Zen Tea

I was initially struck by the darker appearance and stronger scent of the dried leaves in Zen Tea’s Long Jing, relative to other Long Jings familiar to me. I also noticed quite a few smaller and broken leaves in the envelope. Then, upon brewing, though the liquor was very pale greenish yellow, the taste was more robust and vegetal than I have come to expect from this type of tea. That said, the brew is very tasty, so now I’m wondering whether I have been underleafing my Long Jing pots.

Today’s three-glass tetsubin was prepared using 5 grams of tea, so I’ll be sure to use that same amount when I brew other versions in the days to come… It’s nice to have a small scale so that I no longer have to eyeball dried tea servings!

For now, I am happy with this tea, just wondering about the darker vegetal facet, which seems more pronounced than the silken buttery side of this Long Jing.

second infusion: this seemed far more Long JIngy to me—with the characteristic pale greenish yellow liquor and smooth and silken mouthfeel—and now I am wondering whether this might be an example of a tea the first infusion of which the Chinese would toss? I rather liked the more robust first infusion, but it did seem like a different tea…

My recent purchase from Zen Tea. Actually this tea is the main reason I placed an order . i really like this tea. I made it gongfu style.
1TBSP 150ml gaiwan 205F
rinse/10/15/20/30/45sec etc
this tea is wonderful malty,chocolaty some grains. Like brownie if you add some sugar. No sugar for me, i prefer to drink it without additives. if you a fan of Laoshan Black by Verdant tea i think you would like this tea as well.

Fine, dark brown dry leaf that smells a bit earthy with dry plum, which becomes more pronounced when wet. There is possibly a hint of smokiness in the scent as well.

Brews a nice medium brown.
Tastes sweet with cocoa and plum, and there is a wee bit of earthiness. I do not detect much smokiness when drinking, but possibly the leather as in the description. Smooth and enjoyable!

A very nice tea and I re-steeped it once for just as delicious a cup.
Now I wish I had also ordered the other keemun that zen tea has so I could compare them, but perhaps next time.

The dry leaf of this smells JUST like almond extract! So yummy. The smell is less strong once steeped, but definitely still there. I’ve never tried an almond marzipan, but I can say that this is sweet and delicious and almondy. Yum!

I got this in Zentea’s zomg awesome sale last week. I’m really enjoying it. I admit, I ordered it for my daughter because she really likes fruity teas, and the rating here was good. But I might have to keep this. That, and she is drinking a lot of my Earl Grey right now. It’s all good, there’s enough happy to go around.

Another yummy sipdown here. I’ll definitely buy more Curled Dragon Silver Tips in the future!

For today’s tetsubin of Zen Tea Curled Dragon Silver Tips, I used 5 grams for a 17 ounce vessel. Last time I used 5 grams for 26 ounces and found the taste a bit weak.

This is definitely the right dose. Now the more vegetal flavor is more obvious. The liquor is pale peachy green and reminds me of a cross between Bi Luo Chun and Mao Feng. The dried form looks like snipped yarn which has been tied with knots before being cut.

A good midday green.

I love the compact, gnarled knottiness of this Curled Dragon Silver Tips tea from Zen Tea. The scent of the dried leaves is strong and toasty. The liquor is pale greenish yellow and begins to veer toward peach after a couple of minutes.

My first glass seemed a bit low on taste somehow—probably expectations. It was reminding me a bit of subtle China greens such as Bi Luo Chun. The second glass was more flavorful—again, I believe, because the perfect drinking temperature for green tea is a bit lower than the brewing temperature.

The flavor was succulent but still subtler than I had been expecting. From the scent of the dried leaves, I was fully expecting a more robust liquor. I’ll probably increase my leafage next time…

My very first experience with Zen Tea—from an order placed only a couple of days ago!—Jasmine YInhao brews up pale greenish yellow but begins to turn golden as the temperature cools. I think that I may have used overly heated water, so it took a while before it cooled to drinking temperature.

Anyway, so far so good: a nice jasmine scent and flavor. I’ll be trying this tea again soon steeped at a lower temperature to ensure that it is experienced in the best possible conditions.

The jasmine is imparted by essence, not flower petals, but it smells true to nature.

