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“LiShan Special Reserve 2014 Origin: LiShan, Central Taiwan Harvest: Spring Elevation: 2000-2400m Dry Leaves: The leaves are absolutely beautiful, while mostly green, there is tons of blues in...” Read full tasting note
Along with its counterpart, the ShanLinXi reserve, this tea is a premium selection GaoShanCha. Probably the most renowned area for producing the best teas right now in Taiwan in LiShan Mountain. This tea is grown around 7,000 ft. up! It grows slower than its relatives at lower elevations and takes its time gathering everything it needs to produce a quality tea. There are only two harvests per year of this tea. It’s heavier bodied like the ShanLinXi Special Reserve. Very smooth and drinkable. This is an outstanding tea! Take your time and explore this tea and you might get such notes as oatmeal. You can brew this tea in a Gaiwan is you like but we suggest you take your time and brew it gongfu style. It’s worth it. Like our other teas, this tea is expertly grown, hand-picked, hand-processed and FRESH!
Location: LiShan Mountain, Central Taiwan.
Chinese name: 梨山特選高山茶/LiShan TeXuan Gao Shan Cha
LiShan Special Reserve 2014
Origin: LiShan, Central Taiwan
Harvest: Spring
Elevation: 2000-2400m
Dry Leaves: The leaves are absolutely beautiful, while mostly green, there is tons of blues in there, as well as stems. I could tell instantly this was going to be a beautiful Taiwanese tea. There was a slight scent, but I had trouble describing it, my best description was oolong-y
Temperature: Boiling (then 190oF)
Brewing Time: One Minute
Aroma: Floral
Flavor: Lilac, Mineral and Cherry
Tasting Notes: This was surprisingly thin, not that I am disappointed, but I was expecting a thicker mouthfeel for a tea grown at such a high elevation. Regardless this was quite nice, it was pleasantly floral and it had some nice cherry notes that I don’t often see in oolongs, especially Taiwanese oolongs. The liquor was rather attractive, I used my favorite chawan and it almost looked like it had specs of gold in it, which I found was a nice contrast to the brown and white of the chawan, although I have made this tea in other cups and it doesn’t have that same effect.
If BTT still had any stock of this I could easily see myself buying again, I don’t remember it being that expensive, I think it was a little less than $10 an ounce. This used to be my favorite High Mountain Oolong from Beautiful Taiwan Tea, but then I tried the Misty Mountain and some of their newer teas causing me to rethink this, although I suppose the question is do I prefer this LiShan over the Winter LiShan. Unlike the Misty Mountain, this is hardly a daily drinker and compared to the Winter LiShan its leaves took much longer to unfurl. I got twelve infusions out of this tea.
[More at: http://rah-tea.blogspot.com/2015/01/beautiful-taiwan-tea-2014-lishan.html)
