A vaguely Darjeeling-like tea with dark, vegetal and herbaceous aspects. I'm noticing a trend amongst all of the teas I sample from Rare Tea Republic. This is one tea though that I found did not particularly fit its description: I would not describe it as "brisk", nor did I notice many "floral notes".

The aroma is complex without being in-your-face. The aroma has some strange qualities, almost suggesting fava beans or asparagus. I could do without these qualities, but they only emerge briefly and then quickly vanish. Towards the end of the cup, a faint wintergreen aroma develops. Some of the muscatel grape nuances are present from the start. The end of the cup had a suggestion of cinnamon in the finish.

Surprisingly sweet! The end of the cup almost tastes sweetened.

Before sampling the teas from Rare Tea Republic, I had only tried one tea from Jun Chiyabari, a TGFOP from Imperial Tea Garden; this tea was much more nuanced than that one, but it was less edgy, a quality I like. I honestly prefer that tea by flavor, but I prefer this tea by aroma; it was more subtle. This tea, however, is considerably pricier.

I found that, in contrast to the other teas from Rare Tea Republic, which required less leaf to produce a flavorful cup, this tea required considerably more leaf to come out the way I liked. That, to me, made this tea seem pricier than the other offerings from this company, which, for black teas, stretched quite far with a small amount of leaf.

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