Jade Green Review

Type: Green
Origin: China and India mix
Price: Sample (regular price - $8.49 for 15 pyramids)
Vendor: Choice Organic Teas
Brewing Method: 1 pyramid, 1 cup of filtered water, heated to 160°F-170°F, steeped for 2-3 minutes.
Overall Score: 4.1 out of 5

Jade Green is a mix of organic Chinese and Indian green teas. I could smell the grassy green tea as soon as I tore open the package. The leaves are very tightly rolled up bits and can easily be viewed through the fabric of the pyramid.

The one thing that immediately concerned me was the amount of tea in the pyramid. There really wasn’t that much in the bag. I broke out my digital scale and weighed the tea to find out that the whole pyramid (tea, string, paper tag, and fabric) only weighed 2.2 grams. Subtracting about half a gram for the pyramid itself, which means there was less than 2 grams of tea here.

The reason I was concerned was because normally the “rule of thumb” is 2.5 grams of loose leaves per cup of water. Also, some instructions I have for Chinese green tea is 3-4 grams of loose leaves per cup of water. I know this was being kind of picky, but the leaf per water ratio can greatly affect the taste – in good ways and bad ways.

While steeping, the tea gave off a luscious, sweet, grassy aroma. The liquor is a bright yellow color. Going back to my issues of how much loose tea was in the pyramid, I started to think that maybe Choice Organic put that amount of tea in there because of how much room the leaves needed to open up. However, after steeping there was still over half of the pyramid that was empty.

I was not as pleased with the taste as I hoped to be. The tea definitely had the usual green tea – vegetal and grassy - taste to it. However, it was also a little bitter and almost sour. There is a small amount of astringency (but I don’t think I’ve found a green tea, yet, that has none). Even though the flavor was light bodied, it was not watered down. Because of that, I can safely guess that Choice Organic knew what they were doing by putting less than the usual amount of loose leaves in the bag.

I love drinking green tea that hasn’t been overly flavored with fruits, flowers, herbs, etc, so I was very excited to try this one. However, this wasn’t exactly my favorite green tea, but it was nice to have a cup of green without all of the additives.