First roasted Ti Kuan Yin I’ve ever had, I was pretty excited to try this tea to see how it compares to regular TKY’s.
The tea gives off a toasty sweet aroma, reminds me a bit of roasted honey. The dry leaf is made up of big curled up balls with a mix of dark brown and greenish brown color.
I prepared this tea using a gaiwan and following the suggested brewing guidelines of 195F water and 2 min steep time.
The first infusion gave me a light yellow-brownish cup with a sweet toasty aroma. The tea itself was light and creamy, very sweet, with a lightly roasted honey-like flavor, and some floral undertones. In the second cup, the honey like fragrance and flavor remained pretty much the same, with little or no change. From the third cup onwards, each subsequent brew became less flavorful than the one before. I steeped this tea until the 5th cup, where I got a non-aromatic tea with just hints of flavor.
The wet leaf was a mix of broken and unbroken leaves with a lot of dust. A dark green-brown color was revealed after many infusions. The leaves were also stiffer compared to regular Ti Kuan Yin’s.
Overall, this is a great tea with a nice flavor and subtle aroma. Perfect for chilly days. I didn’t know what to expect from a traditional roasted Ti Kuan Yin since I had never had one before. Still, I enjoyed the flavorful cup this tea brews compared to the more complex subtle flavors of regular TKY. I still prefer the greener variations of this tea though.
