Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Gunpowder - Adagio



Gunpowder is a hand rolled green tea from the Guangdong province of China.  And from the background info from Adagio, it is apparently a favorite green tea in Morocco and the Middle East where it is prepared with mint and sugar.  The flavor of this tea is more smoky and leans more towards oolong than the vegetal taste of most green teas.

I steeped just under one tablespoon of leaves with about 2 cups of 180F water for about 3 minutes. At first I was a bit worried because there was a lot of dust and the tea brewed up brownish green.  I was expecting a bitter cup, but was pleasantly surprised by a very light tea.  The smokiness of this tea is nothing like that of lapsang souchang. It sort of lingers at the back of your tongue and is really only noticeable if you really pay attention. 

You may be able to tell from previous posts that I prefer vegetal, grassy green teas, whites with floral notes, or pungently flavored 'kick in the face' black teas.  Gunpowder is not one of those.  This just wasn't a tea that I enjoyed.  I'd like to say that gunpowder is a pleasant hybrid of green and black flavors with a hint of smokiness, but it just tasted like cheap tea from a Chinese restaurant that was used to wash an ashtray.


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4 comments:

Tom said...

I had a better experience with green tea. I find it just has a good clean taste.

Kay said...

Do you mean gunpowder or another green tea? I like most green teas but this one was just a bit off somehow.

Tracing Tea said...

Hi,

Just thought you might be interested in Tracing Tea - an expedition from Calcutta to London researching the history and culture of tea. See www.tracingtea.org for more details.

Regards,

Neil
neil@tracingtea.org

Samantha said...

I love gunpowder! I've been drinking it all the time for the past week, and have gotten 3 good infusions out of it regularly.

I like your site and will be visiting it regularly.

-- Sam

http://infuseme.blogspot.com