Hey friends! Happy Wednesday!
Today's post is a review of the lichuan black tea from FlowInverse tea. FlowInverse is a newer Seattle-based company with a focus on teas from Enshi, China. They emphasize the importance of compensating farmers, showcasing "voices from disadvantaged groups, the silent groups, and the minor groups" to the world.
Now, their focus is, at the moment, entirely on Enshi, as they offer two teas: lichuan black tea and Enshi Jade Dew (Enshi YuLu). According to them, Enshi is one of the most impoverished areas in China, with "20% of families have an annual income of less than $120, with half of them due to illness or disability" (FlowInverse). They mention that they purchase their lichuan leaves at $80/kg, or significantly above market price, to "ensure the farmers' income and interests." I also really love how genuinely transparent they are, telling us the costs per kilo on their end as well as giving us in-depth information on the teas we purchase. This showcases their efforts to create a fairer market system for farmers and is a great mission, so when they reached out to me offering to send me a bag of their lichuan and a bag of their yu lu in exchange for a review, I had to. Specifically, I got sent the high-value lichuan black tea, which is a one bud-two-leaves picking standard. They also graciously included a discount code for all of you to use for 15% off their black teas, so read to the end for that.
As a disclaimer, this is just a discount code, not an affiliate link. I will NOT, and HAVE NOT been paid or compensated to provide this code, nor will I make commissions with purchases using the code. It is simply a code given to show appreciation.
So, without further ado, let's get into this review.
Product Specifications:
Type: Black Tea ("紅茶", "hongcha," "red tea")
Cultivar: Zhongcha # 108
Origin: Enshi, China
Elevation: 2,900 feet
Harvest: April, 2024
Producer: Qiu
Caffeine Level: Medium
Processing Method: Withering, Rolling, Oxidizing, and Drying
Brewing Parameters:
5g leaf, 100ml gaiwan
100C/212F spring water
Flash steeps initially, 5-10s steeps thereafter
*As a caveat, I used the brewing parameters I generally use when evaluating a black tea for quality, flavor, aroma, longevity, turbidity, etc.; these are slightly different from the suggested parameters from the manufacturer, though as always, please feel free to experiment with your teas to your desired tastes. FlowInverse recommends using 1g leaf for every 30ml, so for a 100ml gaiwan you'd use roughly 3g of leaf; they also suggest using slightly cooler water (185-194°F (85-90°C) and starting with an 8 second first steep, then increasing each steep thereafter by 3-5 seconds. *
Dry Leaves: These dried leaves are absolutely gorgeous. They're thin, needle-like leaves with a lovely golden buddiness to them. There is a pleasant, malty aroma from the dried leaves, coupled with something sweet and honey-like.
Warmed gaiwan: The leaves now have a lovely aroma of sweet potatoes, malt, hay, and wildly, wheat starch. There's a concord-grape-like aroma hiding in there, too.
Flash rinse: The rinse was quite lovely for a rinse. This rinse had notes of sugared sweet potatoes, malted milk, barley, and was incredibly sweet for just a rinse.
1st steep 5s: Wow. This might be the sweetest black tea I've ever tasted. It's candy-like, almost, delivering a deliciously sweet flavor with notes of sweet potato pie with subtle vegetal and floral notes (i.e. like chamomile or rose petals). There's also a lingering background fruity note of fresh apricots or concord grapes and grapeskins- that sort of vegetal greenish, sweet backing note. This is incredibly balanced- the sweetness isn't overpowering nor is the astringency super noticeable. I reserved a bit of this first steep to see if this lichuan has the famous "cream down" effect.
2nd steep 10s: Wow. I'm still wildly blown away by the sweetness here; it's not cloyingly sweet, but man is it present. It's sugary sweet but not in a bad way in any shape. The floral notes are more present now, being almost rose-petal like. The maltiness comes through as well but the predominant note is, by far, sweet potato pie (which, if you've never had, you should seriously try it- it's like a creamier pumpkin pie)- that creamy, silky feeling with a sweet, slightly spiced flavor. As the tea cooled, as well, it gained a silky creaminess to it, with a slight lychee-like flavor creeping in in the aftertaste.
3rd steep 15s: Still incredibly sweet. The floral notes come through stronger and there is a slight, drying astringency noticeable, but it's fairly tame and is relatively in-line with other black teas. This is still incredibly balanced and the flavors blend well with the slight astringency, which keeps the session engaging and interesting.
4th steep 20s: This is the final steep- the drop off is noticeable as now it's mostly just sweetened, grassy/vegetal flavors with not much depth. The astringency is slightly stronger. It's still enjoyable but it's definitely on its last leg. Time for the super steep.
5th steep 60s: This was the kill-steep. This was actually quite pleasant; slightly bitter from being pushed this long, but still incredibly sweet, this went down easier than I had anticipated for the longer brew time with boiling water. This final steep also had a more pronounced note of starch and grapeskin.
Reserved and Chilled 1st steep: I chilled this in the refrigerator. There was a minor cream down effect noted, but the prominent note for this chilled first steep is the change in mouthfeel. This first steep was thinner and more broth-like, whereas this stuff is now incredibly creamy and smooth. It has a more prominent maltiness to it as well, though the sweetness is still prominent and forward. Very fun seeing how this changed as it cooled down.
Final Thoughts and Discount Code:
For the price, $7.99/10g, or about $0.80c/gram, this is a fairly reasonable tea. Lichuan black tea tends to range anywhere from $0.50c/g to several dollars per gram, and when you factor in the prices FlowInverse pays to support farmers, as well as the fact that the tea has been handpicked, this tea is quite reasonably priced.
While the tea only lasted about 5 steeps, it remains probably one of the most memorable black teas I've had this year- the incredible sweetness of this tea really sells it as a delicious treat. I could see this being great for people who don't typically like drinking black tea straight, or for people who tend to enjoy adding some sort of sweetener to their tea (i.e. honey, sugar, etc.), as the flavor profile already has that lovely intense sweetness to it.
FlowInverse was also kind enough to provide me with a discount code to share with my followers. This code can be used for any of their black tea offerings and gives you a cool 15% off. To get your 15% off, use the code "NELDON15%" at checkout.
Happy Steeping, friends!
As a disclaimer, this is NOT an affiliate code and I DO NOT make commission with purchases using my code, nor was I paid money to review this tea or include this code.
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