Den's Tea

very high 4/5, kinda tempted to make it 5/5 in that it’s the best still-affordable straight sencha I’ve had so far

Aw man, I hate having relatively pricey taste, ha. I like this sencha much, much, MUCH more than the previous, cheaper one I tried from Den’s. Smooth and sweet, no harsh bitterness here at all. Really lovely stuff. Probably the best straight (that is, unflavored) sencha I’ve tried so far.

Price aside, the major disparity between the two could have something to do with the surprisingly high brew temperature recommended for the other one (180F instead of 160F)…might mess around a bit with it to see if 160F makes it better. That said I think it’s unlikely the previous one will ever taste as good as this!

3/5

Extremely mineral-y and quite grassy, earthy-bitter. It doesn’t actually taste of beets or bitter greens (think high oxalic acid greens), but has a similar flavor profile. Definitely not something I’d want all the time, but I can see why it’d be an excellent tea to drink with certain types of meals full of relatively bland-sweet white rice and seafood. Like with many greens, the sweetness comes in at the end and lingers in a very pleasant way.

Another one from Stephanie.
I drank this earlier today, but don’t really have much to say other than it was green & it was good. Thanks Steph!

I might have to keep this one, LOL.
It was in the Here’s Hoping TTB, unopened!
So of course I opened it & had a cup! It was very nice! Almost like have a cup of Matcha, so fresh & green, a little bitter, perhaps, but thus is life. Tea Sipper, let me know if you want some of this, since the box will be headed your way.

I used to drink lots & lots of green tea: Dragonwell, Sencha, Matcha, Bilo…then I discovered black tea, & I’m sorry to say that my love affair with greens ended. Like a dejected lover, my green teas haunt their shelf, hoping for a stray glance & smile, an occasional moment together. Once in awhile I indulge them, reflecting on our pasts & knowing that we can never go back. However, I do still enjoy their company once in awhile.
I can’t same the same for my ex-husband.

Dumped out my bamboo tea and dug around in my desk drawer here at work and found THIS!

I haven’t had any straight genmaicha in a while. Yum! I hope the matcha boost will perk me up since I seem to be getting a case of the afternoon sleepies.

this is gonna sound weird and just plain old wrong to a lot of people. but, ya know how some people just don’t like lapsang, or others maybe really can’t enjoy a dark puerh? well, i kinda suspect that maybe i don’t like senchas.
i’m almost embarrassed.
and i bet it means that one day, like a year from now, after more and more tea drinking and learning, i will suddenly become a sencha fanatic. but for now, mmmm…it’s not really my thing.
Thank you Shelley_Lorraine for teaching me new things and helping me challenge my preferences! always grateful to be challenged! always.

At work I drink this iced. Put it in a water bottle and shake it up. Delicious! Smooth rich green tea.

I got the little packet sample with my last order from Den’s Tea. It sounded so healthy I was worried it’d taste horrible lol, but it’s ok. It just tastes like mild seaweed. I may have used too much water, also the water was room temperature and neither hot or cold. Having things in it to suppress histamines, this might be a good present for my mom since she has pretty bad allergies at times. Wonder if it would help me when the vog is strong and I suffer with itchy eyes and runny nose? The little packet is the perfect size to carry around. Also, no clumps. When I plopped the whole thing in the bottle, there were clumpy bits so I thought it’d be like when i didn’t sift and my matcha has clumps and stick that way even when shaken but the benefuki powder dissolved really nicely. Not even a chalky texture at all while drinking.

Is there such a thing as Steepster withdrawal? If so, I think I’ve just experienced it. I was on travel for work for only a couple days, but I really missed Steepster! And I also missed black tea! I stayed with a coworker and she gave me green tea. Now, I am not yet a fan of green tea…I have hopes though, that someday I will appreciate it in all forms. ;) Anyway, not only did I have Steepster withdrawal, but I didn’t have black tea with breakfast! The shock! The horror! Lol! Black tea withdrawal!

