A thing about the tea in oriental markets is that it's usually cheap and of fairly decent quality. I've bought 8 oz of rolled green tea buds in a metal tin for about 3 bucks and it having a higher quality taste than the cheap tea bags you buy at your grocery store for three times the price. I really was looking for some matcha, but I have been eyeing these tins for a while since they're just so cute, so I got them as a birthday present at $6.99 (slightly pricier than most for the amount, but whatever). And then I discovered that there were six different kinds! Oh, the excitement!
This set contains 20g each of: Green tea with Jasmine, Pu-Erh, Lung Chin (which I found out is Dragonwell thanks to /r/tea), Lychee black tea, Oolong, and Tikuantin.
Pu-Erh: Oh god, the fishy-ness. Ok, I know this is a sign of a low-grade Pu-erh and really I should expect this. But yeah, this tea tastes like fish. Not salty like fish, but fish. I'm a little curious if I can get some kelp and miso paste, mix this all up together and make a pretty good miso soup. For that reason alone, I'm ok keeping this in the tin, but really it's a PASS.
Lung Chin: I think this was the most disappointing for me. It really just tastes like dirt and bitterness, which maybe the bitterness is due to me brewing it wrong but that still doesn't excuse the dirt. I would say something like "Oh, just use it if you need cheap green tea for something" but you know what? I can get eight ounces of cheap green tea from the oriental market for 3 bucks that tastes like cheap green tea and not dirt. As hard as it may be to believe, especially after I said I drank a tea that tastes like fish, this is one of the worst teas I have ever drank. I just threw it all away and put some blueberry red in the tin. My rating is something along the lines of KILL IT WITH FIRE or BURN IT or whatever I had as the rating.
Jasmine Tea: Thankfully, this one isn't so bad. It's not great either, but probably good to drink before a date so your sweat smells like flowers. I tend to like my jasmine tea with more of a hint of jasmine and a nice pleasant green tea, but I can drink this and really, that's what matters with this tin. Pass if you don't like jasmine, Try it if you do.
Tikuanyin: This tea is OK as well. OK in the way that it's really quite inoffensive and tastes like nothing despite me thinking I added enough. It's the second time I've made this and both times, it tasted like bland and cheap green tea, kinda with this kelp-y flavor. Honestly, I can see myself just boiling a pot and drinking it out of thirst. Pass or Try it.
Lychee Black: I often complain about teas not having enough fruit flavor but don't usually complain about them not having enough tea flavor. There is a fruit flavor here, a little more than a subtle hint but far from strong. But there isn't really a tea flavor. If anything, this tea tastes a bit like soapy water with a lychee scent, but that's only a bit and I can drink it. Pass or Try it.
Oolong: I applaud this tea for having a flavor. Compared to the Touch Organic Oolong Tea (which I haven't posted yet), it's not as robust a flavor, but compared to the rest of these, it's probably the best. It's a little...smokey and has a woody taste to it, stronger than a green but not as strong as a black. Plus oolong is supposed to be the most effective tea in terms of weight loss so yeah, it's not bad. Try it!
Overall: I bought this tea for the tins and if anyone would ask me about them, I'd tell them to buy it for the tins with the tea as a pretty crappy bonus. The oolong and jasmine are easily the best as they are the only two that have a decent flavor. I could probably mix the lychee and tiku....whatever with complementing teas just go get rid of them and the Pu-erh and Lung Chin (dragonwell), you might just want to throw away.
My Rating: Try it, by which I mean buy it once for the tins and if you're tolerant of tea and want to try something new. Don't buy it if you think you have enough tines. Considering that the box didn't even have a company, no web site this week.
I've had mixed results buying things in Asian stores...but I have found a few real deals. The best were probably two green teas in 6 oz green tins from a company called Starway (the brand was only listed on the back). They were $3 and $4. But the same brand offered two oolongs, each for $5 a tin, which I found sorely disappointing.
ReplyDeleteAlthough it's fun to experiment, I often avoid these teas in Chinese stores because the quality tends to be low, and also the sizes are just so big...I usually like very small samples, and I'd rather spend $1-$3 on a 1 ounce or 15 gram sample of high quality tea, than $5 on a large tin of low-quality tea.