Rating between a 87-92. I decided to western brew style it because I felt lazy.
I rinsed it, and the rinse was extra sweet and buttery, but a little bit cool from the 195 temp. I amped up the kettle to 200-205, and aimed to steep it for two minutes. I let it sit, and after about 30 seconds I poured some into my cup to check its progress. It was sweet buttery and melony. I gave it another ten seconds, and same thing with more of the lavender floral. I thought I waited another minute into what ended up being two, I poured some more out to check, and it was vegetal edging on broccoli and cabbage, so I “saved” what I could by dumping it out.
The vegetal notes took over! I should remember that hotter water makes the tea develop faster. I poured some room temperature water in the mug to cut down on the vegetal notes and the slight grassy astringency, and it was good. Still sweet, buttery, creamy, and heavy on the melon, but the dill note was the strongest. I looked at the mug again, and I think I put closer to 5 grams instead of the 3 I assumed I did. There were some smaller leaves I couldn’t see.
Oh well, I took that as a lesson about this particular tea, so I dropped the temp back to 185-190 and let it only sit for between 1-2 minutes. The vegetal notes resided back, and the honeydew melon was back in place as the main flavor. I’m going to have to use 2 grams instead for western next time-I underestimated how powerful it would be.
I’m pretty happy with this one so far western, but gong fu is the way to go with this Li Shan. I have not decided if I want to tumbler it or not because it’s a little bit too vegetal for longer steeping, and if I do, I cannot exceed 2 grams. The veggie notes are making me lean more toward an 88 for a rating despite this being a higher quality tea, but my parameters in what makes a tea I prefer is versatility, so I am docking a few points for now. I will likely raise the rating back up later on, so we’ll see how it goes in other styles.
I know this is a critical good review, but I am a little bit more harsh this time around because I am liking some of the other teas they have more, especially the Long Feng and Shan Lin Xi….nevermind the notes I didn’t like were absolutely my fault. I still recommend Trident because they basically have a full catalogue that only focuses on the good teas. It’s by no means overwhelming, but it’s pretty damn complete.
Flavors: Broccoli, Butter, Cream, Floral, Fruity, Honeydew, Osmanthus, Spinach, Vegetables, Vegetal, Zucchini
