Samovar

Kinda smooth, kinda roasty. It’s got some umph and body to it. Slight bit of genmaicha hint to it which comes out a bit more with the second steep. Like the first steep more.

Among my most favorite teas – definitely a strong lemon scent and taste.

Hmmmm….what to say? First of all, I only ordered a sample of this, which Samovar says is enough for one pot. It looks to be about a tablespoon worth of leaf. One of the dynamic things about this tea is that it is supposed to have split personalities. You can brew it like an oolong with hotter water temps and it reacts very much like a Bai Hao or Oriental beauty oolong, which rivals a good Darjeeling in my opinion. However, Samovar promotes that you can also brew this like a white tea and have a somewhat different experience in terms of the notes that this gives up.

Since I only have enough for one pot, I decided to go with the lower water temps. Specifically, 180 degrees for 3 min. This is good, but a little grassy for me to want to actually purchase it for myself. There are notes of muscat, fruit, nuttiness, and a floral component. It is a bit malty and somewhat dry. Doesn’t sound much different than a typical Bai Hao, does it. But it is…it tastes much more like a white tea than a typical oolong. With hindsight being 20/20. I think I could have gotten away with making two small pots of this and done a hotter temp prep (prepare like an oolong) and a cooler temp prep (like a white tea) as this is a bit on the strong side.

Overall, I like this and would recommend this to folks that like Oriental Beauty, Darjeelings, grassy whites and the like. However, I likely would not purchase this in quantity for myself as it as bit grassier than I prefer. I might, however, get another sample of it and try again.

Sometimes I forget just how sweet and smooth this Puerh really is. BTW, it really does go great with a bowl of ice cream. French vanilla, if you please.

great for breakfast, too

My second pot (thankfully I started small) was much better today. The second was lighter on the black tea (1 tbsp instead of two) and white agave instead of sugar. I much prefer the agave instead of sugar or honey.

I love this spice blend, particularly the cardamom & pepper balance. Next time I think a little less sugar but whole milk instead of 2% is in order.

I bought this sample some time ago, but just getting around to trying it tonight.

It smells delightful – fruity notes along with a fresh vegetative scent and a hint of floral – honeysuckles!

The flavor is nice. I am definitely getting a honeysuckle flavor from this cup – nice and sweet and floral. Very smooth, slightly nutty, with a peach-y like flavor.

Mmmmmmm…. very relaxing, soothing, dreamy!

This is a delicius and complex green oolong. It is a little less heavy and less syrupy than many TGY, but still similar to TGY. I found notes of butter, cinnamon, green beans, milk, bread(!) and, of course, a strong floral component as the oolong unfolded. This one is nice and complex. However, it falls a little short in the mouthfeel for an oolong that has those creamy/buttery notes. I liken it to the difference between the mouthfeel of whole milk and 2% milk with this one offering the mouthfeel of 2%. The other thing to note is that this one does require a nice amount of leaf in order to produce the optimal cup. That said the leaves are beyond beautiful.

Second Samovar sample of the day. I’m now out of Samovar black tea samples to try until I come out of lockdown and can order again. It looks like there are only two that I haven’t tasted yet.

Does anyone else occasionally look at their tea log and go “wow, I can’t believe there are even that many teas in the world, let alone that I’ve tasted X number of them, let alone that I’ve written about Y number of them?” It’s a little mind boggling to me sometimes.

Wow, love the smell of the dry leaves. Floral. My first thought was lavender for some reason. Maybe my smeller is still off from being sick. It’s really rose.

The tea is a little too red to be called mahogany, but otherwise pretty close. And it has a sweet, fruity, floral aroma that is difficult to pin down. I’ve only had lychees in restaurants and I don’t really care for them as dessert offerings, but I like what their flavor does in this tea. It gives a sweetness to the tea that is a departure from the usual malty sweetness I get in Samovar black teas as it is lighter and fruitier. Nectar-like, really. There’s a slight nuttiness to it too, which is consistent with my experience of lychee in general.

This is one I’d like to drink next to some other rosy florals for comparison purposes. It seems to be a bit more subtle in its floral qualities than some others, which I like, and though I’m not an overly enthusiastic fan of the lychee by itself, at the risk of repeating myself, I will say I do like what it does in this tea.

Time to break out a few more Samovar samples. Since it’s still early, I’m going with a black tea to start.

Green and black are one of my favorite color combinations ever. It was the color combo for my bridesmaids’ dresses back in the married era, though the green in those was more of an emerald. In any case, I love the contrast, both in the color and in the texture of the lemongrass and the black tea leaves.

The smell I get from the dry mixture is not so Pledgy as it is a fairly sharp, high lemon note. It has a sort of powdery feel in my nasal passages, and between the sharpness and the feel I’m thinking dry lemon drink mix, minus sweetener. Crystal Light maybe.

