Green Tea Vendor Topic

[Victoria]

Recommend green tea vendors and share your experiences, good or bad.

[wildisthewind]

http://www.lifeinteacup.com

His website is a bit of a mess, but he's friendly and helpful by email, and his green teas are stunning. Totally redefined the category for this green tea novice

[aet]

if u r looking for Yunnan green tea, I'd recommend wait another 2 weeks. Now is "tou chun" out already. Ive tried Cui Ming , not bad , very strong. Bi Luo Chun and others not out yet.

[There is no self]

It's been a while since I drank Japanese greens, but if I had to recommend some vendors I'd go with:

https://www.o-cha.com/: best Sencha and Gyokuro I've ever tasted. Good Matcha as well.
http://www.ippodo-tea.co.jp/en/: good Sencha, but what I really like is their Genmaicha and Kukicha. Truly astonishing.
https://www.denstea.com/: overall good Sencha and Bancha. I also tried their Genmaicha with Matcha but found it a bit bland.

I reckon most of us here are already familiar with these vendors, but hopefully new members will find this useful.

[teaformeplease]

For Japanese green tea, I really enjoy the selections at Yunomi.life.

http://yunomi.life/

They carry a dizzying array of teas, including some that are really hard to find. I'm also addicted to the black tea that was smoked with Japanese whiskey barrels.

[Victoria]

For Japanese green tea, I really enjoy the selections at Yunomi.life.

http://yunomi.life/

They carry a dizzying array of teas, including some that are really hard to find. I'm also addicted to the black tea that was smoked with Japanese whiskey barrels.

This vendor sells/reps a huge amount of teas, a mega amount. I even found a few roasted sencha I’ve been looking for.

[tea_twig]

I have ordered from both Horaido and Maiko and was very happy. Both vendors went out of their way to answer my questions and help me with ordering and choosing a shipping method. Highly recommended!

Horaido: sencha, gyokuro, matcha, karigane from gyokuro
Maiko: Yamashita 5 x gyokuro set, chasen

[LuckyMe]

For Japanese greens, Yuuki-Cha is hands down my favorite vendor. Been ordering from them for years and their teas are consistently high quality. O-Cha is another good Japanese vendor. I have mixed feelings about Yunomi. They have a huge selection and offer sample sizes which is a plus, but I've never been blown away by their teas.

When it comes to Chinese green tea, I love Verdant tea as I'm a huge fan of green teas from Shandong which they specialize in. I also like Teavivre for their massive selection and inexpensive samples. I'll also recommend Yunnan Sourcing with the caveat to avoid the Yunnan grown green teas.

One vendor I'm curious about is Mei Leaf. I watch their YouTube channel and it seems they have a well-curated store. Has anyone ever tried their green tea?

[hopeofdawn]

I'm very surprised no one has mentioned Tea Trekker ( https://teatrekker.com/ ) yet--their selection is extensive, and they provide a lot of information on terroir, pluck, etc. I have several perennial favorites from them, and enjoy experimenting with new teas from them every now and then.

[Ginpachi]

As for Japanese tea, in general, I can recommend Sunday Natural - only available in French and German, but maybe useful to French and German speaking forum fellows:
www.sunday.de
www.sunday.fr

What I like is the tea quality, the sortiment, as well as the information about the cultivar, origin, farming grounds and methods.
I can also highly recommend their Green Roiboos and Sideritis.
What I did not like is their "Sunrouge Red Blueberry Leaf" which is a mixture with blueberry leaves; way too sour for my taste!
They also sell other teas and also teaware, which I cannot recommend since I did not try it out.

[Victoria]

Over in the What Green Are You Drinking thread we’ve been discussing a few Chinese Green Tea vendor recommendations starting here with @faj, so I thought I’d share them here as well. All three are based in the USA. If anyone has AAA recommendations for green tea vendors based in China please share.

TeaHabitat
Tea Trekker
Seven Cups

I see TeaHabitat, based in Los Angeles, CA, has two 2020 Longjing available. A few other friends have ordered Chinese greens from Tea Trekker, in Northampton, MA. I haven’t tried their teas yet though, but their web site is full of interesting information, and I’ve heard good things about them.

I’ll order puerh shipped from China but not green tea. In the best of circumstances shipping times are unpredictable. I usually order from tea trekker or seven cups.

I forgot about Seven Cups in Phoenix, Az. They have quite a few Chinese greens, and what looks like a very high quality Shi Feng LongJing. I’ve thought of ordering some yancha from them for some time now.

[polezaivsani]

Good mood to ya'all . Has any of you had any experience with green teas from https://www.teahong.com/?

[Victoria]

Good mood to ya'all . Has any of you had any experience with green teas from https://www.teahong.com/?

Welcome @polezaivsani. I haven’t tried their green teas but really enjoyed a Rougui- Cassia Extraordinaire 2016 from Tea Hong.

[polezaivsani]

Welcome polezaivsani. I haven’t tried their green teas but really enjoyed a Rougui- Cassia Extraordinaire 2016 from Tea Hong.

Thanks Victoria!

For a small aside, while trying to research them, i found an interesting article on blanching leaves on the sister information outlet, shedding light at the moment of very first drops of hot water hitting the leaves - https://www.teaguardian.com/tea-hows/to ... to-blanch/.

[faj]

For a small aside, while trying to research them, i found an interesting article on blanching leaves on the sister information outlet, shedding light at the moment of very first drops of hot water hitting the leaves - https://www.teaguardian.com/tea-hows/to ... to-blanch/.

Sorry for being off-topic, but the question of rinsing is one that puzzles me. While you hear people describing how they tried various temperatures and steeping time to get the most of a tea, I do not remember reading about people testing a given tea with and without rinsing. It is like it is so obvious that you either should rinse or not (for a given tea type) that it does not even warrant testing the preconception.

Any justification that is based on the idea of "getting rid of something" (dirt, pesticides, bits and pieces, easily soluble but detrimental aromatics, etc.) I can understand. If one likes the result better when rinsing first, that is fine with me. Using the rinse as a way to preheat the vessel? That can be done without the leaves, but yes, it does that. If one were to rinse the leaves with hotter water, and then infuse at a lower temperature? Yeah, I see the argument this achieves something different compared to a single infusion.

But often it seems to me it is considered a performance-enhancing technique that works across the board (for a given tea type) regardless of any other infusion parameter, and something is to be "scientifically justified" rather than experimented with and judged as a matter of preference. Is that an incorrect perception of how rinsing is usually approached?

As an aside I do not understand the use of the term "blanching" in the article. I am not much of a cook, but it seems to me blanching is not a short dip into hot water prior to cooking in hot water. I know about blanched potatoes for french fries. Blanched mashed potatoes... Is that a thing and I do not know?