Organic Silver Needle White Tea
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Ratings & Reviews
Page 1 of 1 page with 2 reviews
63 Aroma: 6/10 Flavor: 3/5 Value: 3/5E. Alex Gerster (66 reviews) on Dec. 12th, 2013
Silver Needle Tea can be extremely fickle to brew and very subtle in flavor and aroma. It is typically a very mild and smooth tea, and this sample of Wegman's was very much in character.
Brief steepings at about 190 degrees produced a weak aroma, and yet nice flavor of sweet grass with a touch of melon. For a first flush tea there is very little down on the tea leaves, but they are obviously of high quality. I am just a bit surprised by the weak flavor and aroma, and suspect that it is either due to the age of the tea, or a different cultivar than any I have tasted previously.
For a really wonderful version of this tea try Seven Cups Bai Hao Yin Zhen (Silver Needle).
53 Aroma: 5/10 Flavor: 3/5 Value: 3/5Alex Zorach (1453 reviews) on Sep. 13th, 2013
I'm not a huge fan of silver needle; I thought this was above average for its type but I would still strongly prefer other teas, even other white teas, both because of price and characteristics of the cup.
Dry leaf, consisting exclusively of whole, intact tips, has a melony aroma with a slight hint of caramel, but is more tea-like than other silver needle. I found it more pleasant than normal for this style.
Brews a very clear cup, with a mild and smooth flavor. The dominant aroma is of green melon, like honeydew. There's also a hint of an aroma like straw or freshly cut grass, different from the grassy quality in green tea.
Finish is slightly astringent.
Good overall, but not terribly interesting, and relatively weak in aroma. I tend not to like Silver Needle, because it is too weak and too subtle for me, and too expensive...but this was a decent example of one...I think above average in quality. Still, the best Silver Needle teas I've tried have not been Chinese--they've been produced in other regions and had a bolder flavor.
I preferred a single, long steeping. Wegmans recommends a steeping temperature of 180-190 but I think 180 is too low (leading to too bland a cup), and I noticed nothing lost if brewed with boiling water. If you like a more delicate cup (which I don't), briefer steepings might make sense.
Page 1 of 1 page with 2 reviews
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