Mi Lan Black Tea

Dry leaves smelled of plum, cocoa, honey, and the faintest hint of licorice.

For brewing parameters, I copied another Steepster’s gongfu method at 208F with a rinse and subsequent steeps at 6 seconds, 10 seconds, 16 seconds, and 20 seconds, for a total of 4 steeps.

The initial rinse had the smell of fresh pancakes drizzled with maple syrup wafting through my kitchen, and admittedly, I was slightly taken aback. While it was a lovely, if not nostalgic aroma, I worried for my tongue and its sensitivity to sweetness, but I’d end up being pleasantly surprised soon after.

If you are a fan of maple syrup and honey, this tea is a must-try. The first steep met me with a wave of dark honey and plum, along with that same aroma of maple syrup filling my nose with every sip. The aftertaste mimicked the aforementioned scent and left my mouth feeling coated, almost sticky. Suffice to say, this is a very syrupy tea, and those with a fondness for that particular viscosity will not find themselves disappointed. I’d go as far as to say the mouthfeel is the star attraction of this tea. Personally, I’m neutral on syrupy bodies, but I definitely found it enjoyable with the notes associated with this tea.

Further steeps didn’t offer much of a difference in body or taste, save for an expected lightening on the overall boldness of the tea that eventually gave way to a light but appreciated note of something vaguely floral and allowed me to taste some hints of cocoa that had been held back by the honey and maple a bit more clearly. The lack of change and complexity isn’t something I see as a negative, rather, I think it cements these leaves as being a great potential daily driver for those seeking a viscous, syrupy tea.

Overall, I’d recommend this tea and will enjoy finishing my remaining 20 grams, even if it isn’t quite my preferred cup.

Still working on sipping through this 25g packet. It looks like I have 2 cups to go after this one. Every cup I’ve had of this tea has tasted slightly different. This one if very sweet, syrupy honey with a bit more woodiness that previous cups.

Sipdown #5

I have been having a love affair with Verdant’s black teas lately and this one is another sad sipdown but December’s Verdant Tea Club was all black teas which made me quite happy.

This tea tastes like straight up honey . As the tea cools there are other hints of bread, cocoa, and floral but the major spotlight flavor is honey. Soooo good.

Spring 2018.

Hmm, this one was just above ‘meh’ for me. The flavor hardly bore any resemblance to the oolong tea that its derived from. Leaves smelled like cocoa and tobacco. The brewed tea was slightly earthy and tasted of yams and cocoa powder. Lighter and less malty than your typical black. I didn’t taste the floral honeyed notes they described nor any of the fruitiness of Mi Lan Dancong.

Yum yum yum. Another tea I do remember, because it was honey sweet and delicious, and I resteeped it like 3 times. Really tasty; a black I’d keep stocked in my cupboard because it’s a nice change from LB and PTA.

Last night I decided that I needed to break up my ongoing oolong and green tea binge with something more fully oxidized, and in the the interest of trying something new, I settled on this Dancong black tea from Huang Rui Guang. Since I have only recently started to open up to Dancongs, Dancong black teas were totally unfamiliar to me prior to trying this tea. I figured this one would be enjoyable as I am a fan of Mi Lan Xiang oolongs. Fortunately, I was right.

I prepared this tea gongfu style. Verdant Tea recommends using 10 grams of tea leaves per 6 fluid ounces of water, but I only had 5 grams to play with which to play. After a brief rinse, I steeped my 5 gram sample in 4 ounces of 208 F water for 6 seconds. This infusion was chased by 15 subsequent infusions. Steep times for these infusions were as follows: 8 seconds, 10 seconds, 13 seconds, 16 seconds, 20 seconds, 25 seconds, 30 seconds, 40 seconds, 50 seconds, 1 minute, 1 minute 15 seconds, 1 minute 30 seconds, 2 minutes, 3 minutes, and 5 minutes.

Prior to the rinse, I detected aromas of nectarine, lychee, orange, cedar, and orchid coming from the dry tea leaves. After the rinse, I found emerging aromas of honey, pear, and pine. The first real infusion then brought out a hint of cocoa on the nose. In the mouth, I detected notes of nectarine, lychee, orange, orchid, cedar, honey, pine, and pear backed by notes of cream, malt, cocoa, and plum. Subsequent infusions brought out stronger impressions of cream, malt, cocoa, and plum in the mouth. I also found new impressions of leather, earth, sweet potato, brown sugar, sandalwood, peach, and minerals. The later infusions offered lingering notes of malt, cream, cocoa, and minerals with some lingering hints of honey and stone fruit sweetness on the swallow.

This was an enjoyable black tea that made me curious to try some other Dancong black teas. I especially appreciated the fact that the core characteristics of the Mi Lan Xiang cultivar were not lost in this tea. Though I could and would drink this tea regularly with no complaints, I usually prefer stronger, slightly more astringent black teas as they tend to leave more of an impression on me. Still, as an introduction to Dancong black teas, this was extremely nice.

I couldn’t find any definite info on this tea from Verdant’s website; I want to say it’s the same as their “Mi Lan Black” offering but I’m going to stick with the exact labels used on my packet for the sake of filing. My tea doesn’t quite look like those long big twirled leaves either, although the dry leaf was a kind of twine strip.

The flavour profile is practically on par with their Mi Lan page description; dark, rich honey, spicy sandalwood, charred sweet potato, etc. This first steeping has a comfortable note of bitter leather too. Citrus notes come out in subsequent steeps.

Anyways, this was a nice break after mostly drinking teas on the greener side of the spectrum. Like a nice scotch or whisky after a rainstorm of vodka. Or a blackberry after so many strawberries. I love silly comparisons.

Steep Count: 3

Sample provided by Verdant Tea. Thanks!