Silver Needles is the most prized type of white tea one can buy. Davidson's Tea gives you this fine tea at a good price for the volume of leaves.
This tea has a white fur on each little leaf. Supposedly, this is because it is picked from the top two leaf layers of early (immature) tea. For those who have not had Silver Needles before, it has a much more subtle tea flavor than does green tea. For some, this may not be as pleasant to drink, so before you put out the money for an entire pound, you may want to try it in a less expensive way first. For myself, I do prefer green and even black tea, but white tea has some health advantages I seek.
As others have mentioned, you can definitely get at least three good brews out of this tea. Also, the tea does not leave you jittery from caffeine as similar amounts of green or black tea would. This is, in part, because it has less caffeine than the others, appears to have a stronger concentration of differing antioxidants, and it has more theobromine and theanine--both of which soothe and calm people. You are left amazingly alert but calm as you drink this. If you have something to do that requires a lot of concentration, drinking this tea greatly helps you focus. I cannot fully describe just how strong this effect is, but your mind functions as well as if you had just had a great night's sleep, coupled with a vigorous workout (depending on how much tea you used or how long the initial brew took -- the more the better). The effect seems to be most noticeable starting 30 minutes after drinking the first cup and lasts many hours.
Without a doubt, the tea tastes best if brewed at something below 170 degrees (probably 160 is best). I have taken to using a kitchen thermometer if I'm in doubt as to its relative temperature. It takes longer to brew, but the taste stays more agreeable.
On a different note, we were surprised to have this arrive in a large plastic-lined paper bag THAT WAS MERELY TWIST-TIED SHUT. Yes, this arrives without any sort of seal, even a zipping-type of seal. All you do to get access to the tea inside is undo the two little edge twist-ties and then unroll.
I do not think anyone at the Amazon warehouse will have tampered with the tea, but honestly, there's no way to prove that. Davidson's sells other bulk one-pound teas that have a zipper seal and are also tightly-glued above that seal. For those, there is no way to tamper with them without it being noticed.
I am not "weirded out" enough to not purchase this very fine tea this way again, as it really just arrives as if you'd gotten it bulk from a local store in which you'd bagged it yourself, but I do think other people will be bothered by this. Those people are now warned.
NOTE: Silver Needles tea leaves are supposed to be short. Since they are picked at the earliest time of the spring, they are not nearly fully-grown. It is also the reason the tea is "brittle"--the tea is dried and was only picked one time in the year. If you are expecting big leaves that are "moist", you are looking for a different tea.
UPDATE: With out latest pound, Lot#: AMZ-S3110980, the flavor is quite different, tasting more like White Peony with a hint of Jasmine. The prior bag, Lot #: AMZ-T3278926, had no such hint to it. Both teas look identical, though.
UPDATE (March 2011): The bag (Lot #: AMZ-T2662880) now comes in a tamper-proof bag, like many of the other Davidson's teas. Thanks, Davidson's!
UPDATE (November 2012): Davidson's has removed the Lot numbers, but added a "Best By" date. Our bag, with a date of 08/09/2014, tastes like tree leaves somehow got in it. The individual leaves (buds) look a bit sickly compared with prior bags, too. Because it has always been good, we are overlooking this one bag's issue and will drink it up. We go through a bag roughly every three months. Sadly, this bag came in as the Amazon price had gone up, so we paid more for lesser quality than ever before.
UPDATE (January 2013): Our tea with an 11/2/2014 "Best By" date looks almost as good as Teavana's. I found two small clover-type leaves, but otherwise, this looks and tastes the best we've seen in over a year. Excellent!
Organic Black Teas and Natural Oil of Bergamot.
