Another Thrift Store Treasure

This lovely little yixing-style teapot came home with the DH (dear hubby) from the thrift store. What a great surprise!  I soaked it in boiling-hot water a number of times and tested the pouring and the lid fit.  All checked out; it's a keeper!  And for <$5, I'm even more tickled with it. 

The pot has a stamp on the bottom and Chinese characters on the front, neither of which I can decipher.  It's perfect size for gong-fu brewing.  Since the unglazed clay is absorbent, I will dedicate this teapot to light, flowery oolongs.   The one I'm drinking here is a very light Ti Quan Yin.  The pretty little teacup is a souvenir from Xian, China, the teahouse on the grounds of the Terracotta Warriors.

Thank you DH for always being on the lookout for tea treasures!

The Ti Quan Yin hails from Harney & Sons.  I am ashamed to say this tea was two years old, yet both the aroma and flavor held up.  It has those typical high floral notes and bright flavor.  The little green balls expand leisurely and lend themselves to several round of steeping.  I tend to choose darker, more oxidized oolongs, but on a hot summer day (it's actually in the upper 90's today!), this was perfect.

Harney & Sons Tea Tasting: Hojicha

I think this is a really cool photo!  I like how the small glass teapot has steamed up and framed the steeping stalks.

Hojicha - This tea is a novelty.  In the world of tea, many things are old, ancient.  Tea has been consumed a looong time.  Yet hojicha is relatively new on the tea scene.  It was created as a by-product of mechanized tea picking (which began in the '20s).  The leaves get used for bancha and sencha, the twigs remain, and that's what this is - twigs of tea.  This tea is roasted over charcoal.  Very different from its steam-fired Japanese green cousins, and an entirely different flavor and aroma profile.  

I'm drawn to the metaphor that is offered to us in each sip.  I like how the creators of this tea looked for a way to use the leftover materials, what many people would throw away, and make them into something useful. 

In his tasting book, Michael Harney recommends this tea as a good one for coffee drinkers. While I don't drink coffee, I understand the comparison. It's darkly roasted in flavor and color. What I found most interesting is the sweet aftertaste and very dry tongue feeling.


Hojicha is not very known to those of us in the US. If you get the chance to try it, do!

Harney & Sons Tea Tasting: Genmaicha

Today's tea review is Genmaicha, also known as brown rice tea or "popcorn" tea.  There is rice in this tea, but no popcorn.  That nickname comes from a "popped" kernel of rice that really does look like popcorn!

I regret that I don't have my own photo for this review.  I should!  Heaven knows I have sipped my fair share of this tea.  (I brew at ~190 degrees for about 2 minutes.)  But I don't have any on had at this moment...and I want to move along in the book, so here's a shot from wikipedia.

In my opinion, this tea is a fun one, and a great one for new green tea drinkers.  I say that because of the inclusion of toasted brown rice, which gives the tea a nutty, gentle flavor that balances the stronger bancha (or sometimes sencha) green.

From Harney's website:  "Once considered a cheap peasant beverage, Genmaicha has recently come into vogue among Japanese urban elite and in the United States as a health drink."

If you drink this tea, what do you like about it?

Harney & Sons Tea Tasting: Bancha

Bancha tea is an everyday green consumed widely in Japan.  Bancha comes from the same plant as Sencha tea, however it is picked in a later harvest.  This later harvest makes for a lower-grade tea.  Even within Bancha, there are a number of grades.

Bancha is made with both leaf and twig, which you can see in the picture above.

I wasn't expecting to enjoy this tea.  I prefer smooth teas.  Ones that are what I can only describe as "metallic" are not among my regulars.  However, I liked this tea just fine.  I drank several cups.  Mine came from Harney & Sons.  Not sure of the grade.

The wet leaf plumps up.  I steeped for 2 min at 175 degrees.

As Harney described, the liquor is bright yellow. 

All in all, this was a flavorful tea.  To read another review, check out Angela's.

Harney & Sons Tea Tasting: Silver Tips and Bai Mu Dan

This is the second pairing of white teas in the Harney & Sons Guide to tea. This pairing concludes the four teas of the white tea chapter. (See the other two here.)

