★★★★☆
This is a decent green tea, but it was a bit one note, so I added honey. The sweetener helped mask the taste of hay and pear, and it became a nice, smooth cup of tea with a slight floral profile.
The large twisted "yellow tea" leaves brew to a lovely golden yellow color. It has soft, airy notes and a dry, crisp, fruity character.
Customers use these reviews to describe their experience with Hunan Gold, including flavor, aroma, preparation preferences, strength, and how the tea fits into daily routines. Browse the full review history page by page to compare tasting notes, steeping tips, and favorite ways to enjoy this tea.
This is a decent green tea, but it was a bit one note, so I added honey. The sweetener helped mask the taste of hay and pear, and it became a nice, smooth cup of tea with a slight floral profile.
Nice and light, very airy and healthy. I enjoyed it plain!
Light, with a touch of sweetness. I brewed carefully to avoid any grassy notes and enjoyed this tea. A little lighter taste than I usual go for, but a very nice cup of tea!
I had a single serve packet of this tea as a Communitea selection and immediately ordered some...it was that good.
Hubby and I both enjoy this lovely green tea, so I changed my prior review from four stars to five. I brewed it at 180 for two minutes and then three minutes for the second steep. Non astringent and no grassiness...mellow, smooth and soft green tea.
A mellow, if exceptionally light in taste tea with hints of something almost grainy. Unfortunately, not a tea for me.
It's a grassy green tea. This one was a tad bitter to me so I would suggest a lower steeping temp or cold brew.
I steeped for 3 min @ 180. The golden liquor gave me a mild sense of steamed greens. There was medium astringency, no bitterness, and light floral aftertaste. I steeped a second time for 2 min @ 180 and got a darker liquid that was less astringent and no floral aftertaste. This was a smooth green tea to me that I got multiple resteeps out of. I enjoy green teas and found this one to be pleasant and relaxing.
Flavor was very light, toasty. This is not an ‘in your face’ green tea, but rather subtle and easy to drink
Very good, clean flavor, bold workout being over powering. It's delicate but makes an impact worth any cotton after taste.
AMAZING! Used to buy this tea years ago at Teavana but since they closed I haven’t been able to find it…until now. Love the soft yet sweet/warm notes this tea gives. Truly unique
A must-have for any tea aficionado. Intriguing and captivating, the liquor from these leaves is liquid gold!
I don't drink hot liquids much but this is a good flavored tea. I am not a connoisseur, but I enjoy this.
I love hunan teas. So, I looked forward to drinking this. It did not disappoint me. This tea can be a breakfast tea or an anytime tea. It all depends on how long you steep it. Again I have it with half and half.
Really great tea. It was the first time I ordered. Will reorder again and again and again and again.
New favorite green tea. Keep going back to this one. I've drank 2 bags in only a couple months...
A nice lightly floral green. Not sure if closer to grass than vegetal taste its so light; very little astringency. Took a few tries of brewing to realize this was one of the teas I needed to go on the longer brewing time rather than the shorter.
This tea was just ok to me. I am not a huge fan of green tea but this one was not too bad and while I wouldn't order it again, it was decent.
A fine green tea, if that is your cup if tea, very subtle.
Loved this tea! Very good green tea it’s not bitter at all
I brewed my Hunan Gold lukewarm with some burdock and green tea honey. I barely heated the water as I didn't want to burn the tea. It is good and has a unique, striking flavor, like a mellow black tea, if that makes any sense. I look forward to experimenting with this tea more. I would recommend this tea!
A nice and enjoyable green tea to try. It is somewhat basic in flavor, but worth the experience.
I love the flavor of this tea when sweetened with a spoonful of honey. I often have it at breakfast instead of coffee.
This has been a favorite of mine for many years, but this year's batch is nothing like I remember. The taste is bland, like a mediocre, mass-market green tea. Even the leaves are differently colored than usual, not resembling the brownish-gold color shown in the online picture. I reported it to Adagio, but they offered no help.
Single origin, pure teas are still my favorite. This wonderful yellow tea has the elegance of it's green sisters without the grassy or savory quality of some types. It is just plain smooth and delicious; very slightly floral without overdoing it.
Yellow teas can be rare, and although this one was a little hard to find in Adagio's catalogs (under green tea), it is wonderful. Mellow, flavorful, and warming
I don't think this will be the chief tea I reach for when I'm wanting a cup, but it is nonetheless decent. It's mild but has some interest. I did note a few of the tongue zings that Jim R. mentioned. It's also a good example of astringency since I could feel the dry pull at the back of my throat after most sips-- not bitter, just astringent. I think those citing a fruity or floral taste for this tea are reaching because its flavors are subdued rather than pronounced. However, keep in mind that I enjoy teas with up-front flower scents & flavors-- jasmine, osmanthus, lavender, etc. Also, I don't add sweetener of any kind to my sips. The color of the tea is a nice yellow. I have to classify this as a 'good' rather than an 'okay' tea, because it seems as though the mildness of this tea was purposely created. It would have the more typical green tea attributes by default had it not been processed differently.
I was looking for a teavanna golden dragon replacement, its not the exact same and I'm trying the rest of the gold line up but its really good still.
A nice tea, but rather generic and does not strike me as something worth drinking more than once.
I have trouble getting into Chinese green teas - I've drank far too much sencha, and they just feel completely different. This one in particular is not very grassy, which depending on your taste could be a good thing.
