shaowebb
Member
I drink a lot of tea and recently I had the worst two experiences involving tea in my whole life. I am reposting them now for your amusement. Second is by far the worst though...
________________________________________________________________TEA TIME!
Last time I went to the Asian Market I found a metal tin labeled "nan nuo shan Pu' erh Tea". I was excited to try it since I had never heard of it and it had a stylish tin.
Don't that just look delicious...
It was odd because it didn't have a very tea like smell at all. In fact, it smelled like your pants after using a weed whacker in the woods for an hour. Reading the tin I find the word "INCENSE" and wonder if somehow they mixed patchouli into my tea or something. Smelled like a burnout's ash tray after he'd lit about 5 misc sticks of incense on it.
Feeling adventurous I began to steep it...for a green looking tea it appeared like a red tea with deep reddish orange swirls as it steeped. I set it up with my normal cream and sugar and it then smelled...well...exactly the same. So I decided maybe it was an herbal tea like yellow root and ginseng tea that I had hit once or twice growing up. Those are root teas and they taste like hell, but give you a pretty good burst of energy and kind of help a lot with allergies and colds so I figured I'd give it a try.
I feel like I just went down on a lint trap and forgot to come up for air.
This stuff isn't good. Not one bit. Its not horrific in flavor, but its not really close to any tea I've ever had in any way. I could taste my milk, sugar and water and next to that flavor was the flavor of an old sock.
Reading the tin I found it had a shelf life of 24 months from its born on date which was 5/18/2010...this stuff had gone bad 6 months ago. I dumped the tin out and it looked like black sand and I have no idea what this was ever supposed to taste like. I read that its supposed to be that color, but possessing a sweet and mellow taste. I may never know. Though the reviews I've read say it smelled like a horse and had a barn flavor so it may have always tasted like this.
A short while later...
And just kind of coughed up a chunk of something. Christ what did I drink? I only had a few sips and left that tea to die in the sink and its killing me. My tongue feels like the scouring top of an old dish sponge.
TEA TIME!
Well after the horrifying experience I had with the Pu Erh tea I thought nothing could ever be as bad Right?
WRONG.
I could drink a gallon of Pu Erh tea out of the nether crevices of a dead horse and it'd be better than what I just drank from the bargain bin of the asian market. For $2 I found a long box of 50 packs of "JIAOGULAN TEA". This stuff said it was great for blood pressure, cholestrol, and was an "anti aging?" tea meant to keep you young. Yeah, I severely doubt that last one, but what the hell the Lo Han Kuo definitely did cool you down with its "Cooling" effect so I thought I'd try this tea out and see what it was like.
My first impression of this tea meant to lower your blood pressure was that it smelled a LOT like marijuana. Like a loooooooooooot like it. Of course I have a cold right now and can barely smell anything with old righty the blighty sinus shooting blood scabs out every time I blow my nose lately so I thought that it was just me. After all they couldn't market weed as tea and sell it as an blood pressure regulator right?
Anyhow I did my normal deal and got my big glass tea cup, and got it hot and popped in a baggie. It took forever to steep and barely bled out anything and what it did bleed was pure green. Thinking it an old baggie I tossed in a SECOND bag of Jiaogulan Tea to steep so the stuff wouldn't turn out weak or something. After all, I drink my tea strong and let it steep forever even when I'm brewing P&G tips which has LITERALLY been known to erode the esophagus of those drinking 6 cups plus a day.
Eventually the tea steeped and It was a strong greenish yellow brownish thing so I tossed in my cream and sugar and had a go at it. I took a tiny sip.
I'm struggling for a metaphor that fits what I experienced at this point in my tale. You know that feeling of toothpaste and orange juice? Well thats bitter right? Well thats like cake frosting glazed in honey compared to Jiagulan Tea. I shouldn't have worried about it being "weak". This stuff would give Superman a swirly and call him a weakling. It could chew coal and spit out diamonds. This tea make Cthulhu go insane at the mention of its own name. This tea could job Goldberg at a pay per view. This tea could stalk Slenderman. This tea could do it all and not break a sweat.
I have never in all my life sipped something and started crying. I literally had tears as I fully dilated and started shaking from the pain of this drink. It also still smells like marijuana.
No more random stuff from the Asian market. I thought Pu Erh tea was the worst "tea" ever conceived, but Jiaogulan Tea destroyed it. I think I lost some of my ability to taste from that sip. Its that damned painful. Here is a picture of the exact product I bought. It is horrible.
