Official what Black (Red) Tea Are You Drinking Right Now?

[jayinhk]

Jin Jun Mei...free sample from a Taobao vendor. I used half of the 8g bag and then taped it up and forgot about it. I am brewing the rest in a modern zhuni pot. The tea appears to have lost some aroma in the last year or so, but is still tasty and smooth drinking with interesting sweetness, bitterness and sourness. Calming energy too and easy on the stomach. I quite like Chinese red teas. Something like English Breakfast, on the other hand, can make me nauseous if I haven't eaten.

[debunix]

I definitely do better with Chinese red teas on the whole, but there are some that I've found as difficult as English breakfast, like Keemum. Just can't cope with the bitter. I think it's about the degree of brokenness of the leaves, becuase I've done fine with the Jin Jun Mei, and Yunnan gold tips, and Taiwanese Black Ruby or Buddha's Hand.

[jayinhk]

Could be the greater surface area of broken leaf means more astringent compounds are leached. I had some Malaysian tea last week, and brewed with less powder, was quite pleasant.

[Tead Off]

2013 Arya Tara Wonder tea. 2nd flush. From Nepal. Almost 3 years old and has lost very little. Whole leaves that open into small bushes. 2.8g in a 120-130ml old Bizen wood fired kyusu. Delicious and several brews were pulled out of this.

[pedant]

castleton moonlight first flush 2015



3.3g in a 55mL shibo, 200F water, really short steeps (like 30s tops)
wow, this is great. the distilled essence of first flush dj. i'm tempted to brew the rest of bag the same way.

[ethan]

pedant, How many good infusions did this preparation yield?

[Tead Off]

castleton moonlight first flush 2015



3.3g in a 55mL shibo, 200F water, really short steeps (like 30s tops)
wow, this is great. the distilled essence of first flush dj. i'm tempted to brew the rest of bag the same way.

I get very good brews out of using that shibo for Dancong teas, too.

[ethan]

From Jun Chiyabari, Himalayan Orange. Writing about this again. I ran out of it while traveling & went 6 weeks w/o it. Despite enjoying delicious tea lately, I am so happy to have this again. It is so dynamic. Besides flavor, I like it being organic though I don't really worry when drinking non-organic tea.

Some of the flavors are also found w/ Oriental Beauty but not the combination of flavor & aroma.

[Luca B.]

Yunnan d'or,despite being a black tea i find that the perfect time for brewing this one in a teapot (1 spoon in 250ml) is 1.5 minutes. It has a strong astringency wich will overwhelm every flavor after a couple of minutes. If brewed fine it's quite delicate and sweet,still not one of my favourites.

[ethan]

Luca, There are no rules for our enjoyment of tea. I am drinking a high-mountain black tea; &, like you steeped for 1 1/2 minutes. Also, in Taiwan I heard "one to fifty" meaning 1 gram per 50 ml, but I used < 3 grams for 200 ml. Delicious. Cheers.

[Tead Off]

by ethan » Mar 17th 16 6:54 pm

Luca, There are no rules for our enjoyment of tea. I am drinking a high-mountain black tea; &, like you steeped for 1 1/2 minutes. Also, in Taiwan I heard "one to fifty" meaning 1 gram per 50 ml, but I used < 3 grams for 200 ml. Delicious. Cheers.

There may not be rules for enjoying tea, but there are certainly rules for making it. Perhaps guidelines might be a better word.

I hate the format of the new Teachat. Very clumsy. They need a real designer to step in.

[LouPepe]

^^^^^^^ Agreed^^^^^^^

[Alucard]

Assam from What-Cha

Agree with Tead Off about the site. One little annoyance is having to scroll to the bottom of the page to select the last page in the thread, scrolling down to read recent posts, then having to back to the top of the page to reply.

[debunix]

Today I had my eyes opened to the possibilities of Chai. For a celebration lunch, one of my colleagues brought in a thermos of homemade chai, spiced with abundant fresh ginger--the dominant flavor; smoothed with milk; made with just a hint of sweetener of some kind; and background notes of clove and cinnamon. Really amazing. I've only had overly sweetened, overly spiced versions before that seem to have little to do with tea. This was prepared with a lighter hand and yet so bold with the ginger. Wow.

Now pondering the tin of Yunnan gold with new intent....

[ethan]

Interesting to hear that from you, debunix. Better ask what is in it. Some secret may be the key.

When I was in Thailand writing about being thrilled from excellent tea from Taiwan, about twice a week I'd get Thai iced tea on the street. The sweetened condensed milk used has a significant of palm kernel oil which gives it a taste I like. W/ better milk, I like such tea much less.

Cheers.