This is like drinking honey, as if you were a royal at court with a tray of afternoon pastries ready to the side. Highly recommend, 2 minutes is all you need
Delicious. Crisp and clean. I multi-brewed this several times and loved every cup.
I absolutely love this as a cold brew. Turns out really smooth and refreshing with a bit of sweetness.
Very gentle, delicate flavor, almost sweet. Good for when you're in the mood for something like green tea, but lighter and without the strong vegetal flavor most greens have.
In the packet it smells like an old wooden chest. It brews a clear pale orange, and smells like apricot toast. Some astringency. Reminds me of a mild flavored puer. Also has some subtle white tea aroma and flavor. A little disappointed that it comes nowhere near to the beautifully worded description.
What a perfectly balanced, calming, green tea. Aside from my Hanami cherry blossom green tea, this will be taking up permanent residence. When I m in the mood for green, it s this.
This tea was too mild/mellow for my tastes. Nothing bad, but nothing memorable.
Today's CommuniTEA packet contained wispy yellow tipped leaves of Hunan Gold. Steeping for 3 minutes at 180°F produced a bright yellow green tea.
The name's similarity alone to one of my other favorite teas, Yunnan Gold, was enough to build up the hype for this brew. However, the flavor of this one is completely unique and different altogether. This tea is somewhere in between a green tea and a black darjeeling, but has no grassy flavors at all. The finish and body are both moderately astringent and fragrant but a certain crispness dominates the palate. The only other similar 'yellow tea' style that I've tried was the Meng Ding Huang Ya. Both of these teas have a similar flavor profile in that they're like a green tea without being grassy, instead they are delicate yet slightly toasty or nutty. The Hunan Gold adds to this a crisp and dry flavor similar to the muscatel character of a spring tip darjeeling that was steeped to perfection.
Overall, this tea has a uniquely impressive style that surprises one's expectations. Fruity and dry with layers of a certain unique flavor profile that seems to be the signature of a great 'yellow tea'.
While the leaves are very pretty once they're brewed, the tea itself has zero scent and the taste at a three minute brew time at 180 is bitter, with no real undernotes.
Yellow leaves but definitely tastes like green tea.
I really wanted to like today's communiTEA but it just had too much of a veggie, grassy taste for me to enjoy. :(
The astringency on this one was a little too high for me, but with honey added it was quite good. I guess I'm a bit basic when it comes to green tea, because mostly I tend to prefer less fancy leaves (or matcha... mmmm, matcha). I also enjoy the flavored green teas quite a bit, so take this with a grain of salt. If you like your green teas to be mildly grassy and astringent, then you would probably really like this tea.
Personal this is not favorite tea. The flavor was mild. I loved the color.
Tasted like a cup of liquid grass. Big, big yucky tea.
I love me a nice basic green tea. Delicious!!!
Smelled weirdly peppery in the packet for a green tea, but I was excited to try it! It's quite light and tasty, and carries a barely-noticeable sweet astringency. Mostly just your standard green tea and vegetal flavors. Overall, I think this is a really high-quality green tea, but not much stands out to me otherwise. Still, it's a five star to me because it's delicious anyway :)
On my 2nd steep and reading up on astringency while sipping. This tea has a lovely, light floral flavor, but I’m getting a rough astringency, to the point where it’s a bit unpleasant. Since I’m drinking it in the evening and I didn’t drink enough water today, I’m wondering whether having a dry mouth already can affect how we perceive astringency and whether we get that mouthwatering sedation afterward or just more dryness... Tea is truly subjective, even when the same person is tasting under different circumstances or from day to day. Sorry, Hunan Gold; this wasn’t your day.
I received a sample of this tea as part of the CommuniTEA box. However, as this isn't a blend, the small sample should be balanced. Still, I may have made mistakes steeping it.
Out of the tea, the leaves are large, well-rolled, with very little debris that's too small to be caught by my steeper. It smells much like many green teas, especially grassier or more organic green teas. It's a fairly subtle scent, though. After steeping for three minutes with 180F water, it produces a pale yellow tea that smells organic as well. The taste is pleasant. It's grassy and warm, with some floral notes to it. The taste is somewhat similar to other green teas I've had. Adding sugar, however, strangely ruins the flavor, though I'm not sure if that's because the sugar I used is weird, or the spoon was, or whatever. Regardless, it tastes almost musty with sugar added to it.
Overall, while I like the tea without sugar, it's not my favorite green tea. It would be four stars if it didn't taste so odd with sugar, and I prefer other green teas, even despite the similarities this has to other teas. If you like green tea, I suppose you might like this one. I won't refuse it if offered again, and if I received a free sample, I wouldn't be sad. However, I won't be buying this myself.
This one was too much on the grassy / straw side for me. Not a fan.
I can see how other may like this a lot more. I thought it was okay. The scent was very floral, sweet, and faintly grassy so was hoping for the best. While the first cup was subtly sweet and floral with only hints of grassiness and overall mellow flavor which was decent almost good. A rebrew turned it very grassy and had gained some bitterness so it was not really enjoyable.
So not only was it just a decent tea, it could only make one cup of it. I prefer for my tea to be able to rebrew well and evolve a little bit. This one almost completely changed and not for the better.
Very enjoyable flavorful and smooth green tea.