Whispering Pines Tea Company

I initially thought two things when I first tried this tea: 1) Holy Bergamot, and 2) Sil would not like this at all.

The Bergamot is strong but not enough to curdle milk. I wouldn’t normally add milk to a Dian Hong but this scented tea takes it well- Like a freshly baked citrus loaf, with sweet potato and butterscotch notes. Someone else mentioned taro root and that is spot on. I also get a marmalade finish, which sours into a red wine aftertaste (and man, is that noticeable after cooking with our old syrah tonight).

This tea needs no explanation from me. Sorry if that’s what you’re looking for. Exceptional for the price.

Thank you for the sample, Brenden.

Ambrosia has delightful notes of cocoa, malt, dark cherry, vanilla, and marshmallow. It’s smooth and creamy, nice mouth feeling… A thickness feeling and has a long-lasting finish. It is a complex tea with lots of underlying notes especially of fruity layers such as stone fruits, apricots, apples, mainly baked cherries, however, the vanilla and chocolate notes are on the forefront. Other notes throughout are baked bread, malt, berries. It is energizing and calming at the same time.

Gaiwan, 200℉, 5g, 110ml, 7steeps: rinse, 5s, 10s, 20s, 30s, 40s, 60s,120s

I have also tried it as directed, western brew. Excellent that way too.

I adore the name of this one, and it’s beautiful when dry with all the buds – they do look like fox tails! Beyond that, it’s a cozy and comfortable tea. No bitterness, nothing deep and dark. A little earthy, sometimes just a hint of a little peppery/herbal in the background. The sweetness is pretty mellow too, it doesn’t taste like fruit or desserts or anything like that. I didn’t think of sweet potato while drinking it, but seeing other people describe it that way makes sense. It’s not my longest lasting tea, but I got several good cups out of it.

I finished off my bag of the Spring 2018 harvest several days ago and it took a while to background process my opinion.

While this tea is complex and layered flavor-wise because of the mix of Chinese red teas, I feel like the Jabberwocky’s bark is bigger than its bite. It’s an easy tea to slay, one I could drink all day but I was always left longing for something a little deeper, a tea I could sink my teeth into, a beast that would put up more of a fight. I may have preferred this tea gongfu actually, because each type of leaf in the blend waxed and waned. There was however, always a bit of flatness to the body regardless of brewing method. The description is mostly apt, but I was missing out on that camphor and eucalyptus.

I think this tea would be very appealing to those who like slightly sweet and softly poetic Chinese reds.

A word to cold-brew fans.

I typically leaf my cold-brewed greens lightly. Last night, I used 3 grams to 500mL and tasted the tea this morning. It’s really light, even for me. I won’t at the time recommend doubling your leaf amount since I haven’t tried it yet, but I’ll be doing so tonight. The wet leaf smells so lovely sweet and creamy. I’m hoping a heavier hand will bring out some of that in taste.

Hello and good day. I’m excited about having my first green tea of 2019. Spring is here in this region of the states. I welcomed its arrival by prepping the garden which had fallen victim to snails, Bermuda grass, Himalayan blackberry, English ivy and baby palm trees. Mowed the grass, weed whacked and set to work digging up all the bristly ox tongue before it bolts and flowers. I also spent Friday cutting down 8 trees on a friend’s property for a nice sum of cash which bought me a new mattress and the leftovers of which will feed my recent puerh buying habit. I haven’t been drinking much tea this past week because I’ve been so damn busy.

I tried this a few days ago using Brenden’s parameters Western style, with 1T, 8oz, 180F and 3 steeps at 2/3/5 min. The tea was ok. It didn’t really awaken the crisp, spring green desire within me, being rather vegetal and muddled in flavor. I tend to like my green teas light and gentle, so I will have to play around with amounts and temperatures Western style.

This morning, though, I opted to brew the leaves gongfu and am much happier with the result. 6g, 150mL, 175F, 8 or 9 short steeps. The dry leaf smells soft, sweet, floral and young grass. Rinsed, I picked up on white chocolate, steamed veg and spinach and soft florals. The liquor is a crystal clear very light green-yellow without much aroma. The taste is crisp and light with fresh grass, minerals (salty), and florals with a light stonefruit-osmanthus aftertaste. In the mouth, the tea is thick and glassy early on moving quickly to a light body with soft astringency. The flavor ends more vegetal, perhaps green bean with a hint of oat creaminess. I thought maybe the tea got a little fruitier in the late steeps, but it was just the aftertaste that lingered.

Overall, brewed gongfu, it’s a very mineral yet delicate, light and crisp green tea that embodies what I’m looking for in the first days of spring. I imagine I’ll finish this bag today since the weather will be warm and sunny. A few more cloudy and rainy days are on the horizon.

