavor is imparted to it by the slight moisture it absorbs when nightly unloaded and placed on the snow-covered steppes, the enhanced price it commands compensates for the greater expense and difficulty of its carriage by this route. Part of the tea lore is that the tea picked up its smokey flavor from the campfires of the caravans, but that probably wasn't true then and definitely isn't true now. Even still, just smelling the tea instantly transports you to a seat around the campfire. I've never had it seated around an actual campfire, but it sounds just delightful; the tea itself has a comforting warmth and a full body, with a flavor that hangs around with you for a while after you've finished. I can taste the smoke on my breath for some time on days that I drink it. Straight lapsang has much the same, but lacks the woody sweetness that the oolong provides. Lapsang in particular is getting a bit expensive, since the region that produces it is not large and it's a frequent inclusion in a lot of blends, so good Russian Caravan can be kind of hard to find in the States. My usual shops only carry it infrequently, and often have to blend it themselves, so your options may be limited for trying it. If you're a black tea fan and want to try something with a pretty different flavor profile, I recommend it for that, and if you can't find RC, straight lapsang is, of course, a good alternative to enjoy a smoked tea. Here's some photos: Dry leaf:  Post-brew leaf:  Brewed:  On a personal note, it says something about the power of scent to elicit memories that every time I smell this tea I am suddenly four years old again and remembering a very particular scent that I loved when I was very young. I had a scratch 'n' sniff Disney book featuring the DuckTales characters, and on one of the pages there had been a recently extinguished fire. Scratching the page gave off an aroma very similar to that of the smokey lapsang scent, and smelling this tea sends me into a Proustian reverie of my very early childhood centered around a book I haven't thought about in three decades. What a strange sensation that is. Heath fucked around with this message at 18:20 on Jan 28, 2020 |
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Jan 28, 2020 18:12
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I'm an absolute slut for smoke so I'll have to get some of that. Thanks for the enticing writeup!
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Jan 28, 2020 22:11
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Heath posted:On a personal note, it says something about the power of scent to elicit memories that every time I smell this tea I am suddenly four years old again and remembering a very particular scent that I loved when I was very young. I had a scratch 'n' sniff Disney book featuring the DuckTales characters, and on one of the pages there had been a recently extinguished fire. Scratching the page gave off an aroma very similar to that of the smokey lapsang scent, and smelling this tea sends me into a Proustian reverie of my very early childhood centered around a book I haven't thought about in three decades. What a strange sensation that is. I'm not a huge tea snob by most standards. I'm just enough of a tea snob to make me look like a tea snob to people who've only ever drank Lipton or Pure Leaf teas. So that in mind, the only lapsang I've ever had is Twinnings. So it's not super high-end, authentic, and only-available-sometimes, but just like you, the smell instantly transports me back to my scouting days, right to the side of a camp fire on warm spring evening. It strikes me as really weird that that's really one of the few really good memories I have of my childhood that's so strongly tied to a specific scent. Also, on this note: Heath posted:I wrote this a couple of days ago, but I am really loving this tea lately: I dunno where you live, but if you're anywhere around Western New York, the local huge grocery chain, Wegmans, sells their own loose leaf version of this, which I picked up over the weekend after reading this post. I have yet to try it, but it smells delicious. I also picked up a couple ounces of a lavendar sencha that I did actually try yesterday and loved, so I'll likely be getting more of that once I run out of the sample. Price-wise, I'm getting these for around $1.19 to $1.49/ounce, which isn't horrible, all things considered. I ended up getting these teas to try after I followed this post: Stuporstar posted:I get all my Chinese blacks from Teavivre these days: https://www.teavivre.com/tea.html?cat=10 And was incredibly disappointed to find out that Teavivre wasn't shipping orders till the end of the month due to the lunar new year. Further, my wife got all squicked out at the idea due to the recent illnesses on that side of the world, so... I guess I'm stuck waiting on that magnificent looking golden snail till things clear up.
