Tea: Golden Monkey
A Golden Monkey from Infuze
This tea has been retired/discontinued.
| Brand: | Infuze |
| Style: | Golden Monkey |
| Region: | ????? |
| Caffeine: | Caffeinated |
| Loose? | Loose |
| # Ratings: | 2 View All |
Reviewer: Alex Zorach
✓ 1448 teas reviewed
✓ 6 of Golden Monkey
✓ 496 of Black Tea
✓ 3 of Infuze
✓ 168 from ?????
Review of Golden Monkey
November 15th, 2013
| Aroma | Flavor | Value | Total |
| 8 of 10 | 5 of 5 | 4 of 5 | 87 of 100 |
| Excellent | Excellent | Good Value |
I really enjoyed this tea. Dry leaf is dark with golden tips, and has a strong and pleasant aroma of dried fruit, like raisins.
Flavor is very smooth, cup has just enough astringency to give it a pleasant body...aroma is strongly of dried fruit, with tones of vanilla, and a sort of bready finish, tending towards toasty at the bottom of the cup. Infuze describes the aroma as suggesting baked apples, and I can see this. There is a faint wintergreen note and a suggestion of smokiness without it actually being smoky. Very pleasant.
I brewed for 3 minutes and it came out on the mild side. However, brewed this way I was easily able to produce a second cup, also mild. The second cup brought out slight cocoa tones, and had a more pronounced vanilla aroma. I found it very pleasant, similar to the first. I was able to produce a third infusion. I think I prefer making two steepings though, using longer steep times: this brings out more of the complexity of the tea, and it doesn't become too strong.
I preferred brewing stronger, for about 5 minutes. This brings out the cocoa tones, as well as some pleasant herbaceous tones, and the cup feels fuller-bodied, although a bit more astringent, and still mild. This way there was enough flavor left for a second, but not third infusion; I needed to steep the second cup for well over 8 minutes to get it as strong as I wanted.
A very easy-to-drink tea. This would please people who like dark black teas with a fruity character, yet who want lower-tannin teas that are smoother and with less astringency or bitterness.
I'm much more familiar with the Yunnan gold teas than the Fujian Golden Monkey, but I thought this was a very enjoyable one. It's not a "pure gold", just gold tips among mostly dark leaf, but my experience has been that I like the darker variants better anyway.
This tea is on the pricey side, but it's a high grade tea that brews many cups, so considering this it's not as pricey as it seems. I do think that the 1 ounce size is a bit expensive though. $7 for an ounce seems awful steep, whereas $19 for 4 ounces seems much more reasonable.