Unlike derk, I like cold-brewed greens quite strong. I crushed about 7g of leaves and steeped them in 500ml for about 2 hours at room temperature. The result is a briny and tangy tea with a lot of umami, decent bitterness and no astringency. As usual for greens the taste is crisp, refreshing and somewhat sour. I think it would go extremely well with a hint of elderberry syrup and mint, but I don’t have either at work :D

Like for derk, this is also the first 2019 tea for me. Here in Ontario, the spring hasn’t arrived yet, but while we anticipate its arrival, we can at least drink some fresh tea, right?

This particular tea is quite a light one, it reminds me of the first flush Mao Feng offered by YS. It is characterized by a clean and crisp taste of green vegetables with an underlying floral sweetness. Despite being on the lighter side, it is fairly complex, especially when using a higher amount of leaves. The aromas are nutty and floral, with notes like swiss chard, candies, courgette and lamb. Taste starts savoury, but quickly transforms into a sweet and grassy one. Apart from the flavours mentioned, I also notice chicory and white fish meat resembling ones. Aftertaste is weak, but there are similar notes complemented by some herbal ones like Breckland thyme.

I find that this tea performs better with longer infusion times and quite a high leaf/water ratio. For this session I used 4.5g/180ml and steeped 3 infusions for several minutes each. The body is fuller than with shorter brewing times. The mouthfeel is slightly less smooth, but I think the astringency actually adds to the experience.

Finally I had time for a more complex tea than some tea bags.
I sample from Derk and I really like it.

Preheated gaiwan, 3 grams of tea.
Oh, right after first notes started to appear! Mineral as well spicy, grapes, other stone fruits. Hmm, very, very interesting.

No rinse; too lazy to do it. I did not even had some precious time managment, just brewing as I like it. Once it was 30 seconds, then 90 seconds. I don´t care :D I was just preparing it somehow.

Tastes? Oh, so many. Red grapes probably most, but there are mineral notes, pine, forest floor, kinda woody, come on? It is so complex as well very velvety, smooth, cooling down a bit I guess. It is so good! Really! Maybe I feel bit nostalgic, as I also noticed antique shop aromas and as well a old books. Really fancy tea!

Derk, why you have not send me more? I would love to try it in different ways too! But of course it is bit ironic; it is lovely tea and really thank you for this sample.

Got this as a sample with my recent order so thought I would give it a try.

Its described on the package a breakfast blend with hints of dark malt and light citrus. Honestly I don’t notice either. However, I also have a cold. While my sense of taste has seemed ok, I’m sure my sense of smell is borked. I could have sworn when I drank this at one point that I kept tasting eucalyptus.

I’ll give it another go once I feel better and I can trust my senses a little better.

Drinking a sample of this one in an attempt to make Mondays better…

I got this one as a sample with my order of Lord of the Lakes…it’s a very different tea, so I’m glad to have tried them both. Huron is sweet, but not chocolately like Lord of the Lakes can be. I can see where the description of mushroom notes comes from, it tastes more like things growing in the forest than the forest itself, if that makes sense (and would probably go very well with a bowl of roasted vegetables). It also has strong minerality and a dry feel to it. I like the sweet/stone contrast, but it feels like it’s lacking something for me…Overall, a fairly mellow and savory, good-tasting tea, if not likely to be a staple for me.

I like to keep this one on hand for when the need for a nice iced tea strikes, but I’m pretty neutral about it as a hot tea. It’s not the tea’s fault, I just generally prefer something a little more surprising from my everyday tea. It’s a great earl grey, however; good quality tea and a nice balance of flavor (sure it could be stronger, but why completely drown out the tea?). I’d definitely recommend this one if earl grey is your style, or for people who want an accessible upgrade from tea bag earl grey…