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Jan 29, 2020 03:10
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neogeo0823 posted:And was incredibly disappointed to find out that Teavivre wasn't shipping orders till the end of the month due to the lunar new year. Further, my wife got all squicked out at the idea due to the recent illnesses on that side of the world, so... I guess I'm stuck waiting on that magnificent looking golden snail till things clear up. Same tbh. Maybe I’m being superstitious, but ordering tea during a promotion for the year of the rat while a plague is ripping through their country seems... inauspicious, and my 2020 has sucked from the start. I’m not even sure my order wouldn’t be held in customs an extra month because of this, so I’m gonna wait on ordering more tea for now.
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Jan 29, 2020 07:11
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Well thanks to this thread I have ordered my own first yellow tea, https://shop.tgtea.com/China-Yellow-Dragon-00541-100/7120/. It's waiting at home and am excited to try it out for the first time tonight!
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Jan 29, 2020 18:01
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I just ordered my first real Japanese load: - 50g Gyokuro Tamohare ($65CAD !!!) - 100g Sencha Yame - 100g Sencha Ashikubo I’m going through Camellia Sinensis in Montreal, and have no idea the differences between the types of Gyokuros and Sencha. There’s so many options with no real definition as to why the gyokuro I bought was $65 for 50g when another one with a different name, Gyokuro Shizuoka, is only $16 for 50g. This type of tea is still very new to me.
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Jan 29, 2020 18:43
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Heath posted:tea Very much enjoying your review posts, thank you.
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Jan 29, 2020 19:14
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virinvictus posted:I just ordered my first real Japanese load: Gyokuro is something of a prestige tea, so it can command some ridiculous prices. Really, most of the time anything rated as a gyokuro is going to be pretty good. Let us know how the expensive stuff is, though.
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Jan 29, 2020 19:58
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Today's tea is a jasmine-infused green tea called Moli Hua Cha. (also written Mo Li Hua Cha.) Or, more properly, you could call it a green-infused jasmine tea. It's heavily floral and fragrant, with a delightful smoothness, going down quite easily - a very drinkable tea, the kind you want to slurp a little bit to oxygenate it as you sip, to kick up the floral smell. This tea is contributing to my ongoing refusal to acknowledge winter by pretending it's already spring, and it's quite good for that. It smells like the inside of a green nursery. This one's a new one for me, since I don't tend to gravitate toward the floral teas, but I'm looking to expand my palate a bit, and it gives me something to write about. A lot of the floral teas I've had have suffered from having an overpowering fragrance. This one is just jasmine and green tea, so while it's powerful, it's not overwhelming; many of them include a few too many floral flavors rather than too much of them. The single-stream jasmine taste smooths any astringency produced by the included green, reduces the caffeine content a bit, and makes for something you can drink all day long. I'm having it with a bit of chocolate and the flavors compliment wonderfully. Photos: Dry leaf:  Wet leaf:  Brewed: 
Heath fucked around with this message at 20:34 on Jan 29, 2020 |
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Jan 29, 2020 20:29
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Trabant posted:I'm looking at a looong-rear end business trip around the world, so thought I might as well squeeze in as much tourist stuff as I can. I just got back from a trip to London and had fun checking out the Twining's shop. It's still in the same building from when it opened in the early 1700s. There's a little museum section in the back and the curator was super nice to talk to. The staff were very well-informed about the teas and happy to brew anything to sample as well. Unrelated to tea - both the National Gallery and the Victoria and Albert Museum are incredible and well worth a visit.
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Jan 31, 2020 20:11
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Just because, here's my cheater gaiwan. 
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Jan 31, 2020 23:22
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that looks v nice
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Jan 31, 2020 23:54
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Carbon Thief posted:I just got back from a trip to London and had fun checking out the Twining's shop. It's still in the same building from when it opened in the early 1700s. There's a little museum section in the back and the curator was super nice to talk to. The staff were very well-informed about the teas and happy to brew anything to sample as well.  That looks like a great stop!The museums are on the list, time allowing, and I'll probably aim for V&A first. I visited the National Gallery a while back (even if I saw just a fraction of it), but more importantly: Victoria and Albert is just a 20-minute walk from the nearest location of a restaurant I've wanted to go back to for years. I'm not leaving that drat town without having the Dishoom gunpowder potatoes. 
