i owe this to lena, my tea connection at peet's. its time to catch up. and my father requested pictures, so i'm trying this out.
Ti Kwan Yin is an oolong tea. it is light and tastes of green leaves with a dark undertow. it is a good afternoon tea, but it finishes almost bitterly.
i get the teas in large batches and i am at my friend's mercy as to which teas i get. i wouldn't have selected these next two because they are blends, but i was pleasantly surprised. they are interestingly related to each other, to describe them separately would be pointless. Russian Caravan and Scottish Breakfast are both black teas, Russian Caravan is a china black, and Scottish Breakfast is an indian/china blend. I like assamica teas, or indian black, i prefer them to most of the chinese blacks for its malty and rich taste. I also like lapsang souchong, the first tea i tried on this little adventure, the one that tasted like burning christmas trees. Scottish Breakfast is an assam with lapsang mixed in it is bold and malty with a smokey finish. the lapsang is specifically pine-y. The Russian Caravan uses a base of yunnan which is syrupy and honey flavored and adds keemum which is smokey but not as overpowering or pine flavored as lapsang.
which amounts to a shootout between two blends that are both black tea bases with smokey aftertaste. i prefer the Russian Caravan for its milder smoke. Smokey teas are fine, i would once in a while enjoy a lapsang, but you have to be prepared and committed to it, its just so potent that it overwhelms the other flavors. not to say that Scottish Breakfast is undrinkable, just a milder form of actual lapsang souchong, like burning christmas trees with training wheels on.
i also recieved some interesting darjeelings, one of which is relatively pricey and only produced in limited quantities. as you no doubt recall, i was not crazy about darjeelings in my last review, but these two really changed my perception. Darjeeling extra fancy Kalimpong is the better quality version of what i had last time, much less peanutty, a decent evening tea, somewhat lighter than i prefer, but nice as a change. First Flush Darjeeling Namring Estate, is the expensive fancy one, in fact, it is unavailable. first flush refers to the first leaves that grow in the spring, they are often plucked early to allow a fuller flush the second time around which is usually larger in output. Kalimpong is a second flush tea. the first thing i noticed was the green leaves of the dry tea, they are processed like regular darjeeling teas but they have a bright green color that indicates their early season. it is a great afternoon tea. namring is what i had hoped ti kwan yin would be, light enough to drink during the day, but not so curt an aftertaste. and there is almost no peanut flavor to be found.
The final tea of the group is Snow Leopard. this is a big leaf white tea, with white fuzz on the leaves. in fact i couldn't steep it in my usual fashion with a ball infuser. the large leaves would have gotten all broken and crumbly, so i opted for my french press. i even made some extra for meg to try, she usually stays out of this unless i really think she needs to try something. this tea is great, it lacks the crisp acridity of green teas, and if steeped long enough likens more closely to an incredibly mild black tea. there is also a hint of white grapes in it. meg requests it most nights now. in fact, it was the last i recieved and it will be the first to run out.