This tones down and mellows quite a bit during steeping, and the tea’s aroma ends up being a wonderful combination of that Samovar black tea smell I love so much and lemon. The sweet maltiness of the tea combines with the lemon to give it an almost lemon drop smell. Wow.

The liquor is interestingly cloudy, which must be from the lemongrass as I haven’t seen this in a Samovar black tea before. It’s on the lighter side of tea colored. I may be drinking this before optimum steeping time and I am going to resteep longer (Samovar black teas are the only ones I’ve found that resteep reasonably well).

Hmm. This wasn’t at all what I expected this to taste like from the aroma. It seems to me to be balanced more toward lemon than toward tea. The tea flavor comes through mostly as a dip toward the tail end of the sip, kind of like that finger game I play with my kids… Johnny Johnny Johhny Johhny Whoops Johnny Whoops Johnny… it’s the Whoops slide down the tip of the kid’s pointer with the mom’s finger and back up to the tip of the kid’s thumb. Except for the Whoops, all the Johnnys are pretty heavily lemon-weighted over an undercurrent of a sort of dusky tea, which would probably taste a lot sweeter than it does if not for the lemon.

Now. You might think from what I just said that I’m disappointed in this tea. Maybe I am, just a teensy bit, because I had hoped for more of that black tea flavor that I love so much with the lemon as an accent rather than a main flavor. But it’s really not disappointment so much as that I’m a little taken aback and not sure what to make of this because it’s so different from what I’d expected.

I also wonder whether my sample was skewed a little more heavily toward lemon than would normally be true. I just took a look at what others have said about this and I seem to be in a minority in thinking this is heavily weighted toward lemon, though it seems Ricky’s experience of this came close to mine.

So now I’m faced with a big question mark about whether I like this enough to add it to a future order. I think the answer might be yes, but a cautious yes. I need to taste this again a few times now that I know what to expect. Knowing what to expect, I’d be able to analyze the flavor in context a bit better and see how I think I’d feel about multiple drinkings.

I really need about three more sample tries to be sure, but by that time I might as well bite the bullet and order a small tin, no?

Another new tea to try thanks to threewhales. This tea smells earthy, slightly sweet and with a hint of chocolate. It brews up extremely dark in just 3 minutes and is medium-bodied. Initially, there is a slight bitterness which dissolves away to an earthy and sweet quality that I’ve rarely come across. The aftertaste is bold and quite pleasantly tea-like. This would make a great base for all sorts of additions, but I think it could only handle a tiny bit of milk. It is also very easy to drink plain with the flavors developing as it cools.

I don’t think I would purchase this, but it is pretty good.

This is one of my favorite morning teas. Words I would use to describe it are earthy, nourishing and grounding. Upon brewing, the tea has a mild toasted-cereal-in-a-meadow fragrance which carries through to the flavor. This makes for a rich (almost hearty) drink. The color, which is slightly turbid, is a pleasant green that approaches neon. The cup is cheerful and is a great way to welcome the day.

I’ve had this forever and just opened it this morning. Just had to share it with my co-workers who love genmaicha.

I was able to get 4 infusions from my 12oz mug.

This is basically Genmaicha “to the Max!!” (lol, that’s such an 80’s reference isn’t it?). It’s super toasty, super green, mostly savory but with a little sweetness…and a bit of seaweed?

I enjoyed this because I love genmaicha. But it didn’t knock my socks off. So, while this was good, I’m not sure I’ll re-order once this tin is empty.

But it’s a good tea to share.

(hmm…I wonder exactly why I don’t love this? Since I find it good but not amazing, maybe the Samovar love spell has passed me over? ;) )

Ahhhh now that’s more like it! I gave this pu-erh a quick rinse and then steeped for the full 5mins and it brewed up to a very dark brown/black color. The taste is like a sweet hay/mossy taste with a bit of astringency to it, but that’s ok! Honestly though I would prefer a stronger earthy/hay/mossy taste. But this is still really good! Nom, nom, nom!!! :-D

Rawr! This is my kind of tea! I kind of wish I would have ordered this tea in a large tin instead of the osmanthus silver needle one, oh well! Anyways this tea is a strong/bold white tea with a natural juicy peach taste… and of course jasmine! I often mix a peach tea with my jasmine pearls, but this tea tops any blend I have had before. This tea has depth and isn’t overly powerful on any of the flavors. They all compliment each other perfectly… and this tea resteeps well! Ahhhhhhh this is nice, too bad I don’t have anymore :-(

Yum, yum! One of my few “got to haves”!!! I had this last night before bed and it was very relaxing and light :-)