Sipdown!! (174)

Thank you Amariel for sending this my way. I really enjoyed getting to taste it. I think I actually prefer this cup to my first as I am getting a lot of strawberry and a lot of malt. Together it is making for a tasty treat. I don’t think I will be stocking this but we are parting on a wonderful note, thus I would not turn down another cup in the future :)

Strawberry? Check. Cream? Check. Slightly distracting black base? Unfortunately, check. I can see the potential in this as all the flavors are there but I find the black is competing for center stage as opposed to just being a foundation for the strawberry cream goodness. Consequently, I get notes of strawberry and notes of creaminess but it is all muted by the base. Perhaps some tweaking can correct that issue. Thankfully, Amariel was generous enough to send me a large sample that I have some more to play around with so thank you Amariel for the chance to try this tea :).

And the last tea from my green exploration.

This was in your face, beating you over the head grassy. This is why I think I don’t like green tea. This was way too strong for me, way too grassy, way too green. I’m sure this is a good quality Sencha – I just can’t do it. Willing to explore, willing to try teas that are generously sent to me, but this just confirms that I green isn’t my favorite and that if I must drink green, I prefer Chinese to Japanese….

Thank you so much TheTeaFairy for allowing me to try a few greens together. Helps to confirm how I feel about them.

My quest for the perfect Masala Chai is always ongoing. I like the strength of the spice in relationship to the base. It all seems to be well balanced. My problem is that the spice blend is too heavy on the anise for me. Nope don’t like the licorice taste to this one.

I decided to just let the leaves of this hang out freely in the hot water this time, in order to give the leaves plenty of space to uncurl. Thankfully, it was really easy to scoop them out, and I think it was a success! This cup was even more delicious than the last. Sweet and nutty and vanilla-y, and sort of caramel-y. So good.

So, while at Target today, I picked up a four pack of cafe cup coffee pod things for $10 that are supposed to be used for keurig, just to hold me over until I get a better steeping mechanism (I’m really wanting a nord or perfect cup from David’s Tea). They’re pretty small, so I’ll probably limit teas that really expand to 1/2 tsp at a time, but its better than twist-tied coffee filters.
Anyway, so I chuckled a little when I saw that MissB had included this in my box. I just placed an order with Zen Tea this weekend, and this is probably the tea that I’m most looking forward to from my order, haha.
I’m definitely glad I ordered it now, I love just about anything vanilla or hazelnut, and the nuttyness from the oolong goes perfectly. I’m finding that oolong is one of my favorite bases for desserty blends. It just complements the vanilla-y, caramel-y, nutty flavors that are in most dessert teas so well.
And I just love how much oolongs expand. Seeing how 1/2 tsp expands and fills the whole cafe cup is so neat to me. of course this means that since theres not enough room for the leaves to fully extend, the teas probably isn’t living up to it’s full potential.
Deifinately a yummy dessert tea! (I feel like I say yummy too much in my reviews)

Oh the Chinese green teas! They are so sneaky and so shy at the same time. The dry leaf for this tea is spectacular, silver, pretty and curled – the name doesn’t lie! The liquor I got is straw colored and smells like the promise of a buttery peas and asparagus casserole :D Yum!

The flavor is bolder than I expected. There are some mildly roasty grass notes in the foretaste that evaporate into sweet, buttery aftertaste. This tea is kicking! There is a certain boldness to its flavor that is in no way straightforward but rather complex. The mouthfeel is more on the astringent side, but only very slightly so. This one is definitely more a sneak than a shy chick, LOL. I don’t even know what I meant by that.

In other, but still related, news, I ordered a bunch of teas from ZenTea because of their huge sale they have going on, but I was also tempted to get one of their gaiwans and 2 cups. My first gaiwan!!! I am really excited. I have a little glass pot that is going to make a perfect pitcher, and the trays are way too expensive for now, so I figured that a gaiwan and 2 cups (for my hub and me) would be all I need to finally go gongfu style!

Op, nope, not a fan. Licorice is all I taste. Very visually appealing blend, but just can’t get past the licorice. Not wanting to dumb the cup, I tried adding a heavy dose of Almond Joy coffee creamer. This did a good job masking the licorice through the front and middle of sip, and left a very mellow slight licorice taste at the end of the sip. While this made the cup drinkable, I don’t see myself making this again. If only I could pull the licorice out of the blend, because the rest sounds interesting. Also, I think I way over leafed this.
Thanks MissB for sending this to me.

Thank you Zen Tea for this sample.

The raw blend smells minty and refreshing, very fresh and vibrant. It has a generic herbal scent in the background of the mint.

After the long 7 minute steep the tea is burnt orange in colour with a sweet yet herbal scent with mint being the dominating tone. I think I can smell the licorice in the background.

