Indie Teas

Today I am reviewing Teaflection's Japanese Sencha Green Tea. I've never tried Teaflection's tea before so I'm excited. Sencha tea is the most common type of tea consumed in Japan. About 80% of all tea produced in Japan is sencha tea.Image provided by Wikipedia It's typically a very good daily tea without much fuss.

The Nose and Color: The color looks like a greenish yellow typically of most green teas and smells a lot like seaweed. The leaves are about medium size and aren't too big. They really unfurl a lot once you steep the tea. I like the aroma of the leaves and it's very calming. Nothing overpowering and just a very simple smell.

Tasting: This tea is very basic and is a classic japanese sencha. If you want a classic green tea taste then this is a good tea to go for. It's slightly astringent on the back end but overall it's very smooth.

Steep Instructions: 4 teaspoons per 3/4 cup at about 200F for 1-2 minutes.

Price: $14.95 for a 1/2 pound bag (as of this writing it's currently on sale for $7.90).

Summary: 85 out of 100. I enjoyed this classic sencha and it was nice for my palate. There wasn't anything that was really overwhelming so this would make a really good everyday tea if you love japanese green teas.

Full Disclosure: Samples were provided by Teaflection

I'm trying out Zhi Tea's Tropical Green Iced Tea out today. This is my first time trying any of Zhi Tea's products so I'm excited about it. Image provided by Zhi Tea

The Nose and Color: This tea smells great with a nice fruity component. This green tea is sencha based and has real pineapple, papaya, rose petals, calendula and safflowers which make it both smell great and look great. The leaves are beautiful to look at and really open up after steeping.

Tasting: This tea is perfect on ice for a hot summer day. I love its fruity flavoring with a nice relaxing green tea like sencha. I can really taste the papaya and pineapple and it makes for a great steep cold. I definitely think the ice helps open up the flavoring even more and I would recommend it more as an iced tea then a hot one.

Steep Instructions: 2 teaspoons per 12oz (double for iced tea) at 185F for 3 minutes.

Price: $12.50 for a 3.6oz tin.

Summary: 92 out of 100. If you are looking for a great iced tea then I highly recommend this one for hot summer days. The tropical fruits like papaya make it perfect for a hot day. This tea screams summer so it's perfect for this time of year.

Full Disclosure: Samples were provided by Zhi Tea

Today I will be reviewing my first ever rooibos tea. Rooibos is new to my palate so I'm pretty excited. Rooibos tea is an herbal tea that hails from South Africa, the site of this year's World Cup (Go USA!), and it's known as red tea to some. Rooibos in Afrikaans means "red bush" and comes from Aspalathus linearis plant. Rooibos has increased in popularity in many Western countries because it's caffeine free and has a lot of antioxidants. This tea is from a company called Suffuse Tea that has a lot of great information on their website. I recommend checking it out.

The Nose and Color: The aroma of the tea is very different than anything I'm used to. It smells very "bushy" and almost medicinal in a good way. I also smell a nice earthy, dirt component. The color is a nice reddish brown and the leaves kind of look like ground up tobacco.

Tasting: I must say rooibos is a very interesting flavor. In some ways it reminds me of a very light pu-erh and has more of a raw earthy side. This tea tastes very bushy and earthy. It's a nice interesting flavor that is very unique. The finish is great and some slightly dry undetones for me on the finish. 

Steep Instructions: 1 pack at boiling for 2 minutes

Price: $9.99 for a 24-sachet pack.

Summary: 89 out of 100. This tea tasted great and I enjoyed trying rooibos for the first time. If you've never tried rooibos then I highly recommend it to help develop your palate. 

Full Disclosure: Samples were provided by Suffuse Tea

The World Tea Expo is a big trade expo for the entire tea industry that will be held from June 11-13. I unfortunately will not attend but I always get really excited to see who wins the world tea championships which crowns the best teas in each category. Before the tea expo, the iced tea class winners are announced and they just came out today. If you love great iced tea then this is definitely a great place to look.

Hey everyone,

I just realized that this past Sunday (May 23rd) was the 1 year anniversary since my first post here on IndieTeas! I want to thank everyone that has ever viewed this webpage. It's been a good year and I'm happy with how IndieTeas has gone so far.

I started the site wanting to share more information about tea with the world on a nice site that puts content front and center without a bunch of ads. I feel like I've stuck to that goal and feel good about the site in general.

Where to go from here? Hopefully, I can continue growing the site more and more and reach as many people as possible. I run this site because I love tea and I've always wanted to learn more about it. As long as that never changes I'll keep doing what I'm doing. 

Thanks for reading,

Neil

Continuing the series "Great Design" I wanted to post some cool tea kettle designs I found. Check out some more pictures here.

Image provided by The Design Blog

Image provided by The Design Blog

Image provided by The Design Blog

Image provided by The Design Blog

I was surfing on YouTube looking for cool tea videos and I found this one of Mike Tyson. Turns out he drinks tea every morning, hate cannolis, thinks Earl Grey "sucks", and chamomile is cool. This video's pretty hilarious in my opinion seeing how Mike Tyson interacts with another person.

Jesse Jacobs, the founder of Samovar Life, was on a local ABC station recently talking about tea and pairing it with food. There are some really interesting tips in the video so give it a view if you're interested.

Charles Cain over at TeaRetailer has written a great five part series detailing Wholesale tea that you can buy from grocery stores etc. There were some really important parts after reading them that I wanted to share with everyone.

In Part 1: Overview:

This leads me to my second primary point - buyers often have an irrational focus on everything BUT product quality. In many cases this is because they simply don't know how to tell the difference between a high quality and low quality tea in each of two dozen categories of teas they carry...Buyers of packaged tea products purchase based on the quality of the packaging, price points and low minimum orders.

This explains Lipton's recent change to improve their tea bags and not their tea. Tea education of consumers is so crucial to help people select the best possible tea they can get for their money. Great tea is not expensive but inexpensive tea is in comparison.

Part 2

Quality flavored teas are made with liquid flavoring agents and the inclusions you see are primarily for aesthetic appeal. 

Interesting to see how inclusions (dried flowers, etc) are really just for show and don't provide any real value.

Part 3

Having seen the inner workings of wholesale, internet and retail tea operations I personally would not touch the wholesale market without at least $500,000 in cash.

Fascinating to see how much capital he recommends when starting a wholesale business. 

Part 4

As importantly, your packaging has to be extremely professional. I had a conversation a few years back with a buyer from Whole Foods who said that the customer selects their tea based on two criteria: packaging and price point.

Again Charles reiterates the point that consumers just do not even think twice about the quality of tea leaves. Do they even know there's a difference?

Part 5

The best tea served in typical fashion at even a fine restaurant is mediocre at best.

At most restaurants if I know when I order hot tea I would be getting much more then bagged tea I would definitely be willing to pay extra. I would love to go to a great restaurant that can actually serve a proper cup of tea.

The whole series by Charles Cain is extremely well written and very informative of the wholesale tea business. I highly recommend checking it out.