Friday TeaDay 12/17/10 TasteDUDS 2010!

[Chip]

Greetings TeaAficionados! Welcome to another TeaDay, hopefully a GREAT one! Please drop in throughout the day and share what is in your cup.

Yesterday we took end of year inventory of unopened teas. You can still vote and discuss yesterday's topic.

Today's TeaPoll and discussion topic. End of year reflections, any TasteDUDs in the TeaRealm? Please share TeaFlops for 2010! Grin and bear it.

I am looking forward to sharing this TeaDay with everyone, bottoms up.

[JBaymore]

No duds.

best,

.........john

[Trey Winston]

I also had no duds in 2010. I know what I like

Liking some oolong today. Very floral. Very.

[artmom]

GREEN any green was a dud for me this year. Maybe a New Year will help.

, not surprised are you, Chip?

[tortoise]

The biggest tastedud for me this year was Gokujo Sencha from Yuuki. Not that it was weak tasting. Quite the opposite. It was just completely over the top in all the less favorable notes that should be balanced in a Sencha. Bitterness, marine to the point of (dare I say) "Fishy" and all of this turned up to 11 on the amplifier. Basically, I'd compare it to a cheap gyokuro.

It may suit someone else's taste. I don't know enough about the entire Sencha spectrum to say with authority that it is "bad" tea; but I wouldn't drink it again.

At the risk of being long-winded, TokyoB was kind enough to take it off of my hands and he sent me some hou de Dancongs which were less to his liking. For me it was a great trade.

This morning, Chiran!

[jodiklaus]

Being a new tea drinker I did have some duds and discovered that I don't care too much for Rooibos.

Having a nice strawberry lemonade/jasmine pearl blend today that has been at the top of my favorites for about a month.

[debunix]

Duds were mostly a few teas given as gifts. I had some teasmthat were mostly not to my preference, like some fukamushi senchas, but they were all good enough teas to enjoy despite that. A few that I thought were going to be duds turned out pretty well in the end, with some better brewing techniques. So, mostly the gift teas that were a mixed bag of good and not so good.

[brad4419]

No duds. I like em ALL!

rou gui this morning

[msurads06]

pretty much every green i tried this year was a dud, i also had a few flavored whites and a yunnan silver needle that were duds. Only one oolong really qualified as a dud, a quing xin sample i got from norbu, it was overly floral, and made my mouth/teeth burn. not sure exactly how to describe the sensation, but it had nothing to do with the temperature of the tea and lingered no matter how weakly i brewed the tea.

taiwaneese ruby tea this morning

[Victoria]

Yep, it was a green for me too.

Started the day with Turzum Darjeeling.
Crazy busy time of the year at work.

[entropyembrace]

Had a couple of duds...both were green tea...asamushi senchas....both very grassy and not much else.

I thought the first was stale but after tasting the "togei" from OTTI 7 which was very similar I think I wasn´t being fair to the first tea or the vendor. I just don´t like the grassyness of them

[JRS22]

I've been trying different chinese teas this year and decided to do my own taste tests of yellow teas. I bought 3 yellows from Teaspring, including the Jun Shan Yin Zhen in the gold tin. I have no reason to believe there's anything wrong with the tea - it's just disappointing. By comparison, I've found something to enjoy in every chinese green and white that I've bought this year, even if I won't buy more.

[nickE]

Plenty of bad samples this year, but no big duds I guess.

Brewing the 2008 Dehong brick today; I might brew some Hongcha later. I have a Yixing that I used to use for Wuyi, but it's really too big at 150ml. I'm going to boil it and try it out with Hongcha.

[mosshorn]

+1 to the list of disappointed greens. I've found out I don't care for green tea much anymore, except for one from Obubu.

Drinking: Turzum 2nd flush darjeeling

[TwoPynts]

Had one or two pu duds this year, blech.