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I think I like black tea stronger than it should be. The vanilla and strawberry are very light and kind of overwhelmed, but I think this is because I steeped it a little too long. It’s a very tasty spring tea especially, I think, though it’s good whenever. The strawberry gives it this little bit of fruity sweetness that I enjoy especially. Probably not something I’ll desperately need again in the future, but I will thoroughly enjoy what I have!

Hey, everyone, it’s been a while!

So it turns out that when you study abroad in Japan, you have a hard time coming home without mountains of tea. :D This is one of the 3 I picked up. It’s kind of generic-tasting, but there’s this fruity-honey aftertaste that I really love—I only got it about 2 months ago and I’m nearly out already!

Bought this because I am in college and I could always use a tea that purports to aid me in studying. Alas, it did not. I’m also starting to think I don’t know how to brew oolong correctly, because Kwan Yin is excellent but most other oolongs I’ve had just kind of taste like wood to me, and this is no exception. It’s tasty and a very clean-tasting tea, and it makes a surprisingly great morning tea for not being that strong, but it doesn’t really stand out to me at all.

I’m just not really a fan of grapefruit. I love Lupicia’s springy green teas, so when I got this as a sample, I saved it to try some time around now, but unfortunately the green tea being delicious doesn’t balance out the fact that the grapefruit tastes like grapefruit. Objectively good, for a grapefruit green tea, but not my thing.

Interesting story about this tea.
The first time I ever had houjicha, it was one of those Yamamotoyama teabags at a sushi restaurant near my college. I had no idea how long to steep it, but I fell in love with the result of the union of this one tea bag with one cup of water out of the hot side of the cooler. My immediate reaction was “I need this in loose-leaf, DUH”, so I snagged a tin of this while visiting a friend in Oklahoma. I brewed it perfectly according to the instructions on the back. It tasted…not like the houjicha I knew and loved. No nutty caramel goodness, only that woody taste I know from oolong and most decidedly am not a fan of.
Approximately five billion fine-tuned brewings later, ladies and gentlemen, I have reached HOUJICHA EQUILIBRIUM, and I now have sweet toasted goodness at my beck and call. Bravo, Republic of Tea.

Wow, this was so good! I don’t even know what osmanthus smells like and I was a little nervous about the prospect of tasting it without even that reference point, but I had absolutely nothing to worry about and ultimately I wish I had more of this than just a sample. The initial flavor didn’t wow me that much—I mean, it was good; it’s a light and refreshing oolong with a clean taste, but it didn’t really stand out, but then this gorgeous full smooth aftertaste that I’ve never had from an oolong before showed up and now I wish I could make my one-teabag sample last longer. I don’t know if I’m going to buy more right away, but I’m definitely considering doing so in the future.

The more I try of Lupicia’s stuff, the more excited I get about the idea that I might be able to visit their store when I study abroad this summer. This is really tasty, and I think because of the combination of flavors it would make a really good cold-weather or warm-weather tea (I think of blackcurrant as a winter thing but blueberry as a spring thing). It’s got kind of a colder-weather feel to it, but it’s really light and springy, and it does the thing that tea manages to do sometimes where it tricks me into liking a flavor I normally hate—in this case blueberry. So sad I’m out of samples now!

I like this a lot! It’s got that great floraly-savory Chinese green tea smell and a delicious light taste. I’m not sure Dragonwell’s going to be one of my favorites, but it’s a good standard green tea and I’m glad I have a bag in case I get a hankering for it.

Oh my GOD.

TEA IS OVER. EVERYONE GO HOME. THIS HAS WON.

I literally never want to be without this again. This was the other of the Dynamic Duo of teas (the other one being Brioche) that I received for Christmas and fell immediately in love with upon trying. First of all, I can tell it tastes different from other senchas, which is a step for me since Lupicia’s other senchas that I’ve had (Chiran and Kanaya ♥♥♥) tasted pretty much the same. Second of all, this being said, I am not kidding when I say this is the best Japanese green tea I have ever tasted. Yes, I have had Gyokuro. I have also had Teavana’s Gyokuro Genmaicha, which was basically two of my favorite things married to each other, and THIS IS STILL BETTER.

aaaaaaah I have to stop drinking this long enough to review it. Okay.

Starts off delicate and nice like any other sencha, but the astringent kick hits you sooner rather than waiting until the tea hits the back of your mouth. Also, the aftertaste doesn’t taste so much like nori. Instead, something happens between when the smoothness turns vegetal and when the astringency hits, and it’s the most divine, warm, savory, almost marine note that I have EVER tasted. I want to note that this is kind of subtle if you drink this on its own, but if you’re eating—I had this with sushi the first time—that specific salty savory taste will punch you in the face and make the world taste like God for about half a second.

This is the savoriness I wanted from Dokudami Umami that I didn’t get. I think I might die if I run out of this, but at least I know where to get more. Lupicia is, at this point, trying to usurp ZenTea’s place in my heart between White Christmas and this.

It pairs gloriously with homework on a foggy morning, and also everything else.

This is so lovely! I’d been looking forward to trying it for a while and it absolutely lived up to what i was hoping for. It legitimately smells like cookies in the tin and in the cup, and to be honest? It tastes like it too. I have no idea how this tea was accomplished. I want to give every single award to whoever said “You know what’s not fair? It’s the 21st century, and we’re still not capable of drinking a pastry. Let’s fix that!” I have to assume this was the intent. It tastes like delicious dessert bread or cookies or something, with an almondy-cinnamon aftertaste, which I note because I normally really don’t like cinnamon but this tea blends it so well that I don’t mind.

It’s a great autumn-winter tea, I think, and I will DEFINITELY buy it again.