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Looking back on what I said about this a month ago, the main difference is that I can now comment on “the rooibos aspect.”

Tonight, in fact, the rooibos aspect was the main thing I tasted in this tisane. It makes me wonder whether my novice palate at the time confused the rooibos with another flavor. Rooibos can have a fruity note to it, and I may have interpreted this note as apple. But now that I’ve had more rooibos, it’s not apple. And the lion tamer in me wants to reach for my whip and chair and back the rooibos back into its corner, where I like it best. Bumping down a couple of points.

Second of my samples.

What makes this Long Island? (No idea).

I made my wee sample with about half the amount of water I’ve been using for the GM samples.

First surprise, the dry leaves smell nicely fruity. No cough syrup or any such oddness. I had a tiny dried strawberry and two tiny bits of papaya in my sample. Second surprise, the aroma of the steeped tea is vague but sweet and nice. The color is just barely yellow.

Third and last surprise, this is a pretty good flavored green tea. This from someone who has only met 1.5 flavored green teas she’s actually liked well enough to reorder. It is pretty delicate, and not quite as robust a flavor as I’d like, but it’s not what I call thin. I think this is 100% attributable to the strawberry which adds a fruity sweetness to the taste that gives it (shut my mouth) the beginnings of character, something mostly absent in flavored green teas I’ve tasted.

It isn’t quite enough to get me over the hump to ordering it, but I think those who like fruity green teas should give it a whirl.

Golden Moon sample No. 7 of 31. You guessed it — randomly picked.

This is going to be interesting. It’s my first loose leaf gunpowder green tea. I’m enjoying looking at the little rolled up leaves as I haven’t been able to see them before when I’ve had bagged gunpowder. They’re nestled in and among the brighter green, flat mint leaves.

It’s also going to be interesting because of my love affair with Samovar Moorish Mint, the only flavored green tea that has my number so far.

Smells minty (duh) and the dusky smell of the tea adds some depth and darkness. I’m reminded of Girl Scout thin mints. I heart Girl Scout thin mints! This bodes well.

It steeps to a golden yellow with a hint of green. A dark champagne color. The minty aroma has become duskier, greener and lost its thin mint quality. It’s more like a warmed-up mint cordial.

The minty note is fresh and clean, and lands softly on a surprisingly mellow gunpowder base. I expected it to be more pungent than it is. I’d describe it as a cross between wheatgrass and parsley with maybe a little moss thrown in. It’s not quite sweet, but it’s not overpowering or bitter either. The tea feels soft and velvety, and the finish is sweet with a persistent minty freshness.

It’s a nice mint. I’d drink it if I couldn’t get the Samovar and I wanted a mint tea instead of a tisane, but it isn’t a replacement for the Moorish Mint.

Golden Moon sample No. 6 of 31 at random. I’d think it weird and that I seem to be channeling other Steeples today with this pick, but I’m saved from the weirdness because I actually fished it out of the basket two nights ago after the Coconut Pouchong. I just haven’ t had a chance to give it any attention until now.

Dry leaf mix is a nice range of colors across the tea color spectrum from very dark to silver flecks. Their scent is interesting. Vanilla, surely — it smells like cream soda vanilla to me. And jasmine, just as surely. And some darker notes: tree bark, and something that is almost musky.

I always have a dilemma as to how to steep mixed teas and I know I tend to like my greens steeped under two minutes and my black steeped around 3 minutes. It looked like most folks on Steepster who have had this went with longer steeps, so I chose closer to the black parameters.

To extend the cream soda metaphor, the liquor is pretty much the color of one of those old timely, hearty cream sodas — not the wimpy yellowish ones, the tan/amber ones. The aroma is lovely. The jasmine smells very fresh, and the vanilla smells more seasoned, and they come together in a nice, balanced way.

Unfortunately, I’m not feeling the love in the taste. Maybe I should have steeped longer? Or shorter? I taste some flowers, but not much vanilla. And there is an unexpected harshness to the blend. Something about it is making it stick in the back of my throat rather uncomfortably. It isn’t making me gag, it’s just a noticeable, continuing sensation, almost like an afterburn, though I didn’t drink the tea when it was overly hot. I would call it astringency except that it isn’t affecting anywhere else in my mouth, and astringency for me is usually an all over sensation. As the tea cools, I am able to taste more of the flavor of the green tea, the black tea, and the vanilla, all of which are tasty enough but the strange mouth sensation continues even with cooler tea. After the sensation, whatever it is, dissipates, the aftertaste is sweet and flowery, with an interesting, almost tobacco note.

The jasmine and the aftertaste are enough to make me willing to give this tea another chance, but it would have some work to do to change my mind. Mostly it would have to lose the climbing-up-the-uvula thing it’s doing in the back of my throat.

I feel sorry for this tea. Le pauvre.

If I’d tasted it before I tasted the Den’s and the Samovar, it would have gotten a better rating. It’s pleasant enough. Smells of toasty rice, as it should, though not as toasty as some. Tastes of toasty rice and a bucolic, green tea that is both sweet and a tad bitter just around the edges, and even has a silky, thick mouth feel.

