36 Tasting Notes

89

Drank this a few nights ago, will do a full review at a later date but this was a very lovely, warming, Qi heavy session. I spent about an hour and a half just doing about 8 brews with this tea. I think the amount of time this tea made me spend with it really speaks volumes about its quality.

2/27/16 update
7g in 100ml gaiwan. This will be brief: great aroma of fragrant wood, incense, tobacco, and some stewed fruit on the wet leaves. The brew is a dark amber, lovely balance of bitterness and sweetness. Full in the mouth with good characteristics i.e. long finish, causes salivation, long cooling sesnation. The qi is very warming and relaxing. I should have thrown a few more grams in, 8-9 grams next time. This brewed pretty consistently for 8 brews before slowly loosing some steam. dry leather finish and hints of mushroom in later brews. Nice honey sweetness creeps in as well with a floral complexity. Overall a very nice full flavored aged sheng, doing well at the 10 /11 year mark.

Flavors: Floral, Honey, Leather, Wood

Preparation
Boiling 6 g 2 OZ / 60 ML

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80

Nice smell of flowers, berries, malt, straw, and milk chocolate on the dry leaves. The brew was thick and malty with a honey/straw sweetness, lots of floral notes with a tinge of berry acidity. Nice aftertaste which builds a good amount of salivation in the cheeks.

Flavors: Berries, Chocolate, Flowers, Honey, Malt, Straw

Preparation
Boiling 3 g 3 OZ / 100 ML

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84
drank Qilan Fire by white2tea
36 tasting notes

Lovely roasty nose with floral and fruity undertones. Brews a smooth lightly roast cup with a present florality, nice mineral notes build alongside the sweetness with each brew. The key attribute of this tea is its lingering, soft, and sweet aftertaste which lasts long after the last brew. At times the tea was a bit nutty/oily and had a nice thick mouthfeel. Unfortunately I just ran out of my 20 gram sample from tea club :(.

Preparation
Boiling 4 g 3 OZ / 100 ML

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74

Bought from the shinjuku branch of lupicia. The dry leaves are choppy but have a wonderfully sweet chocolate smell with notes of berries. I started with shorter steeps as the leaves were quite broken up. Nice acidity with a sweet fruity note up front, the chocolate is still there with a bit more florality in the mix, the first brew was a bit astringent so I backed off a bit on the temperature and slowly ramped it up again. This is also quite roasty smelling for a black tea, it seriously reminds me of hojicha on the nose of the wet leaves. You can definitely taste this is gyokuro, wonderful base of umami with a lively acidity up to seven brews or so. Probably won’t buy this tea again, but I will definitely drink the rest of the bag I bought.

Preparation
Boiling 2 g 2 OZ / 70 ML

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73

I’ve brewed this up a bunch of times, currently doing a thermos brew of this tea. Gongfu brewing is definitely not necessary for this tea as the flowers overpower the leaves. Either way this is really just a pleasant, warm, and comforting sipper. Nothing complex or out of the ordinary, just an easy-drinker for winter, in a good way. Malty sweet feng qing meets spicy floral chrysanthemum. For the price it’s a good office tea.

Flavors: Floral, Honey, Malt, Spices, Spicy, Sugar, Wood

Preparation
Boiling

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81

Just finished my mini cake, and I wish I had more! For the price this is a lovely cake to go to when you want something comfortable and flavorful. It can endure brew after brew and yields a full and thick woody brew with hints of cocoa, TCM, incense, and leather. I’ll be buying a few more to stock away. I don’t think this is a tea with long term aging potential, but it will be even more pleasant for a few more years.

Preparation
Boiling 5 g 2 OZ / 60 ML

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83

Packed my small gaiwan with about 5-6 grams of this tea. The first brew yielded a blast of sugar cane sweetness, huge florality, and a nice mangosteen note. the next two brews ramped up the bitterness with a thick mouth feel and minerality. The aftertaste is thick and sweet causing lots of salivation. Lots of cooling in the throat and good re-welling of sweetness up the throat. 5-8 brews saw a drop in bitterness, with a more creamy body taking hold, as well as a return of more fruity notes in the ball park of candied citruses.

A very enjoyable young sheng, even in the dead of winter, a bit thicker and darker then expected for its youth.

Preparation
Boiling 6 g 1 OZ / 40 ML

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84
drank Rougui Oolong by white2tea
36 tasting notes

Finishing up my sample from teaclub. This tea has a very forward peachy/ sweet note on the dry leaves. The brew is classic rougui, thick with notes of cinnamon bark spice and sweetness. Nice floral notes here and there with a good dry minerally finish. The best part about this tea is its long lasting saliva-inducing aftertaste. sweet and full. When I need to restock on oolongs this is going to be on my order list.

Preparation
Boiling 3 g 2 OZ / 60 ML

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85

Really firm (90-99% Cocoa) dark chocolate bitterness upfront with a nice dry hint of leather, somewhere within that powerful mix of chocolate and leather I get a hint at subtle fruity complexities which will probably reveal themselves in the coming years. Solid base of mulch, wet wood, and damp leaves with a persistent sweetness delivered through endless salivation in the cheeks. After a minute or so the dry bitter notes fade to reveal a very long and smooth lingering wetness which coats the back of the throat. After looking up more about the tea it seems that sensation is where the cakes name is derived from – “Hui Run”. The qi is forward and strong, it makes no attempt to hide how young it is.

It was enjoyable enough in its own way, but I would probably not visit it again until it’s had some time to develop. As is I wouldn’t rate this well, but with aging in mind I think it has a lot of potential. It’s definitely rough around the edges, but hey it’s less then a year old and has lost a lot of its off flavors. There’s enough heft to develop into something really special in my opinion – not a drink now kind of shou.

Preparation
Boiling 6 g 3 OZ / 100 ML

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89

Packed my smallest gaiwan with about 6 grams of this tea as I always find white teas very forgiving. The smell on the heated leaves is, just as described by the vendor, packed with red dates as well as white peony, a hint of vanilla/cinnamon, and white flowers. This smell was present consistently throughout brewing – in the wet leaves, the tea liquor itself, the after taste, and even the smell in the cup after drinking the tea.
In addition to the flavors already mentioned, the tea tasted of honey and some other light/tart citrusy fruits, toasted oats, and a solid note that reminded me of a pile of dry autumn leaves. Quite full bodied, falls just short of malty. smooth with a nice cooling in the back of the throat and a sweet saliva-inducing buzzing in the cheeks. The tea endured 8 steepings packed with flavor before I decided to boil it. This tea was a welcome change of pace from oolongs and puerh, while still having a full enough body and flavor profile to satisfy me on a cold winter night, it honestly had some parallels to 10-20 year old oolongs.

Flavors: Autumn Leaf Pile, Cinnamon, Dates, Flowers, Honey, Vanilla

Preparation
Boiling 6 g 2 OZ / 50 ML

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