So, I made up for it with 3 cups of black tea today;) AND I picked up some blueberry cream cheese danish black tea (via my smartphone) while I was staying over. Hey! It sells out quickly!

Anyway, this tea…it wasn’t bad. Not too grassy. More like squash, I think. I can handle squash. Interesting to try, and maybe if I ever get myself to venture into non-toasty, more grassy green tea land, I’ll get some.

Sip down :(

I would be running out to buy more of this, but my husband is going to make me some crushed roasted barley next time he’s prepping grains to make beer, which will be a lot cheaper.

I am addicted to this stuff though! Highly recommended :)

I’ve been drinking the heck out of this one lately. So refreshing!

The first time I made this it was bitter and not so great. Turns out I had oversteeped it! Much better with only a hour cold steep. I do still slightly prefer the batch I made for scratch, hot brewed and then chilled. Not bad though.

One of those days that can’t make up its mind: a little bluster, a little sun, a fair amount of raw wind that makes it rain yellow leaves in the backyard. Calls for an afternoon tea that’s savory, not sweet.

This is a (my bad) neglected little sampling of thin green tea needles with toasted rice popcorn in it. The grain scent makes me want to find a hay barn to spend the rest of the day in. More toasted rice flavor than greenness, but that proportion is perfect for the day and time.

This was tucked into an adorable little envelope courtesy of Claire.

Looks like popcorn, smells like sesame, leads with a roasty-toasty flavor, even when I didn’t research proper steep time and let this go well past 2 minutes. (The recommended sweet spot, per Den’s, is 30 seconds.) Eagerly anticipating doing it properly next time!

oops! I accidentally posted this note under the Genmaicha Extra Green Tea Bag. I’ve since deleted that note, but in case any of you are wondering why this looks familar, now you know.

Got this in my sampler kit from Dens. It tastes very much like I remember Lipton’s Green tea bags tasting. No offense to it, I really liked the Lipton bags before I switched to loose leaf, but I always hated that it was ‘Lipton’ brand :p Perhaps the flavor of this is a bit richer, but still a similar overal flavor profile, I think.

Sipdown, 197. Thanks to Ellen for sending me a sample of this tea!

I have never had a shincha before but I am curious about them. Of course, I am totally going to butcher this tea because I am not steeping it Japanese style but in a more western way because that’s what I have the equiptment for right now. The leaf is very fine and a good amount made it through my very fine-holed infuser, but now I have a dark yellow cup that smells amazingly nutty and buttery.

Well shoot my steep was a little too long I think, as I am getting a bit of bitterness/astringency that others have noted with too long a steep. The very first thing I taste is fresh and so buttery, but then that astringency takes over.

I decided to try a resteep of these leaves at 90 seconds to see if I could end up with a more pleasant cup. This one smells less buttery but it tastes much sweeter, although there is still a hint of astringency here.

Honestly this is similar to my travails at the beginning of my experimentation of any somewhat fussy variety of tea. I could see myself a couple of years from now coming back to a shincha and brewing it properly and loving it, but that would take some time and I am not so much in my tea exploration phase anymore. But glad I have this one and another sencha from Den’s to experiment with a bit.

I buy this every spring.
It’s delicate flavor is understated, smooth and refreshing. There is something very refined about this tea. I’m drinking it from a matt/textured/rounded glass cup which for some reason adds to the experience.

My first gyokuro! What an experience! Such a beautiful tea with that lush emerald colour. Isn’t that colour “in” right now in fashion?

I made sure I was very awake for this tea so I didn’t mess up steeping. Overall, very good mix of buttery, sweet and veg – but I didn’t like the astringency, as I’m not a fan of astringency at all.

Cold steep? MAGICAL!

With that said, I really don’t know what to rate this tea as.

Full review on my blog, the oolong owl. I took lots of pics!
http://oolongowl.wordpress.com/2013/03/07/gyokuro-kin-from-dens-tea-tea-review/