Shan Lin Xi High Mountain Oolong

I got this from the January Steepster Select package, and it was definitely one of my favorites. I haven’t had a ton of experience with oolongs, but this one reminded me lot of a Taiwanese Pouchong I got from a tea room in Colorado – one of my favorite teas I’ve ever tried.

It has what I assume to be the characteristic flavor of a lighter oolong – very smooth and almost buttery. It takes extremely well to multiple steepings, so it can last you a while.

This is a light, airy tea. I can imagine that it would be a great tea for meditating, so that one would have time to puzzle out its subtle flavors. However, with a long day ahead of me and a slight cold, I was hoping for a strong tea to wake me up.

IM IN LOVE! This is perfection. One of the most complex teas I’ve tried. Flavors are plentiful and they pop into existence as the tea sits in your mouth. That said, the most predominant flavors to my tongue are papaya and cream. Even with so much complexity and flavor, there is NOTHING harsh about this tea. No bitterness or excessive flavor. Mild astringency develops starting at infusion 3. Yields ~10 infusions.

Drop brewed this beauty and I think the parameters were fine. Could potentially push the heat more in the middle infusions, but hard to believe this could get better :).

Mouthfeel is creamy and thick. Hui gan is strong and lasts many minutes. Hou yun is full and like rolling an “r.” Headiest oolong I’ve tried, and a cha qi that I enjoy. Relaxing, day-dreamy qi. Medium-high sweetness.

My first Shan Lin Xi (translates as Pine Forest Stream) and I’m thoroughly impressed. This batch comes from the Fanzaitan area specifically. I can’t claim to get any floral or pine notes as others have mentioned.

Do my eyes deceive me? Is this tea really so cheap? I’ll be buying this by the barrel. Thank you, Eco-cha, and I SO look forward to trying the other samples from your shop.

Harvest: Winter 2022
Origin: Fanzaitan, Shan Lin Xi (elevation 1400 m).
Cultivar: Unspecified, but usually Qing Xin.

Dry Leaf: Dried apricot, dried pineapple.
Wet Leaf: Apple pie.
Flavors: Cream, cucumber, broccoli, sugar, sweet, pineapple, coconut, sugar, papaya.

I think I got this one from a reddit swap or sale. I used 5g in a 100mL gaiwan with 200F water. The dry leaf, which was comprised of larger than average little nuggets, had a nice and creamy “green” aroma. Once rinsed, I smelled notes of sugarcane and popcorn.

The first steep was vegetal with a bit of sweetness – it actually reminded me a bit of broccoli. After that, I got about seven steeps of creamy, milky, floral, sometimes sugarcane flavors. The tea had a nice thick texture to it, matching with the milky flavor. It also had a bit of a throaty feeling for a couple of those steeps. Less regularly, I got nectarine aftertaste and an occasional cucumber note. I gave it three more steeps after that, but those ones were pretty flat and dead. This one wasn’t as crisp as some High Mountain oolongs I’ve had, but it was still quite nice.

Thankfully a friend sent some of this to me. ShanLinXi is my favorite type of oolong. All the feels. This one is a bit lighter in terms of thickness than some, it the size of the leaf and the feels are on point.

This is easily one that can sit in the cupboard for who cares how long or short and it will continue to brew nice. Quaility leaf with a smooth taste. Provides an enjoyable session with multiple infusions. I’ll need to try all of their SLX and see if one has the thickness and depth I want, even if this is solid… I’m getting more selective :)

Still one of my top favorites, and I am so happy I can taste it while sick. I don’t know if my mucus is doing this, but I’m getting a little bit more coconut in the savory body. The lovely confused yellow fruitiness between apples, pineapples, and “Asian Pears” remains.

Spring 2022.

This was a fantastic Shan Lin Xi teeming with succulent flowers and juicy tropical fruit. It starts off with an alphonso mango fruitiness before shifting to pina colada. After a couple more steeps, flowers and stonefruit emerge and the tea develops a thick, nectar-like mouthfeel. The flavor starts to drop off after the 5th yet still remaining smooth and having a pleasant light fruitiness with floral undertones and additional notes of citrus, bergamot, and pear.

This was a very enjoyable tea with many layers of complex flavors that evolved over steeps. Couldn’t rate this as a 100 however due to the intense but short lived flavor and lack of longevity.

Shan Lin Xi high mountain Oolong has light oxidation and roast. It contains of intact bud-and-leaf parts aswell as single intact leaves. The substantial brew starts off fragrant, incredibly sweet and smooth, somehow like apple pie. Later, it adds coconut notes and becomes more refreshing with a hint of basil in the aftertaste.

Thanks to curlygc for this one! This was my first tea of 2016! It is definitely one of the best oolongs that I have had. It’s florally like a TGY, but without the cacao notes, which is something that I like a lot more about this tea. It is also fruity—pineapple and coconut. 2015 (especially from Black Friday till now) was a year where I acquired lots of tea. I have a long way to go in my knowledge of tea and in developing my taste buds. Here’s to 2016 (raises cup of tea)!

Another lovely oolong from Eco-Cha! Thank you! These jade green bundles are larger than the milk oolong from the other day, so I went with two teaspoons for a mug. I think they brewed up wonderfully. This a unique oolong as I could swear it tastes like…. COCONUT. Buttery, creamy, coconut. The flavor is almost like the milk oolong, but that extra coconut element really stands out in all three steeps. At times, there are also hints of flowers (my favorite type of oolong flavor). As it cools, the third steep becomes very fruity, possibly like pineapple. Pineapple and coconut? Sounds like pina colada to me. All of the flavor notes here result in an amazingly tasty cup. The three steeps were very close in flavor. Again, it’s odd to me that an oolong doesn’t change more than it does here. With some oolongs, the third steep promises that the leaves could be steeped to result in many more delicious full mugs, and I don’t think this oolong was done at three steeps! I think I was close to being perfect with the steep parameters, but I like trying the same tea with different parameters, so we’ll see how 1 1/2 teaspoons works next time. But this was an extremely enjoyable oolong the way this was brewed! A lot of character and a little bit magic. Eco-cha.com has been impressing me!
Steep #1 // 2 teaspoons for a full mug// 15 minutes after boiling // 1 minute steep
Steep #2 // few minutes after boiling // 1 1/2 minute steep
Steep #3 // 7 minutes after boiling // 1 minute steep