I'm sure you, my legions of readers, know by now that I'm on a green tea binge at the moment. It's all the buzz on twitter and foursquare. 'Have you heard? Lahikmajoe's moved on from black to green teas?' It's got the makings of a revolution.
Watch the Digg.com charts next week. You'll see my tea exploits are an internet phenomenon.
Here are my top green teas from the first Hamburg shipment and the single dud:
China Lung Ching Grade 1 was delicious, as was the Japanese Sencha Fudji. I had a few white teas I won't mention here yet, but there was one green I didn't like and want to warn you from choosing. It's a Chinese green and is called simply Yunnan. The tea dealer said it was tasty, but it's simply not my definition of taste.
Let me be realy blunt here. Some people try green tea once, think all of it is exactly like the single one they've happened upon and shun all green tea for the rest of their days. I wasn't thrilled with it several years ago when I first tried it, but merely just hadn't tried the right one yet.
My point? With this sort of tea, you have to be patient. It doesn't conform to our Western tastes. At least not easily in my opinion.
I will say that Japanese Senchas seem to be more tasty to the newbies I've polled. My friend Sylvia was cooing about her Sencha that she had in her mug the other week. I was so pleased she'd found a green she liked. There's something wrong with me, eh? To get jazzed over a friend discovering a new tea is not something society seems to value much. Guess it's not hurting anyone.
Except bad tea purchases. That seems like a good trade off. More good tea choices and less China Yunnan. That's my motto.
I just discovered your blog so I'm going back and reading old posts.
ReplyDeleteI really appreciate the way that you are willing to say not-so-flattering things about teas you liked less or not at all. I appreciate honesty and I think that sometimes you need to write about things that you don't enjoy as much now and then.
I also like how you are emphasizing the diversity of green teas...I know what you mean about people saying they "don't like green tea". My mother always used to say that...then I gave her some raw pu-erh and she was like--this doesn't taste like green tea, and she loved it.
I'd urge you though to not give up on Yunnan green teas though--they can also be pretty diverse. Perhaps you just tried a bad one, or one you didn't like? I don't know enough about what you look for in green teas, but I know I've tried one Yunnan green that I absolutely love: Upton tea's Yunnan Green Jade Supreme (link is to my review).
I have to say that I'm thrilled you found my blog Alex. Thanks for contributing.
ReplyDeleteI'm linking to your blog as well.
I will definitely try other Yunnans. Gladly.