I tasted Ceylon Silver Tips (from H&S) and Bai Mu Dan (Pai Mu Tan, from Upton). Silver Tips are on the left and Bai Mu Dan on the right in both photos. As you can see, these teas look very different. That carries through to the taste.

For the tasting, I brewed both at 175 degrees Fahrenheit for 2 minutes.

The Silver Tips aren't actually leaves, but rather the tender buds. These are a little less fuzy than other "silver" teas. The flavor is fresh, light and lightly sweet. I got a bit of spicyness in the finish. The tea left my mouth feeling clean. An interesting tidbit about this tea is that it comes from Sri Lanka (Ceylon). Most white teas of any quality come from China, so this is a lovely exception.

The Bai Mu Dan (called Pai Mu Tan from Upton) is a mixed bag, literally. Some tips and some green leaves. The brew is darker and the flavor very different than the Silver Tips. The DH described the flavor, "like chewing foxtail grass stems." The aroma, for me, had a definite roasted smell. This is likely due to being dried in an oven or over charcoal. This is a nice hybrid tea; it holds the white sweetness but leans into the essence of a green grassy flavor. According to Harney, the Bai Mu Dan is a much more common tea than the other three.

Harney & Sons Tea Tasting: Yin Zhen and Bai Mei

I've had the Harney & Sons Guide to Tea sitting on my desk for months. Angela at Tea with Friends has been faithfully reviewing teas each Saturday, and doing a heck of a job with it too! She's generously shared some hard-to-find teas with me. I've finally gotten around to starting on this journey!

I'll be (sporadically) tasting and reviewing the teas listed in the Guide, in the order presented. I'll do at least two at a time, as I enjoy having a comparison.
Before I get started on these first two teas, let's talk about the essential equipment. For these tastings, I want to brew the tea as precisely as possible, according to Mike Harney's instructions. To do this, I need two tools: a thermometer and a timer.

I'm fortunate to have two tasting sets. To use these, you brew the tea in the little mug with the lid, loose leaves inside. What you can't see is that on the side of the mug, there are little teeth that allow you to pour the tea out (with lid on), while keeping the tea leaves inside. Then, once done, you can display the leaves on the top of the lid, as I've done below.

The first two teas (dry leaf shown at the top, left to right) are:

• Yin Zhen (Silver Needles)
• Bai Mei (White Eyebrow)

Here are Angela's reviews - Yin Zhen and Bai Mei.
I brewed both at 175 degrees Fahrenheit, for 2 minutes for the first steeping. I did a second steeping at 3 minutes. I enjoyed both and would drink them again.
The Yin Zhen is on the left and Bai Mei on the right. Both are very light brews, but with distinctly unique flavors.

The Yin Zhen leaf looks soft and cuddly. The dry tea smelled exactly to me like freshly cut hay. (I've been riding my bike next to fields of cut hay recently, so it was "fresh" on my mind!) Harney uses the hay reference, too. The taste/feel experience for me was very smooth. No bitterness. Lightly sweet flavor, and it left my mouth feeling very clean.
The Bai Mei is hand tied, and I think it's so pretty! The flavor has more of a presence. It's slightly vegetal, to me. I experienced a lightly bitter aftertaste, but it was pleasant.

And now a word about the book itself. I was expecting a somewhat hard-to-read book, if a person didn't have a bit of background in tea. I am glad to report my assumption was wrong! I think this book is very accessible to even a casual tea drinker. Michael Harney sums it up in his introduction when he says, "I only have one hard and fast rule, for myself as well as for you: Have fun."
Finally, if you embark on a tea tasting, either with Harney or with your own teas, I have two pieces of advice:

1. Try to be descriptive, rather than judgemental. What I mean is that you'll have more fun if you challenge yourself to be creative and use descriptive words. If you don't like a tea, find the right description to say why. When I do tea tastings for others, I encourage them in this approach. One participant described a Pu-Erh as smelling "like my grandfather's basement." Now that's using descriptive words!
2. Don't ever think you're wrong! If I say a tea tastes like a grape popsicle and you think it tastes like mud, then we're both right! Tea tasting is totally personal. The water, the steep time, the water temp all make a difference. Even if we're drinking from the same pot, your body chemistry plays into the mix. It's fun to compare differences.