does gunpowder green taste bad?

I am afraid that´s normal with Gunpowders or zhucha. I have never tasted a good Gunpowder though I have heard that there must be some available somewhere. I believe, because Gunpowder is so widely available and so cheap, many people try that as their first green tea ... and are very disappointed and never try green tea again. Personally I think Gunpowder is good only for strong Moroccon mint tea with lots of sugar. Yugen.

Well, once in a while a nice quick cup of Temple-of-Heaven gunpowder (incredibly cheap at local asia stores) is quite good, in my opinion. Just use less of tea, about 10 to 11 gr. per litre not to hot water an steep for max. two minutes. But you will get a strong brew, litely bitter and a touch of "smokey", which not everybody likes. You can have a milder version: steep for a minute or so and pour the tea away, then make a second infusion, let's steep about one and a half minutes then. But nevertheless, it is gunpowder. Do not compare with delicate green teas like sencha or those others from china or darjeeling, that would be like comparing tea from sumatra with a first flush darjeeling.

Dieter

It's an acquired taste, and the good ones are way better than the bad ones. I started drinking loose leaf tea with some crappy gunpowder, 4 oz. of the stuff, and at first it nearly knocked me over but then I grew to like it, and now the other greens always leave something to be desired.. it's that harshness that makes it.

I think it's according to personal preference. For example, I liked gunpowder and dragon well right off the bat, but whatever two pan-fried that I tried were awful.

I suggest that you brew for a shorter time and/or try another source and see if you get the same result.

There is good gunpowder, but it can be hard to track down. Most of the stuff exported from China is horrible. I did find some great gunpowder at

howlerman