A sample from the Philadelphia Coffee and Tea Festival. This was a classic dragonwell, typical in all respects for what I expect from this style of tea, fresh, and good in quality.

Dry leaf looks well-formed and golden yellow, intact leaf, and smells fresh, with a strong and pleasing nutty aroma!

Upon brewing, produces a balanced cup with the classic chestnut notes. Flavor is fairly umami / savory, with light sweetness, bitterness, and a tangy note as well. Light-bodied but rich tasting, low in astringency, with just enough to make a pleasant finish.

Eminently pleasing till the last drop.

Using about a teaspoon of leaf, my default amount for dragonwell, easily brews two very good cups, but I found the aroma gave out after the second. The second cup had a more cooling quality, and some dusty notes, but a very similar flavor.

The leaf goes pretty far too. The 7-gram pack could be used to brew two stronger cups, three mild cups, or all at once for a more gong-fu style brewing.

The price and packing scheme is a little unusual, so it's hard for me to rate value. It works out to be $15 for 15 packs of 7 grams each, which is 105 grams; this is a good price for tea of this quality, but this isn't factoring in that the tea is individually packed, which might be a benefit for some people, but probably drives up price a bit.

I'm eager to try more from this company. This tea was above average for this price, and a classic example of this style of tea.

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