Flavour is more mild than the scent though the mint is easily recognisable so it’s a light medium strength overall (best way I can put it). I can taste the licorice which is not too bad (for someone who dislikes licorice in teas) it mostly blends into the refreshing after taste of the mint. Other than the mint and licorice there is a generic herbal flavour but it’s light and not as thick as most other herbal blends. Also has some natural sweetness.

I like this, I like herbal blends as long as they are not too thick or dry and the mint is a glorious touch in this one. Husband likes it too which says a lot since he isn’t a herbal tea fan. Perhaps a touch too much licorice for my taste but it’s a pleasant bed time tea non the less.

Thank you Zen Tea for this sample.

It smells heavily rooibos but I do notice a very sweet floral scent, like rose and violet mixed.

Once steeped the tea is burnt orange in colour a sweet and very floral scent, it’s pleasant but the base is very thick (good if you love rooibos).

Flavour matches the scent for the most part, the rooibos base is thick and sweet with a slight smoky, floral after taste. Flower tastes like rose or similar, something fragrant and sweet to carry the sweetness from the rooibos. Almost vanilla pod like, creamy tones are present.

Seeing as I’m not a rooibos fan I actually like this one, despite it being very thickly flavoured. The flowers are an excellent pairing and it fools my taste buds, they think "Oh no it’s rooibos sigh…actually it’s just flowers smile ".

Thank you Zen Tea for this sample.

The raw leaf does have a light toffee scent, nutty and dry with some sweetness. The white tea (Pai Mu Tan) is mostly whole leaf with some stems/sticks present and what looks like blue cornflowers.

Once steeped the tea is burnt yellow and has a light, buttery toffee scent. Very nice! Flavour is very nutty with a sweet butter toffee after taste that has some dryness. Has a slight chemical taste after my first cup but it’s not off putting, could just be flavour of the nuts sticking out. I would say walnut.

More nuts than toffee in overall flavour but it’s paired well with the Pai Mu Tan white tea base. A little too dry in the after taste for my personal liking but the flavour was nice. I would try this again but wouldn’t keep it in stock.

I had this tea a few days ago when I couldn’t quite log it (or even write it down), so my impressions are somewhat hazed and dazed.

The tea arrived to me among others in a mystery pack I got from MissB. Thank you, MissB, for including it :)

I love coconut in everything (my husband just recently brewed a lime & coconut belgian wit beer… It’s not ready yet but it’s going to be AWESOME!) and I absolutely loved the smell of this one. The taste disappointed me a little, however, since the base tea turned out to be a rather pungent sencha. It turns out, the more and more tea I drink, that I am not so huge on sencha. I can see myself craving this seaweedy flavor from time to time, but when I think yummy green, I think dragonwell, gunpowder, or some other Chinese green. So… yeah, the sencha was pretty strong and it spoiled coconut for me a bit. I also detected some matcha bitterness in it. It could’ve been that some of the sencha powdered up a bit and stuck to the coconut pieces and then imitated matcha.

It’s a pretty unique tea, I will definitely have more of it, too. Perhaps I will like it more next time :)

The blend looks pleasant enough, with small strawberry pieces and chopped up leaves amongst it’s dark brown Ceylon (which has some sticks/twigs present). It has a dry strawberry scent, rather mild but also sweet and natural. Also getting wooden tones from the Ceylon.

My steeping parameters:
Leaf – 5g
Water Temperature – 100C
Vessel – personaliTEA teapot 600ml
1 Steeps – 3 minutes
Served with milk

Without milk the tea is mahogany in colour with a sweet but soft strawberry scent, more the fruit than the herb ie leaf. The picture shows one cup with milk and the other without.

The black tea base tastes thick with wood and malt notes and a hint of smoke. Behind that is a light sweetness from the strawberry which comes through in the after taste. The strawberry smelled natural but the flavour is mostly artificial, it’s a touch too sweet and is candy like. Similar to a strawberry gummy sweet. I can’t taste any cream or anything similar, the milk would have lightened some of the wood and malt tones from the Ceylon but even that hasn’t brought out the cream taste. My personal tip to add cream to this tea would be to use a little vanilla, if you have any vanilla sugar at home this tea would taste magical. Alas I have none so I will have to settle for plain strawberry.

Overall
Honestly it’s an average strawberry blend but it can be improved with the likes of sugar/sweetener, particularly vanilla sugar. The Ceylon base is too strong for the strawberry and it’s cream flavour was missing but despite all of that it still made a nice cup of tea. If I had more I would try adding sweetener and maybe a drop of vanilla extract.

For pictures and more information please view my blog –
http://www.kittylovestea.co.uk/2014/05/14/review-three-teas-from-zen-tea/