Green tea with citrus and ginkgo biloba

Today's gift tea from my brother David, bought at Mecca Coffee Company, is a little out of my normal black tea comfort zone.  It's green tea with citrus and ginkgo biloba.  Ginkgo biloba is a herb used in Chinese medicine with some studies done by western medicine .  The primary things it's taken for in the west is memory and mental speed.  The studies done have been with caplets, not as tea just for what it's worth.

I made 4 cups using the Assam tea press and the green tea setting, 175 degrees Fahrenheit, on the smart kettle.  I did a 3 minute brew time.  Being a green tea I'm not going to be using milk with it.  Just as a note, it seems to have some particle smaller than the holes in the infuser basket on the tea press.  This led to a number of particles floating in the tea.  As green tea normally isn't that small I assume that those are either from the citrus or ginkgo.

It has a fairly strong citrus smell while being brewed with a grassy undertone.

1st sip, before sugar to see if it needs sugar or not.  It does.  It's sour, which is to be expected out of tea with citrus.  The sourness is enough to tell me that even it it wasn't a green tea I would not be adding milk to it.

1st full mouthful.  Citrus flavor dominate the flavor, but there is a grassy taste as well.  It's a delicate tea, not really a morning wake up tea, but that is also to be expected of a green tea.  It's as I'm fond of saying, a subtle tea.  To be honest it's almost tasteless, other than the citrus and grassy flavors.   It has a slightly bitter aftertaste.  As a bit of TMI, a burp after drinking it has a fairly strong citrus flavor, almost like lemonade. 

There is a stronger herbal taste once the tea gets cooler.  I'm not sure why the taste changes, but it could be due to the particles in the tea.  The 2nd cup also had a the stronger herbal taste, so I'm going to assume that the particles are the cause.  This also tells me that if I was drinking this for "wellness" reasons I would be letting it brew longer than 3 minutes.  As I don't drink tea for "health benefits", I drink for taste, and you don't want to over brew green tea, so a 3-4 minute brew would be all I would do.  As a green tea it can, in theory, be steeped a 2nd or 3rd time, it wasn't a good enough tea for me to do so.

Would I drink this if offered by a friend? Sure, it's harmless enough.  I'm not sure I would drink a 2nd cup or not.  Probably would, as I drank all 4 cups I made this morning.

Will I drink this tea again? Probably not, given that there are warnings about ginkgo biloba that touch on some of my medications.  I suspect that one pot of tea with it mixed in isn't going to be a problem, but no sense in taking chances.  If it was just the green tea with citrus I would drink again.  Might be good as an iced tea.

Would I buy this tea?  No.  See possible medical interactions.

Did Explorer the Cat go nuts over this tea?  Well, she sniffed at it while I was making it, plus jumped up on the computer desk to sniff it again.  Didn't try to sip any of it like she does mint tea but payed more attention to it than she does black tea.  

Final verdict: 7 out of 10, a harmless tea, as far as taste goes, it's not the worst tea with herbs in it I've had, but fairly blah over all.