Thanks so much for sharing this, Kawaii433! I certainly don’t think I’ve even had a tea that looked like this before? The closest might be Zen’s black dragon pearls. Black bundles with hints of gold, but these leaves have a sheen to them. GABA is Gamma-AminoButyric Acid — a neurotransmitter responsible for inhibiting overactive firing of neurons in the brain. It is the body’s anti-anxiety mechanism supplemented in the natural form through a drink. (Info from Mandala’s GABA black.) This sounds like a great idea in theory. I can’t say if it helped my anxiety, as I looked up what it meant after drinking the tea. I wish I had known to pay attention to my anxiety at the time…
On to the flavor: If you were a fan of Butiki’s Premium Taiwanese Assam, this might have the closest flavor profile out there right now, that I know about. However, since the GABA unravels into quite a large amount of leaves, I probably shouldn’t have used one teaspoon. So the second steep ended up a little brisk which I’m sad about. But the third steep didn’t have that bite to it at all and was much like the first steep again. The Butiki starts out long and wiry, which means I would have been using less leaves compared to these unraveling bundles. Then at times, the tea seems more like one of those Ruby black teas. But I also at times described Butiki’s PTA to Ruby as well. So maybe this is a tea in between a Ruby black and Butiki’s PTA. I’m sorry I don’t have more distinct flavor notes for this though… A Ruby tea tastes a Roman nougat in a Russell Stover candy at times… though this tea isn’t QUITE that. The next day, I did want to revisit PTA because of experiencing this tea and it just reminded me that it’s always like caramelized strawberry, so possibly this tea is more like a Ruby than PTA. Nothing can really compare to the PTA, I suppose.
Steep #1 // 1 teaspoon for a full mug // 16 minutes after boiling // 2 minute steep
Steep #2 // 7 minutes after boiling // 3 minute steep
Steep #3 // just boiled // 3 min
2019 sipdowns: 22

I’m only barely getting into puer, so don’t want to pass much judgement, but this was a really pleasant tea for a rainy day. Steeped in a tiny gaiwan. Reminds me of being out in the forest after the rain, maybe with a little bit of good dark chocolate.

Sipdown! Working my way through some plain black teas that probably would not appreciate being iced.

I didn’t have quite enough of this for my tumbler, so it’s got a scoop of Golden Orchid mixed in. You can’t really tell, though.

Sipdowns in 2019: 21

This was a freebie in my last Whispering Pines order. I was really excited to see it in the box!

The leaves are long, whole, and dark. They smell faintly toasted and sweet. Instructions said to scoop with a half tablespoon, so I did. The resulting tea is a warm, welcoming amber.

Flavorwise, this does taste pleasantly toasted. Almost like brown sugar or burnt sugar. The notes remind me of leather and sweet potato. It’s smooth and hearty and perfect for a breakfast tea. Whispering Pines never fails to impress with their quality and the complexity of their teas.

Bah, I forgot to write a review on this yummy tea.

Update on those people upstairs that caused 7 cop cars, ambulances and more to come to our unit. They were evicted. Apparently, the guy beating the dog and his girlfriend wasn’t a tenant here and so because I called 911 on them, they were also busted for having extra pets (I didn’t know about that) and the guy wasn’t on the lease. So there ya go. It’s finally over and they are out. Looking forward to the next neighbors (not).

Back to the tea… Great tasting notes/reviews on this tea (which is why I purchased it) so I just wanted to put my two cents in. Lots of delicious notes. Fruits, nuts, cocoa with honey and caramel sweetness, malt and minerals. :D

The dry leaves were a mixture of dark and green long leaves, kind of looks like something you’d run into while snorkeling off an island, floating in the sea. It smells of super fresh hay… Like when you go down to the horse stables in the early morning to feed them. The aroma brings back good memories. It’s a vivid aroma. I still can’t say that it’s an aroma that makes me go yum, I’m sure horses think differently hehe. It is an aroma that brings back some precious youth memories, lost youth. The wet leaves added so many more different aromas: Wintergreen, mints in general, flowers, fruits, anise, grass, licorice. As the infusions continued, the mint became more pronounced. There were also sweet cherry notes, subtle peach, cinnamon, and spices, cocoa, malt, roasted yams, honey sweetness notes. Delicate flavors but complex. I wish I wasn’t the only one who reviewed this because I’m sure there is so much more… Just like I think that different temperatures and different tea prep would change this tea as well. It is a medium bodied tea, satisfying with many different notes and aromas but licorice and mint were always there. It never got bitter nor astringent and it has a long minty-cooling finish. I’m not into mint teas but this is very good because of the complexity.

Gaiwan, 7g, 194°F, 110ml, rinse, 9 steeps: 5s, 10s, 15s, 20s, 25s, 35s, 45s, 55s, 1m5s

Just opened my bag of this from…years ago. I don’t know how many. More than one. Tastes delicious, definite cocoa note as indicated in the name. Very nice black tea to get through my morning with. 2 steep so far in my giant Deadpool mug and I think I’ll probably go for a third, though maybe with a little less water. Then decide what I want to drink next.

New medication causes weight gain and is making me super hungry so I’m triyng to placate with tea.

Thank you Derk for this good couple cups of tea :D

Busy day yesterday and I got to try this and it was a really good brew. Not going to go into it, Derk has a good review on it. I had oversteeped it both times. I had meant to follow Derk’s exact directions o.O but got involved in work… However, even with my horrible attention span, it was still delicious. :D