Sipdown! (114)
This was a sample from Stephanie, also known as “Lover of Dancongs”. I’ve been trying to get some more experience with these teas, so I requested this one in our recent swap. The leaves are beautiful – they’re very long and straight, and tightly twisted. Very dark in color. I asked Stephanie for her Western-style brewing parameters and I ended up doing 190 degree for 5 minutes.
Brewed aroma is very strongly apricot. And it’s a rather tart-smelling apricot! Yum. There’s also the ubiquitous roastiness and a bit of floral. Whoa, the taste! Very strong due to the long steep, and the stonefruit flavor is very strong and lovely. There’s also a darker dried fruit flavor, maybe prune or raisin. It’s roasty and there’s a bit of autumn leaf, but it’s in the background which is unusual in my experience. My only issue with this tea is that the floral element is fairly strong, and it almost borders on being soapy near the end. And that kind of prevents me from wanting to drink this again. Curse you, floral! Not rating because of the bias, lul. :D
Flavors: Apricot, Autumn Leaf Pile, Dried Fruit, Floral, Honey, Roasted
I love that stone fruity aspect of it :)