Yu Lu Yan Cha Black

A fragrance of honeyed pineapple. The taste is a lovely buttery chocolate with slight honey or pear back notes. No astringency or acidity. Really a magnificent tea.

SO this was pretty good!
I like the complex flavors i was getting, loved the other tea more that i had of verdants so maybe thats why i’m not 100% floored. but this is really good though i did not really get any astringency and i do like a touch of it as its a sign of a good tea i hear.

The second steep was not nearly as good and i had to add some other things to perk it back up. Overall a very nice tea!

I received this as a sample from my last order from Verdant. They give a surprisingly large sample. It looks like at least 3 sessions worth of tea for the size of my gaiwan. I gave this a second long rinse and it really brews dark fast. The first steep was 3 seconds. The leaves and tea smell sweet and similar to a Yunnan black. It doesn’t have any smokiness, but has a slightly malty starchy flavor. Similar flavor to Laoshan Black, but less chocolaty and a sharper flavor. The flavor is really hard to pin down. It’s a very dry flavor, tasty in its own right, but very hard to pin down. The flavor doesn’t change too much during steepings, but it’s strength remains. It is also a very filling tea.

Just finished up my last bit of this. Certainly one I want to restock! I love this roasted tea. Looking at my previous note, it’s apparently grown on me! I didn’t like it as much at first.

Almost every (quality) black tea I’ve tried has a sort of chewy richness to it that can in many cases be a little too much for me: Sometimes when I get to the 5th or 6th steeping my stomach feels like I just ate one too many bites of a super-rich dessert.
This tea is different—I don’t get any of that stop-you’ve-had-too-much feeling. There’s that refreshing, almost cooling feeling you get with some oolongs with the depth of flavor you expect from a good black tea.
This tea was the solution to a problem I didn’t know I had. It’s different and interesting enough for me to recommend to anyone.

Sipdown (211)

Y is for…Yu Lu Yan Cha

Thank you Sil!! Turns out I have 3 “Y” teas. All are straight black teas. 2 were gifted to me from Sil and this is one of those two.

I keep forgetting about this tea and tea note. I feel that’s not the best sign for this tea. It’s good. Got a lot of cinnamon notes. Honey as well. It’s just not capturing my attention much apparently. If I were someone who drank a cup of black tea daily to get a caffeine fix in, this would be alright for that because its got just enough flavor to be delightful without being something you would get bored with. However, I drink tea for the flavor and this just isn’t standing out. Still fun to try though so thank you again Sil!

I’ve had a couple cups of this throughout the week, and it’s just so tasty and easy to drink.
It’s pretty unfussy and doesn’t get bitter easily. I’ve enjoyed it with while eating some salted caramel bark and it was a delicious pairing.
It’s very honey forward, with notes of chocolate, stone fruits, and a tiny bit of cassia.

Just from the dry aroma it has a very milk chocolate flavour to it. Probably a less harsh cousin of the laoshan black, lets see.

The aroma of the wash smells strikingly like laoshan black. Chocolate, Cocoa, wood, malt, and a bit mineral to it too.

But we’re here for the flavour, no?

First steep, this tastes nearly identical to verdant’s laoshan black, just not as bitter. Steep was around 7s. Definitely predominant cocoa, toasted, wood, and malty notes. I would say there’s a faint honeysuckle as well. Overall very similar to laoshan black.

Second steep was done a little longer (13s). With a longer steep, I can confidently say that this tea is practically identical to Laoshan black, just has a lighter taste in comparison (expanding: less chocolate, roast, and malt flavour). If you ever had a laoshan black and steeped it several times, you’ll notice how the flavour tends to wane a little bit near the end with a bit of bitterness becoming more present. This is how this tea tastes on its second steep.

Third steep tasted as if the tea exhausted its flavour. A little bit of the chocolate notes remain, with the maltness present too. Bitterness exists as well, but that can be attributed to steeping it for a longer period. Granted there was like 30 minutes between steep 2 and 3 (dinner), but the tea was left to dry without getting steamed.

This tea started strong but ended weak rather fast. It tastes like a lesser cousin of both the laoshan black and laoshan roasted oolong. Overall not impressed. If the flavour was unique, I would rate it highly, but it’s completely dwarfed by laoshan black and roasted oolong. I’d have to put this on my very low rating list. Barely survived 2 steeps and overall mediocre.

I nominate this tea as my favorite black from Verdant I have tried so far, and I wish I got more than two samples of it.

I tried it western and a sloppy gong fu rendition of it French Press style. What I loved about it: the lack of astringency, the immensely sweet floral chocolatey notes, the cocoa and sweat potato background, and just enough dry texture to contrast with the growing honey notes and mild citrus that come to the foreground. It got lighter, but again, the brew got naturally sweeter. The first few steeps had the most cocoa, but it blends with the rest of the notes. And I could press this seven good times western to serve 4 grams in 10 oz of giant mug goodness.

So I was unabashedly biased towards this one because it is a medium black that blends all the right elements to a cocoa honey finish in notes. This is a smooth enough tea to introduce some newbs with a little bit of sugar perhaps, but it is good enough for lighter hong cha lovers…albeit it was more light to medium for my palette. The price is actually not bad either, but it is not cheap. I’d be interested to see what I can blend with it, but overall, it was my favorite of Verdant’s teas because it combines the elements of black tea just the way I like them. I have no idea if any of this was useful for you to read. Oh well, try a small sample for yourself.

For the first steeping I smelled sweet, chocolate and floral. The color was an orangey red. For the taste I got the taste of autumn and some bitter and sweetness.