Wild Rose - Rishi OR What in the world is a schizandra berry???

Today I opened up a tea I bought during a trip to Mystic, CT. We took the kids this summer on a last minute excursion. We went to the seaport, visited the aquarium, and just enjoyed walking around. The only disappointment of the trip was that there was a yarn shop I would have loved to hit, but it closed before we made it over and wasn't open the following day. Probably just as well.

This tea is an organic white tea with rose petals released by Rishi Tea called "Wild Rose." According to the description it is a combination of white tea, wild rose, schizandra berries, green tea, peppermint, natural rose flavor, lavender flowers, and jasmine flowers. Which leads to the question, what in the world is a schizandra berry?

Schizandra (Schizandra chinensis) is a woody vine native to China and Japan that is part of the Magnoliaceae family. The berries produced are known as Wu Wei Zi in Chinese, meaning "five taste fruit." They are purported to contain the five primary tastes we recognize - sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and spicy. For 2,000 years, these berries have been used for a variety of homeopathic purposes in the East. While I think alternative medicine/homeopathy is very underutilized in the West, I will not list any specific effects attributed to this fruit as I have not researched them fully.

This particular white tea originates from north of the Min River in the province of Fujian, China. Rishi purchases directly from organic small-holder gardens. The tea is harvested once a year in early spring during a cool, dry period. Rishi representatives visit the tea gardens each year to monitor quality and select the year's offerings.

I found the scent of this tea highly floral. It's taste was quite delicate; the rose flavor among the strongest I'd tasted. The mint was a nice complement, apparent but not strong enough to compete with the other flavors. There was a totally unique taste to this tea that I couldn't identify - perhaps the aforementioned schizandra berries! A very nice tea, all in all. Their commitment to organic and fair trade tea will certainly bring me back as well.

Tea: Wild Rose
Source: Rishi Tea
Type: Scented white tea
Brewing details: 190 degrees for 5 minutes.
Comment: Rishi Tea has a fantastic website that is worth a look. For each type of tea they sell they have a beautiful photo of the leaves and clear markings as to which are fair trade and which are organic. They also sell teas from heirloom tea trees, something I haven't seen elsewhere. Their Travelogue allows you to get a close up look at where their teas come from. So far they have posted one for a trip to Yunnan, China and one from Kangoshima, Japan.

Taken from http://teapages.blogspot.com/