Daylon R Thomas Send Message

There are so many copies of this on Steepster Evol. Anyway, I actually quite enjoyed this tea. It was a western brew beginning at three minutes that yielded four nice cups.

The first one was a fatty, creamy flower butter melting in my cup with a strong buttery vegtal back ground and a sweet foreground. There was some coconut lingering here and there, but overall, a thick condensed milk was had. The second cup was much the same, but sweeter with a little bit more of the coconut I described. The third continued the same character along with a stronger floral edge. The fourth, and the final cup was much the same of everything in lighter, yet continually full bodied form.

Drinking a milk oolong near midnight is mad, but I’ve been mad for a good one. After the HUGE disappointment with Oollo’s, I figured a flavored one was well deserved. The milk flavor is very strong in this which is why I really enjoyed it, but I can see how the weird condensed fatty milk with the buttery green body could disgust some people. Yet I was looking for some thick creamy oolong, and this is what this was. Examining the price was the other main impetus because I’m on the search for the best tasting oolong for the best price of daily drinking. This might fit that criteria, and there’s a few other teas that Zen offers like the Coconut Oolong, a Baozhong, that looks promising. Nevertheless, I’m leaning towards What-Cha for some good results.

Good results came from this tea anyway. I’m impressed that a lot of the natural qualities like the floral notes were able to remain in the tea, which is one of the aspects I really enjoy about Milk Oolongs. Luckily, I have another sample of this. :) More experienced drinkers could be deterred because the liquor is so thick that is very much like a coconut oil lotion, but this is not a bad example of a Milk Oolong-just a potent one.

WOW. Officially one of the best fruit herbals I’ve had. It is naturally sweet, and quite enjoyable. Three cups total. Coconut is dominant, but the other fruit pieces are incredibly wonderful. I dig the apples, the carrots, the pineapples, and the pumpkin. Even as this brews, it brings different variants of the awesome ingredients. I’m totally biased to coconut, so if you love coconut, this is yours. And $7.34 for 100g? Deal.

Lighter steep, and more flavor was drawn out, but incredibly subtle flavor. Definitely needs a revisit.

I need to try this tea again. There was no smell dry leaf, and the wet leaf had a nice coconuty scent. The taste was bland. I could have oversteeped it, but all I got was a highly vegetal and flat Jin Xuan.

I’ve been looking forward to this one because I’ve always wanted to try a Cui Ruan Lishan. Here’s what I got so far.

I tried a rinse, and it was faint. Had to do the two full recommended minutes. This kind of deterred me. But the dry leaf earlier had the nice spicebush and floral peony smell, so I kept my hopes up.

Vegetal, green, and very floral. But oddly complex. At 200 F, it was more vegetal than anything else. Yet as it cooled down, the sweeter floral notes were much more noticeable and incredibly pleasant making the liquor creamier. The smell actually reminded me of cooked marshmallows. More later…

Steep two, more floral, a little bit of sugar cane sweetness that was barely present until the tea cooled down.

More spicebush, vegetals, and florals later.

This was quite enjoyable and had some staying power western, but I was hoping for the tea to be one I could Gong Fu. it reminded me of a Tie Guan Yin in its florals, and tasted like a better Li Shan overall. My expectations of fruitier and sweeter notes left me a bit disappointed. The tea was good and complex enough to change with temperature, but not worth the price I paid. I have higher hopes for the others then.

I was going to be patient, but this little package begged to drink. One smell, and I recognized the high mountain peach scent of the dry leaf.

This was a high quality tea that you could Gong Fu or steep Western. The 15 sec rinse yielded a creamy mouthfeel that some might call floral. It was a little bit fruity, maybe something like coconut or peach, but was silky smooth and lubricating. Four more cups later, which will soon be five (that turned to six), and I got a lovely array of flavors. I went from 30 seconds to “over steeping” it quick. The over steep yielded something like the Misty Mountain, and I can only guess that this was a Qin Xin varietal since it has the creamy peach note.

In summary: a lovely high mountain oolong with a great mouth feel, and all the usually awesome dimensions of its varietal. The fruitiness and florals were more subsided than I’ve had in others, but the lilac was incredibly present in the aroma. Mouthfeel dominates with a very light fruity sweetness. I’ve had sweeter ones before, but again, it really doesn’t matter because of the mouthfeel. I would probably use this as an introduction to high mountain oolongs for a newb since it’s so flexible to brew. Not too sure about the price. I am sure of the joy of sampling this, and how awesome Evol Ving Ness is!

Interesting. I decided to Gong Fu this whole sample too since the scent was faint in the bag. I could maybe tell it was a Jin Xuan with ginseng even without the “milk scent” indicating that possibility. Or it could be a Tie Guan Yin with the creamy florals. It’s on the greener side anyway, but still earthy.

The first steep had an interesting taste and smell. Some floral lilacs with a powerful sweet and earthy ginseing, and some creamy hints. The liqour itself was definitely a green milky oolong with the ginseng slowly opening up into a fruity character. The combined profile was like a hot liquid version of a Pina Colada Jamba Juice-but with stronger hints of other tropical fruit. I could be over describing the sweet ginseng-but something like papaya, mango-or barely pineapple.

The next few cups were a swish back and forth from spinach, minerals, to the florals, and the tropicals. A part of me wonders if I was less impulsive and brewed this western with less leaves: that is, if I would have gotten a more subtle tea. I probably would have gotten the same thing, or so I think as I sip.

Glad that this was a sample because I’m not a huge fan of ginseng oolongs. This, however, made me rethink the dimensions that ginseng can yield with a greener oolong. I’m pretty impressed with the topical fruit character that this tea was able to yield, and am glad to have had it. Thank you Evol Ving Ness!

Wow…Evol Ving Ness, I will be covered for a while. Thank you so much!!!

So I had to tag along the club and try this. The smell is great. Being impatient, I gong fu’d this entire sample. The first steep was really lovely: vanilla and strong hazelnut in the first steep with a roasted caramel oolong body. The second had more oolong and hazelnut. The oolong was definitely on the greener side but high on the roast. Farily vegetal. I wonder if this was a formosa-it was curled up like one.

The third cup is mostly nutty and vegetal losing out on some flavor. Anyway, “Pleasant” is the word to describe this tea. Not something I mind having every once in a while, but not something I’d reach for.

I gong fu’d the last of this sample into a very creamy Yunnan malt cup. The qi was in the first two steeps-15 sec and 30 sec. I also got a little bit of the allusive chocolate note that I constantly obsess over, and later got more hay, but very LIGHT hay. Five cups in total, the later two kinda weak. Overall, light, smooth, malty, and creamy. Really good, but the later cups could have been stronger for me. Maybe if I adjusted the temperature higher in the later steeps I would have gained better results. I normally do anyway.

I would not mind having this again, but I would not reach out to get it only because I’ve had some Yunnan’s I prefer…and oolongs are my world and oolongs typically=$$$. I may, however, say hi to this sweet in the future.

Finished off the last of this sample this morning as my morning tea. Glad I did because the clear qi aided my productivity. I really enjoyed it, especially the fresh quality, the smooth texture, and the headache clearing potential it has, but I’m glad I got a sample because I probably would not enjoy it enough for $10 per half ounce.