Flavoured Milk Oolong often gets a bad reputation for not being as “authentic” as their generally higher grade Jin Xuan counterparts. I have a soft spot for them, however; my very first oolong was David’s Quangzhou Milk Oolong and it opened a whole new world of tea awesomeness for me.
Side note: over the years, David’s Tea has been ambiguous on whether their Milk Oolong has flavouring or not but the website’s current ingredients list is “Chinese oolong, natural flavouring” so I’m going to take that as a yes.
The natural profile of a Jin Xuan can be quite striking and varying, but there’s a lot to be said about the comforting flavouring of these guys. Milk infested floral veggies lay dominion over both tongue and nose and stick around for about a week.
The main con for me is that the best steep is often the first steep, which is pretty much not the case for every other oolong under the sun. The milk flavouring here holds up incredibly well to multiple steeps, but not as well as a natural oolong. It’s also not as dynamic, but that’s the trade-off for flavour consistency.
Anyways, I love that I can pick up 100g of Teavivre’s flavoured Alishan offering for $10.90 USD (atm, 14.87 CAD). The Quangzhou rendition that David’s Tea carries goes for about $26 CAD for the same quantity.
Steep Count: 4
(2016 Harvest)
Flavors: Flowers, Milk, Vegetal
Agreed! I live for flavoured milk oolongs (when I am in the mood for them).