Dragonwell

Dragon Well is one of my favorite green teas ever, so this one really disappoints me. I don’t know why, but every time I make this particular brand of Dragonwell, it’s bitter and tasteless. I’ve tried varying steep time and temperature, but it never seems to come out tasting like Dragon Well at all. Sad :(

Tastes like spinach water extremely grassy and just plain horrible the leaves are dark and broken and not very attractive This is the first of 7 teas I ordered from Adagio.com I hope the others are better than this because this was not a very good start for our business relationship.

Can’t really remember what time I set this to, but this is the first tea I’ve ever had that managed to actually taste significantly sweet without sugar! All I remember is that I turned off the boiling water and let it sit for about 10 – 15 minutes, then poured it up and waited about 3 to 3.5 minutes and I got what was lovely, grassy, smooth, and delicately sweet tea! I’m definitely gonna buy more of this stuff when Adagio restocks!

This is a very easy drinking green tea, as it is surprisingly smooth, a little buttery, and very light, with a planty taste.

You really have to be in a relaxed mood to appreciate this group. It is very characteristic of your standard green. Slightly grassy, it is also layered with a small layer of caramel sweetness and reminiscent of roasted popcorn. A superb evening tea to chill with. One of my favorite greens I’ve tried!

I am of two minds about Adagio’s Dragonwell. At first, this tea kept pulling me back to the green side. So distinctive, so nutty, so mellow, and with a singularly flat leaf shape that must have romanced many a wooden-hulled tea-trader in centuries gone by, Dragonwell was the first tea that made me want to extrapolate tasting notes like a wagonized wino — the sort of ever-so-slightly unusual tea, I felt, that implied literary tributes, glamorous odes, maybe even a saucy limerick or two. When I wanted something different, Dragonwell was the tea for which I reached into my disturbingly organized tea cupboard.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I discovered how much Steepsterites hate Adagio’s rendition of Dragonwell! The vitriol, the vitriol: it is enclouding all the drinking water! But I kid, I kid. I am the first to acknowledge my current green tea rank, which is, summarily, “Novice Green Tea Admirer: Ready and Willing to Advance,” so it is now my mission to try another brand’s offering. I shall not give up on you, Dragonwell! I shall solve your bestially-leafed mystery!

P.S. It is disturbing to think that perhaps the flavor I associate with Dragonwell is not really Dragonwell at all, rather like the old philosophical chestnut: “What if what I see as the color orange is not the color you see as the color orange? How would we ever know?” Lucky for me and the dragons, a tea mystery is far more experimentally-based than a philosophical one.

I’ve never been more ready to put together my usual tea-haikus, which are two in number for this well of debated dragons:

Long-bodied, chartreuse,
nutty dragon at the well:
are you déclassé?

Is this Dragonwell
I see before me? Come, let
me clutch another.

(Sorry about that last one, Mr. Shakespeare. Sort of.)

As far as Chinese Greens go this is a pretty solid one, though not the best I’ve had. A local tea merchant in my area sells one I enjoy a lot more but this one will do in a pinch. A bit expensive for what it is but definitely not bad. It is a mild green tea with a chestnut note. The grassiness it offers is almost pungent and I can almost taste it with my nose (hopefully that makes some sense).

First infusion was weak due to me not adding enough tea leaves. Second was better, added a few more leaves to the steep.

I ordered this tea in the month of July 2010 and that is all I know about it as far as time line. I had an order about 6 months earlier, that I didn’t care for too much but this was not bad at all. As far as the whole steeping thing goes I have sort of adopted a new brewing technique from the Korean Tea shops is Seoul. At about 45-55 water-tea at 175 degrees I allowed it to steep for about 5 to 10 seconds. As long as I kept the steep very light I found it had very pleasant taste not at all grassy or bitter but very savory. After steeping a few time the flavor was much improved. The delicious after taste still linger on the insides of my cheeks, does that happen to any one else?

This is the second tea from Adagio’s premium green tea sampler that I’ve tried. I’m glad that it’s a sampler because I’m utterly ambivilent about it. Neither love nor hate, but I won’t reorder it. It’s just so…tame, and kinda sad. I think that I will have cup now and again just to make my way through the tin – I’ll post another tasting note if any of my feelings change. M