Something new thrills me. I
want blends but I
don't want blends. I want purity, real art, not art that stuns visually and whose foundations are a mish-mash of unknowables. Simplicity mixed with vision, that's what I want. In tea. Hell, in
everything. In my own art, in the art I acquire, in the art I see on the street, in my favorite art which is what I call 'unintentional art' and now I find after drinking
Soleil Tea's Van Dyke, that I want it in my tea as well. I am specifically talking about
blends here. Let me be precise. For in my mind every single-source, pure-bud, or traditional tea I have
is pure art. The better quality tea is better art, of course, but it's all a mind-blowing art-form that can create memory triggers, make me think new thoughts,wonder about different parts of the world, feel pleasure or even more valuable,
a little discomfort and so on. In short, tea does what all good art should do. Challenges me in the Now to WAKE UP!
Ok, so there's that.
What does the above photograph tell me about this tea? As far as I know nothing, but it was chosen with intention, I assume, to be the cover sticker of the sample of Van Dyke I just drank 6 steeps of.
Why does the sign say 'coffee' in the photo? Who is Van Dyke again? Surely, not referring to Dick or the dude who played on 'Coach'? Perhaps Willard Van Dyke? Hmmm...
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| (Prepping the gaiwan with hot water) |
So now after a great first session with this art of a tea, my husband, (yes,
my husband drank this tea! It must have been the promise of 'hops' that did it!) and I go to our separate screens to find out the answers to these questions. THAT is what the function of art should be. I don't even care what the answers are, they can be unflinchingly dull, but the trip to finding out is where I am most alive. So yay for that!
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| (Waking up the dry leaves in the hot gaiwan, a little shake to get them ready!) |
As for the tea, it was
very good. A blend with three ingredients only, no oils, no flavorings. My readers know how I battled about that in my own head, not wanting to cheat myself out of experiences yet finding the oily aftertastes of flavorings, even good quality ones, very noticeable anytime I tried blends, experiences which led me to be the newbie-purist you see before you now.
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| (Gorgeous after steep one) |
So Van Dyke is a nice quality black tea with good looking long light-rolled leaves with wonderful aroma, and pieces of hops and juniper berries. Our experience with it was not in line with what it says on the webpage
description, but it was
better.
The scent out of the bag was great, reminded this ex-gin drinker why I loved Juniper berries and gave me hopes that I could rekindle that relationship without using booze. The hops looked like small green fairy wings, so the presentation was a lot of fun, and the smell was the best part of that.
I used four grams only in a 120 ml gaiwan. The water temp started out at 204f. The smell of the leaves, still dry, getting steamed a bit in the pre-heated gaiwan was a smile-bringer to both Larry and myself. Smelling the leaves scent on the bottom of the gaiwan lid and in the cup were
beyond delicious. We drank the rinse, it was lovely.
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| (All gone!) |
The next six steeps were accomplished more or less in a row with no breaks and steeps of up to one minute maximum. The colors of all the steeps were lovely variances on the shade of amber. There was no astringency in this experience at all. Perhaps next time I try this tea I will kick the grams up to six or seven to see why it is Soleil mentions astringency, but neither of us got a hint of it. I am still amazed I found a tea my husband was interested in having a full session with me, he is always up to trying anything I push at his adorable
punim, but to sit and say 'yes' and 'sure' and 'ok!' when offered continuing steeps was a first.
Van Dyke is something new, something special, at least for this newb, goodness knows I have never had anything like it, and I will start to once again clear the hurtles I might have been putting up in my mind against blends based solely on this terrifically positive session. Deep back-breaking bows of gratitude to Soleil Tea for 'taking me there'. It's always good to go!