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Feb 1, 2020 00:05
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I’ve been eying an easy gaiwan like that for a long time, but haven’t bought one yet. I should probably have a spare in case I break the one I have (why do I have to be so clumsy, I’ve already chipped the saucer).Carbon Thief posted:I just got back from a trip to London and had fun checking out the Twining's shop. It's still in the same building from when it opened in the early 1700s. There's a little museum section in the back and the curator was super nice to talk to. The staff were very well-informed about the teas and happy to brew anything to sample as well. I wish they sold more Twinings loose leaf tins in Canada. Their tea is ok enough that I’d totally buy a tin of Darjeeling just for the purple tin. They’re the perfect size to stack on my tea shelf. I have tons of Irish and English breakfast tins from when I was buying those as my staple breakfast teas, before they jacked the price up so much it’s cheaper to buy better quality Irish breakfast from Murchies.
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Feb 1, 2020 00:19
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I use this one at work because it's quick and easy. And I get a lot of compliments on it, although nobody knows what it is until I show them. One guy thought it was for sake.
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Feb 1, 2020 00:40
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drink yerba mate every morning for about 4 years. circle of drink youtube weirdo is importing Canarias on amazon, my goto.
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Feb 3, 2020 13:49
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Vahdam is out of their daily Assam, anybody got a good recommendation for a similar strong, no-frills, pretty cheap ($6 for 100g is the Vahdam price) Assam I can pick up instead?
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Feb 3, 2020 17:26
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So you know how I was saying I wanted an easy gaiwan? Found this one in a travel box/gift set at the thrift store today for $6 CAD. It’s extremely tiny though. Only holds 2oz, which is half the size of my blue and white one. But for that price I couldn’t not
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Feb 3, 2020 23:02
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That's super cute
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Feb 3, 2020 23:06
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What size is yours? It looks a lot bigger. I’d been eyeing this one for over a year because it’s nice and big and fairly portable https://yunnansourcing.com/collections/gaiwans/products/easy-gaiwan-duan-ni-clay-gaiwan-with-cup
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Feb 3, 2020 23:13
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I don't know how much liquid it holds, but that one looks much taller than mine is. I'll try and get a reference picture for mine.
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Feb 3, 2020 23:19
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So, the gyokuro tamahore from camellia Sinensis was super nice. Really gentle green tea with a very vegetal flavour. My wife doesn’t like it, but I think it’s great. Low caffeine, as well. 14mg per 250ml.
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Feb 4, 2020 01:06
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It's a bit of an acquired taste. If she wants a green tea but wants something that isn't so overpoweringly umami, perhaps try a sencha? I don't have anything to give a proper size reference for my gaiwan so here it is sitting on a copy of David Foster Wallace's Brief Interviews With Hideous Men. 
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Feb 4, 2020 01:17
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I have two separate Senchas with the same order. One from Yame and one from Ashikubo. So we’ll see how she feels about them.
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Feb 4, 2020 01:19
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Sirotan posted:Vahdam is out of their daily Assam, anybody got a good recommendation for a similar strong, no-frills, pretty cheap ($6 for 100g is the Vahdam price) Assam I can pick up instead? Upton’s CTC Irish Breakfast Blend is a blend of Assam teas, $7 for 125g. Pretty good stuff.
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Feb 4, 2020 01:24
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Heath posted:It's a bit of an acquired taste. If she wants a green tea but wants something that isn't so overpoweringly umami, perhaps try a sencha? Lol I just pour water into mine with a measuring cup and note how many oz went in xD
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Feb 4, 2020 01:25
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I'm at work so all I've got to dispense hot water is a Keurig and a plastic cup from a pizza place  I'd guess it's 4 oz?
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Feb 4, 2020 01:26
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