Seldom have I sampled a tea with such a gap between aroma (or lack thereof) and taste. It's a vast chasm, really. The Grand Canyon might be a good analog with another several million years of erosion, widening and deepening.

This was a motel pickup somewhere out on the Great Plains. I don't recall where. I had about 400-500 miles to drive by late afternoon (common for me) and didn't have time that morning to brew up a cup, so I stashed it in the suitcase and brought it home. The dry-bag smell was simply nonexistent. It was as if I was experiencing temporary anosmia with every whiff. In-cup, the aroma was faint, and somewhat sweaty. Not a good impression at all! Yet the flavor is rather bold, smooth, somewhat tannic and astringent, evenhanded, and much friendlier than I had imagined. This tea takes well to sweetening, which also seems to unlock a faint, berry-like element to the flavor. I liked it quite a bit for a common bagged tea, but still can't get over how it can smell so nonexistent or unlike its flavor at the same time.

When I tried an old trick of mine of swallowing the tea and immediately blowing some of its vapors from the back of my throat out my nose, it smelled of old yellowed books in one of those used bookstores that has a lot of them, and lets them scent the air. None of these nasal sensations resembled the taste in the least, and no, I wasn't ill nor hallucinating at the time of consuming the tea. It was one of the most puzzling overall tea-drinking experiences I've had.

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