Yumberry Wulong Oolong

Backlogging

Experience buying from Teavana Online http://steepster.com/places/2822-teavana-online-atlanta-georgia

I bought 2 OZ of this in their year-end Heavenly Tea Sale at 75% off.

It looks almost as good as the picture: lots of colorful goodies mixed in with huge reddish-purplish yum-berries and a few rolled oolong tea leaves. It smells about like any Tie Guan Yin accompanied by weaker notes of berries. I brewed this up as I do any oolong.

Tea liquor smelled about like any TGY: floral, and with the barest hint of berries, and it had a very light strawberry color.

It tasted basically like a TGY in the first steep (there may have been some berry notes in there; admittedly I didn’t ‘look’ too hard). The second steeping had the strongest (and best) flavor, like a decent TGY (no fruit or berry flavor at all), with mild flavor on the fifth. “No flavor any different than a (standard) TGY.” It is a beautiful looking tea, but in every other respect it’s like a decent Tie Guan Yin. In my judgement, it’s not anywhere near worth it all full price ($12 / 2 OZ), or even at 50% off, but I’m glad I got to try it for a few bucks.

My mom bought some tea from Teavana’s heavenly sale this year and brought it up to my grandparents so we could try it. I also gave her an unopened pouch of their Dan Cong that I got from last year’s heavenly sale, since I’m still working through the other 6 oz. of it I got then, too!

This one had huge chunks of what looked like raspberries in there, but I couldn’t find raspberries in the ingredients themselves. Maybe those were the yumberries? I could also see the dried chunks of kiwi and strawberry. The oolong used was rolled in tight little balls – it was a greener oolong, maybe formosa? It smelled like vanilla/cream and fruit, but I don’t know why the vanilla was present because that’s not in the ingredients either!

Anyway – steeped this up at the below parameters, using a pretty sizable tsp. and a half. I figured it would be weak otherwise. The liquor was a very pale pink, and it retained the dry leaf smell. Tastewise, it was still quite delicate, but with a green oolong as the base that’s not too surprising. I really like it, actually. I used way too much leaf for it to be economical at its full price (well, back before it was discontinued!) but the slightly vegetal, creamy fruitiness would be fantastic iced.

This was one of four I made up today to have a mini tasting session with my grandparents and mom – it was so much fun to teach them about tea!

Oh dear. I wanted to like this tea. Fruity and a bit tart, but not too overwhelmingly fruity or tart. It sounded lovely. I prepared it with 1 t per 8 oz, after checking the Teavana website. I was skeptical, since my last brush with oolong tea (Teavivre, thankyouverymuch) called for two to three times as much. But press on I did, and what did I get as a result?

Troubled water. Yes, what resulted at that preparation and a two minute steep could only nicely be called troubled water. Not worth drinking. A vague bit of oolong flavor (unfortunately, greener oolongs are not my favorite), but not enough to be called a tea. I gave it one more shot, hoping for at least a stronger oolong flavor with a second steep at four minutes. The tea was stronger, but no fruit to be found (not surprising on a second steep).

I got this tea on sale at Teavana’s end of the year sale, and I’m glad I didn’t pay full price for it. I’ll give it another shot iced, maybe that will improve it.

I’ve brewed this a few different times using different steeping parameters and I just can’t get much more than a slightly tart hibiscus/berry flavor and green oolong flavor. I just can’t figure out how to get this right. Best tasting, but most sour/tart was a 3 minute steep at just below boiling with 4 tsp/16oz. Turned a pale pink infusion and fully unfurled the leaves, just didn’t give me much flavor. I will try again with a pinch of sugar and again iced, but otherwise this is moving to the swap pile.

This was the other tea that I chose when I made my first Teavana visit. I winged it and went in without reading reviews here first, and when I came back to the hotel after, went on the interwebs, and discovered the horrid reviews, my left eye twitched for a good couple minutes. $14 right there.

What drew me in was the fact that I was in an oolong mood and I liked the idea of berries in this, and figured it would make a great iced tea. It also smelled really good.

I just finished cold steeping it in the fridge for about eight hours, and honestly, it’s not that bad. It’s a little weak, but I think it has just enough flavour to make this refreshing for the summer. The berry flavour is definitely there, but it’s a little vague. I think it’s trying to be strawberry more than anything else.

It’s actually not that bad. I won’t have a problem finishing up what I bought but I wouldn’t repurchase. I probably won’t bother trying it hot.

Found this one in the back of my tea cupboard and couldn’t remember when I purchased it. Whoops! So I tried brewing it to see how it turned out. I remembered that I liked it OK, but wouldn’t purchase it again.

Now, on to this cuppa: it’s funny that it’s considered oolong to me, because it tastes more like green tea if anything. It’s much more grassy and light. (Maybe it’s a poor quality, I don’t know.) The tartness is extreme – anti-hibiscusers beware! I added two Splenda packets to make this more drinkable. It’s decent, but again, I wouldn’t repurchase. That tartness is tough to beat. Perhaps if the raspberries were mixed with a sweeter fruit (kiwi? banana?) or just a big ol’ sugar crystal this would have more appeal.

One word for this one. Strange. It looks like a dehydrated backpack meal dry, steeped it looks like pink lemonade (odd tint for an oolong) and the taste is intensely…strange.

I steeped this in my french press, second steep looked like the waterpan from a Rainbow Vac but was more sedate than the first. I had trouble finding the oolong in this. I think maybe too many berries and things fighting for my attention. :(

It was drinkable, just a bit strange.

This is pretty to look at but very “herbal-ish” in taste. Nothing I would ever purchase again!

This was my second time trying this tea before reviewing. I can’t figure out what I’m doing wrong. 190/3 min. There’s so much fruit in it that I thought that I could add more tea to the water and come up with a better flavor. It’s so extremely tart that it’s undrinkable without copious amounts of sugar… which I almost never do, but I had no choice as we were running late this morning. I cannot taste the tea at all. It’s hidden behind a very tart fruit flavor that causes such a pucker that I can barely drink it. Once sweetened, it’s much more tolerable, but not very pleasant. I used 4.5 tsp/16 oz of water. The only nice thing I can say is that it looks beautiful when dry!

This tea was the greatest disappointment I’ve ever had with a tea. No matter how I tried brewing it, the fruit flavor just seemed diluted and instead there was just some light vegetal taste. Please, do not spend your time, energy, or money on trying this tea. It is not “yumberry” but more luck “noberry” or “blandberry.” Wow this tea made me grouchy today!