Togo Send Message

In recent years, several Oolong productions from central Yunnan have emerged on the international market, often from Taiwanese cultivars, most commonly Qing Xin as is the case with this one.

It is a well-balanced tea, the mild roast brings out nice fruity sweetness and acidity to complement the perfumy, floral and relatively vegetal character. The aromas are fairly weak generally, and remind me of sweet perfume and grass flowers.

The taste also has a decent bitterness to it, as well as some nutty undertones. However, main flavours are in the neighborhood of plums, peach pits, acorn, dry grass, and nectar.

Where the tea really shines is the smooth metallic and powdery mouthfeel, and especially its pungent and lasting mineral aftertaste. The returning flavours include ones like fenugreek leaves, lychee, leafy vegetables (chard), and butter among others.

[Autumn 2017 harvest]

I am very happy about the developments of this tea over time. It is now even more oxidized and starts to resemble a black tea. However, beneath its undeniable sweetness, there hides a well-balanced character without an overbearing complexity that is common among high-end black teas. One other general observation to note is the longevity that is almost unparalleled for a tea at this price point. One can easily push the tea beyond 350ml/g, and this may improve even further with subsequent aging.

The aromas seem to be more pronounced than before. Before the rinse, there are notes of white peach, cherry wood, hot hay, and other floral ones. On the other hand, during the session I can detect hints of apple, peach blossoms and other flowers, shellfish, maple syrup, and sugarcane emerging from the gaiwan.

The taste profile is decidedly sweet and woody, with occasional dips into floral, fruity, and towards the second half also malty and bitter territories. The very end of the session is characterized by a smooth, creamy and mineral taste though. Additionally, flavours of nectar, sandalwood, apricot, winter honey, nougat, and tree bark that come up over the course of the session.

The aftertaste is slightly drying, warming and coupled with a throat tingling sensation. As I mentioned in earlier notes, it is quite a subtle aftertaste. Compared to the sensations from the liquor itself, I find it to have more of the dry grass and thistle notes, but overall it’s fairly similar just more floral.

Compared to the other aged tea I got from Tea Side, 1988 Yuen Neun, this loose pu-erh is much cheaper. It did, however, also leave a weaker impression on me and it yields about 25% less tea overall too.

Dry leaf aroma is reminiscent of nuts, old books and bamboo. After the rinse,a string earthy note of peat emerges, coupled with a cooling eucalyptus wood scent.

The taste is also somewhat peaty with notes of fresh soil, plant roots, old dry wood and pine early on. The third steep has an interesting sweet vegetal flavour that remains fairly isolated in the context of the whole session. In the middle, I can taste cola, dry earth, fermented grains, black beans and yeast. It is still very much an earthy tea with a kombucha-like acidity at times. Towards the end, there is more nuttiness, a bit like hazelnuts I’d say.

The aftertaste is nutty throughout though and a little bit drying too. There are additional notes of root vegetables, betel nut, black cherry, milk, dark chocolate, and licorice root to be found after swallowing.

Texture of the tea is somewhere between creamy and colloidal, and fairly thick at its peak. However, it is not quite what I would call a full bodied tea. The cha qi was nice and definitely noticeable, but not out of this world. I found it to be a calming and a little meditative tea, with an occasional spine tingling as well.

This tea hasn’t changed much since my last note. This time round, I don’t detect much smoke left though. I can also confirm that its energy is reliably aggressive and defocusing, on top of being a very warming tea that makes you sweat.

The dry leaf aroma is a bit more fruity now and there also seems to be more of honey and sugary sweetness appearing throughout the session.

Today, “Don’t Be Sad” is still very pungent and drying, but also not as grassy and a little bit more sweet, especially in late infusions.

The aroma reminds me of white grapes, tobacco, brazil nuts, mushrooms, and green bell peppers in equal measure. Flavour-wise, it’s not too different from a year ago. There is a tinge of metallic sour bite in the first couple of steeps, which also have a slightly musky, woody character. It gets quite bitter and smooth later on, with some vegetal bite and citrus zest note appearing too. Interestingly, the aftertaste has a distinctive warming feel to it.

Crimson Rooster seems to be aging into a well-rounded and elegant shou. Compared to my previous tastings, it was more fruity and sweet today.

Specifically, I could smell wild blueberries in the dry leaf, the taste has a notable raspberry flavour to it and there were also hints of cranberries, banana and papaya in the aftertaste. The sweetness is of the creamy kind and really takes hold of the session towards the end.

Besides those, I also found some other new associations. In the dry leaf scent – petrichor – and after the rinse also char, roasted red peppers, tomato vine, and peat. The taste was more medicinal than what I remember, displaying novel flavours of curry leaves and coriander. Finally, a very nice throat cooling sensation permeated the aftertaste throughout the session.

Jade Pillar is fascinating and immaculate, very much a white tea for young sheng drinkers, if there ever was one.

I am not sure what went wrong, but this is one of a very few of YS sourced teas that I find wholly underwhelming. It’s not bad per se, but at this price one would clearly expect something more than “not bad”. Unfortunately, I only got 10g, so I can’t experiment with it much.

The tea lacks the thick texture, flavour depth and huigan of Yi Wu sheng. It is a pretty grassy one overall, and a tea that might do well with more humid storage compared to other YS sheng. It is not too bitter, but there is a decent amount of abrasive astringency.

At four years since pressing, Rooster King is starting to develop a little bit of an aged aroma, the one I tend to describe as dungeon-like in the context of shou. However, I can also still detect all the scents from my past notes. Similarly, the taste is a bit more tangy and sour, but otherwise quite close to my earlier experiences.

This Dong Ding is the last tea left for me to write about from my Tea Joint order. It is pleasant and very refreshing, but didn’t leave a strong impression ultimately.

The dry leaf aroma is quite interesting with notes of nectarine pits and flowers, followed by milk chocolate and aperol in a preheated pot. During the session, I got a kind of Mediterranean vibe from it, a bit like rosemary flowers.

The taste is sweet and vegetal, displaying flavours of linseed oil, lavender. In the mouth, I get a numbing sensation and the body is medium to light I’d say.