Pipers 50 Greys

Flavored black tea
Pipers Tea & Coffee 

Ingredients: Black tea, bergamot oil, vanilla, cornflower blossoms.

The dry tea smells heady like a complex perfume. I've impressed a number of coworkers after holding the tea tin up to their faces and giving them no choice but to smell. Wouldn't you like to work with me?



Full cornflower blossoms accentuate the rich colors of the dry tea. The liquor looks lighter than I expected during infusion, so I'm curious to see how it will turn out.



Pipers 50 Greys makes a beautiful red cup. Its softness lends a smooth taste that lingers. Bergamot is strong in the aftertaste, with a touch of tangerine. I really feel the L-theanine calm with invigoration.



This is the refill 100g bag of tea to use in their white corked pots.

I usually drink black tea with milk, but this Pipers 50 Greys is so smooth, I love it on its own. I've been consistently impressed with Pipers.

Road trip to Kentucky, anyone?

Use code ALLTEA10 for 10% off your order at www.cupofpipers.com.

Black Jasmine Cream

Blended black and green tea
Margaret's Fine Imports

Ingredients: Green tea, black tea, and jasmine flowers with jasmine and vanilla flavor.

Earl grey drinkers will love this creamy jasmine tea. It's enhanced with jasmine flavor, so the aroma packs a punch. I avoid flavor-added tea, but I guess I just can't shake it.

The floral taste has some astringency, followed by the sweetness of vanilla. You wouldn't think so from the description, but it works with milk when hot. It's hearty like a black tea, but the touch of green tea accommodates the jasmine. It appears to be a mix of CTC and twisted leaves.

A Margaret's employee recommended trying it iced. I think I will!

Japanese Bancha Kyoto Special Leaf

Gently Stirred
Bancha green tea

Infusion method: ceramic teapot
Leaf: approx. 2 tsp.
Time: 2 & 4 min.
Infusion: light yellow

Bancha is described as unique and straw-like. I agree, but I find it different from the well-known, straw-like puerh. As a green tea, it actually smells more like... *cough* an illegal green leaf that is slowly becoming legal in some areas. It's toasted and smoky.



If anyone thinks it's a drug, it's my cats. I found my male cat licking the wrapping paper obsessively. I snatched up the paper, startled to find that something as innocent as paper can become a bad-cat-mom choice. Then my female cat rolled around in the same spot where the paper was. If you try this tea, use a good tin.



The paper cats can't resist.



Back to the tea. It tastes incredible! A special leaf, indeed. The taste matches the smell. It's refreshing like sencha (the first flush) but satisfying like a roasted or slightly fermented tea.



Give this tea a try, and hold onto your cats.

This tea was provided by Gently Stirred.

Castle Black Game of Thrones tea

Flavored black tea
Margaret's Fine Imports

Ingredients: Black tea, ginger, elderberries.

Game of Thrones Season 5 ends tonight! I'm counting down the minutes. To keep me occupied, I have this Castle Black inspired tea from Margaret's Fine Imports' Game of Thrones inspired line.

If you haven't seen the show/read the books, Castle Black is where brave men (or ex-derelicts) in black clothing (and handsome capes!!) wait for enemies, guarding the realms of men. And if you haven't seen it, hurry because spoilers will start in a couple hours!



Now to the tea. This Castle Black tea is a great breakfast blend! Ginger can be a strong flavor, but it's very smooth in this tea, and it's settling on the stomach. Ginger goes well with breakfast, as we see with The Republic of Tea's Downton Abbey Grantham Breakfast Blend tea.

The large ginger pieces look very nice against the richly dark black tea. The taste is warm with a spice.

I like to think the men on the frozen Wall drink it in their dented metal mugs.

Dragonwell Long Jing 2014

Green tea
Dobra Tea

I'm trying this way out of season, but I don't mind! That's what I get for hoarding tea. This is a 2014 Dragonwell Long Jing from the bargain bin at Dobra Tea from much earlier this year. If you ever go by the or store, you can get nice bags of tea for as low as $5!

The dry leaves have a sweet marine smell. The first infusion at the recommended 1 minute brings out a stone fruit smell. The liquor is very light. The taste is like a floral white tea.



After a second infusion at 2 minutes, the marine smell and stronger green tea taste comes through. This is a lovely tea to drink in the gaiwan, and I think I'll also use it as a cold brew on hot days. I love to see how such a dark leaf can translate to a light liquor.



Do go in to Dobra Tea. It's a beautiful and low-key tea house on historic Murray Ave in Pittsburgh. They have new "beer" tea which I have yet to try!

Pure Ceylon Leaf Tea

Black tea
Taylors of Harrogate

Area of origin: Sri Lanka.

This is a brisk, English breakfast-type tea with a lot of flavor. It is described as a rosy tea, so I was pleased to see a reddish brown liquor. Some of the pieces are fine so I expected dust in my tea, but it holds together well. It almost looks like used coffee grounds.

It's a touch sweet, but with astringency too. I like it with a lot of milk. Or for fun, I mix it with some cinnamon chips and maybe an Assam for a cinnamon breakfast.

"A delicate and aromatic tea."



Leaves vary in size.

"A fine quality crop with a delicate flavour and rosy colour."

Inner pouch for freshness. I bought it right when it expired but... it's still very good.

Lanxi Mao Feng green tea

Green tea
Gently Stirred

Area of Origin: Lanxi City, Zhejiang Province, China.

I will remember this as my traveling tea. This Mao Feng went to California in a glass jar with a little tea ball. It's a green tea, but it has the light floral aspect I love in an oolong!



The dry leaf is a rich dark grayish green, so I expected a marine smell from it. But it presents a rich sweet smell that is almost on the floral side of grassy. The leaves look twisted. In a recent Facebook post, Nicole Martin of Tea for Me Please says oolongs didn't always look the way they do now. Maybe this green tea has similar processing to the pre-1990s oolongs?

The cup has a grassy smell and yellow-green color. Lingering, round aftertaste.



Mao Feng green tea is only plucked "within a specific forty-five day period that culminates with the Qingming Festival, also known as the Pure Brightness Festival or Tomb-sweeping Day that falls on either the 4^th or 5^th of April, depending on the lunisolar calendar" (read more here).

I wonder, does that make the tea taste differently each year? Or, since the climate indicates calendar months, is this the perfect tea picking time ever? I will have to try multiple harvests to find out.

I'm enthralled by Tomb-Sweeping Day. I freelanced for a company in China for some time, who emailed to say offices would be closed for the holiday, so I felt part of it, from far away. The tomb-sweeping seems to be a springtime ritual, like a spiritually renewing spring cleaning.



While traveling I simply used a tea ball, and a mug brew, for two infusions at 2 minutes each. I shared it with my father using a small pot to boil water (a couple days later I bought him an actual kettle) and various mugs to use as share cups or temporary vessels to cool down the water.

I'm skeptical of tasting new green teas in anything but a gaiwan, but it worked out fine! Since then, I've also used the gaiwan for three infusions. I actually prefer the oversized tea ball, or mug brew, best.

A beautiful tea! I have another from Gently Stirred to try. Before then, though, I'll bring you a sturdy Ceylon loose tea from a box.

This tea was provided by Gently Stirred.