But alas, I am fast becoming spoiled and the tea, while it isn’t unidimensional, isn’t as multi-faceted as others I’ve tried. It’s like a singer who is a tiny bit flat, almost not enough to notice except to someone who has spent a lot of time listening to really really good singing.

My samples arrived! This is the first I’m trying since I have water at 175 right now, which frankly may even be a little too hot for this.

I’m making half a cup of tea as the samples are small. Not knocking them, they were free, just ‘splainin’.

Very green leaves, very peachy smell. Very light yellowish liquor. Peach aroma, and some buttery vegetal notes. Having just come off a very intense jasmine experience with the Numi Monkey King Jasmine Green, I’m not getting any floral notes here.

I taste the sencha, and a tiny bit of peach which is most obvious in the finish. The jasmine is MIA. The flavor is pleasant but too thin for my taste. At least it isn’t bitter.

I am really trying to find flavored greens that speak to me and I will keep trying, though I have a feeling it will be an uphill battle. I enjoy greens, but I’ve yet to enjoy a flavored one other than the Samovar Moorish Mint as much as I enjoy them in their unadulterated state.

The flavor of this is what I think of as “Chinese restaurant tea” as it seems to be a staple at the Chinese restaurants in this area, only this version is even more jasminy than the norm. The aroma and flavor are very, very jasminy which is a big plus as I love the smell of jasmine.

The tea base is what keeps this from being spectacular. It’s only just peeping through the flowers, and though it is pleasant and mildly sweet, it could announce itself more. Then I’d be able to tell how good this really is — either it would score points or fall down if the tea wasn’t up to at least par. The downside of the intensity of the jasmine is that it masks the tea, and I feel a little like I’m being asked to judge a photo after it’s been airbrushed to conceal all the flaws.

Lest I mislead, this is better than standard restaurant tea in my view as it is more floral and actually more flavorful (I steep mine pretty strong, and restaurants tend not to), but I’m guessing there are better jasmines with more robust bases out there.

Since my April tea of the month club offerings have arrived, I think it’s time to close out March. This was the last of the three March Teavana Classic Tea of the Month Club teas.

This will be brief, because while there is nothing wrong with this tea, it’s not exceptional either. I have had other Chinese greens that were juicy and had a lot of depth, and that made it fun to play “name the vegetable” when deciding what it most tasted like. This has a mild vegetal taste and aroma and a tiny bit of the buttery flavor that I like so much, but it is lacking in depth.

Others have said that it is a good every day tea. Basically, I think if I was going to have an every day Chinese green tea, which I take it means relatively inexpensive, at this point I’d pick Tazo China Green Tips. The full leaf version of that has far more flavor than the Three Kingdoms does.

Even considering cost, I can see no reason why even an every day tea should be just ok — there are so many extraordinary teas out there at all different price points. And Teavana has a reputation for being overpriced. I haven’t done a comparison to pin this down, but I’d think there are more robust, flavorful green teas for the same price or less.

Golden Moon Sampler No. 5 of 31, selected at random.

Wow, back to back selection of the teas Ewa said she was dreading. [Twilight Zone Music]

I’m also dreading this one, not because I don’t like coconut, but because when I looked up Pouchong I learned that it is between a green tea and an oolong. I’ve only had one flavored oolong which was good, but I’ve never met a flavored green tea that I really really liked, with the exception of the Samovar Moorish Mint. I really wanted to like this one. It seems as though it has many fans, so I was hopeful as I started out.

The dry leaves are medium length, twisty, a dark to medium green with yellow highlights and smell like toasted coconut. It’s like someone put a maccaroon in this tea! (I heart maccaroons, so now I’m even more hopeful.) There is also a pronounced floral note. I looked at the ingredients to make sure there wasn’t a flower scent in there as well, but if there is it isn’t listed.

My first steep didn’t go particularly well. I decided to make this in a small teapot, and I thought I’d use just the amount of water that I’ve been using in my tastings of these samples — but that amount of water wasn’t sufficient to cover the leaves. So I had to add a bit more. I am concerned that it was too much. The liquor was a very pale yellowish color, almost colorless, and the aroma and flavor were buttery with a hint of coconut but not a great deal of depth to the flavor.

For the second steep, I used a Finum filter and steeped in the glass. This definitely made a difference in strength. The color was deeper; still pale, but very definitely yellow. The aroma was milky/buttery, floral and toasty/maccaroony.

The first, too-watery tasting made the buttery note primary, and a little on the weak side. But the second is much more satisfactory. Yes! I can taste coconut! It’s a mild, mellow flavor, but it is there. And now I’m kicking myself for not getting this right on the first steep as I can only imagine it should have been a far more accessible flavor the first time through.

I’m thinking I have to order more of this and keep working at it until I find the steeping sweet spot. If and when I do, I expect this will be extraordinary and deserve additional points.

Another steeping discovery. In addition to the honeybush, which I am now adding as a matter of course, I should abandon all rationality when it comes to measuring this mixture and go way overboard. Tonight I had a slice of lemon come out of the bag that was two inches long and weighed enough for a half cup measurement all by itself. Since I was steeping in a mug that holds enough liquid for two rather large normal-sized cups, I put in enough for five cups according to my scale. The result was a sweeter, more flavorful cup than I’ve had from this previously. More is better in this case!