Vietnam Gui Fei Oolong Tea

Free sample from What Cha. Yay.

I didn’t take any notes that day. I did something I normally do not do, and I didn’t weigh it. I just put the whole sample in the gaiwan. I had it a few days ago… But I wanted to make a quick note. I really enjoyed this tea, and as Daylon mentioned in his note, it lasted a long time. I literally drank it all day, and it never stopped giving out the flavor. I’ll have to get more and give it the full gaiwan treatment (timing, temperature… Etc.) to be able to get a good flavor profile next time. It is complex.

It was citrusy, slightly floral, honey-sweet, and lots of stonefruit notes throughout the day. No matter how long I steeped it, it never got bitter and that is a plus. Overall, I am really a fan of their Vietnamese oolongs.

This tea came as a sample from Alistair in my last order. I must admit this tea surprised me with the floral notes. It’ll probably be in my next order!

It’s funny because this review starts off by saying something along the lines of “I may have gone a bit overboard when ordering teas this past Black Friday”. Except, this past Black Friday I ordered no teas. The Black Friday in question is from 2017. I wrote the review in April 2018. Sometimes Sororitea Sisters takes forever to post reviews and then you get weird discrepancies like this one.

Anyways, I quite enjoyed this tea. It is somehow light and rich at the same time and dessert-y without being a dessert-inspired blend. I really should drink this more often.

Check out my full review here: http://sororiteasisters.com/2019/01/07/vietnam-gui-fei-oolong-from-what-cha/

The most interesting aspect of this Gui Fei is definitely its smell. It is very invigorating, sweet and fruity. I could identify hintsof honey, peach, apricot, cloves, nectarine, faint nutmeg and rosemary. Not too dissimilar from a second flush Darjeeling actually. The texture of the liquor is somewhat thin, a little milky and not too exciting. It becomes a bit better in later steeps though. Taste is quite sweet, with notes of fermented nectarines and lemon skin. The aftertaste is fairly sour and a little drying.

I liked this one a lot. I was able to get eight cups and I did not want it to end a lot. It was super sweet and citrusy with a creamy texture and floral background. More will come on this one.

Sil sweetly divided this sample which Alistair was kind enough to include in our somewhat recent group order.

This will be my very first time trying a Gui Fei oolong, I think, so I will not rhapsodize much or compare it with others. I have also not done any research into this type of tea, so I step into this review in full ignorance and with little experience.

I will say though that I am enjoying this very much.

The leaves as they unfurl are small, perhaps the length of a dime, and lovely, hazelnut brown and many with intense green centres with mostly browned edges.

The flavour seems oddly familiar, in ways that are difficult for me to describe, and fresh.
The best that I can come up with at the moment is a honeyed butter milk oolong. And I am getting a faint hint of citrus here too.

Beautiful oolong. I will be enjoying the rest of this sample.

Seriously, it is teas like this that make me wonder why I don’t drink oolongs more often than I do.

Thank you, Alistair. And Sil.

edit—I just read the tea descriptor on the site and shockingly, or perhaps just surprisingly, my tastebuds picked up on most of the flavours present in my cup, including the Jin Xuan cultivar which I tuned into through the milk oolong flavours I was detecting. Perhaps all this tea drinking is paying off. :)
I would have thought that my tea doctoring lately has been killing my tastebuds.
Still a long long long way to go before I can confidently rhapsodize, but sharing my joy, nonetheless.

I got this free with my Black Friday order. I can’t believe I just had this hidden away. That happens to a lot of us tea addicts! I’m blown away by how tasty this was! I am on 5th rebrew. It just keeps producing tastiness. It’s not too dark and oxidized. I actually prefer this over the milk oolong. I followed eastkyteaguy’s gong fu brewing timing. It was perfection!

I am really loving What-cha’s Vietnamese tea offerings.

Free same in our group what-cha order. I tried this one today so i can divy up the rest of it for VariaTEA and Evolvingness. On the whole, not one i’d order for myself, though i generally like roastier oolongs. Had a cup of this while i tried to make wonton soup from scratch! haha. All in all, a decent cup but nothing to knock my socks off. IE. glad i tried it but that’s enough for me.

Wow, interesting coldbrew.

1 tsp leaf, 500 mL cold water. This doesn’t steep well cold. It was very light and the pearls didn’t open up very well. I think a longer steep (306 hours) would produce a much more flavourful brew.

My immediate thought was raisins and brown sugar. Molasses, lighted roasted, fruity (apricot and navel orange), sweet. Normally when I get molasses and roasty flavours I expect the slight bitterness associated with burnt sugar or buckwheat, but this tea has no bitterness.

The weather has turned colder here, so my sinuses are acting up yet again. To make matters worse, my senses of smell and taste are once again spotty. I’m still not back at full strength from the severe respiratory infection I’ve been fighting off for the past couple of weeks either. Since I can’t properly evaluate them right now, all of those lovely green teas and high mountain oolongs will have to wait. Fortunately I can still get something resembling the full effect from bug-bitten and/or more heavily roasted oolongs such as this one.

I prepared this tea gongfu style. After a quick rinse, I steeped 6 grams of loose tea leaves in 4 ounces of 195 F water for 10 seconds. I followed this infusion up with 12 subsequent infusions. Steep times for these infusions were as follows: 12 seconds, 15 seconds, 20 seconds, 25 seconds, 30 seconds, 40 seconds, 50 seconds, 1 minute, 1 minute 15 seconds, 1 minute 30 seconds, 2 minutes, and 3 minutes.

Prior to the rinse, the dry tea leaves emitted aromas of honey, nectarine, and wood. After the rinse, the honey, nectarine, and wood aromas intensified and were joined by scents of osmanthus, toast, and roasted almond. The first infusion produced a similar, though more balanced bouquet. I was able to detect thin notes of wood, roasted almond, toast, osmanthus, nectarine, apricot, and honey in the mouth. Subsequent infusions featured more prominent impressions of honey, toast, roasted almond, apricot, osmanthus, and nectarine balanced by emerging lemon, orange, and rose aromas and flavors. Subtle traces of herbs and minerals were also detectable on the finish. Later infusions were quick to wash out, though I could still detect subtle herb, honey, toast, wood, citrus, and rose notes beneath the mineral presence.

To be clear, this was far from a bad tea, but I could not help comparing it unfavorably to the last couple of Taiwanese Gui Fei oolongs I have tried. The main problem I have with this tea is that it was too similar to a typical Taiwanese Gui Fei for me to consider it unique, yet it displayed just enough subtle differences for one to deduce that it was not a Taiwanese tea. I’m probably being a bit harsh here because this was far from a bad tea, but it was hard for me to figure out how to take it. I couldn’t quite compare it directly to classic Taiwanese takes on the style, yet could not quite treat it as a unique twist on the style either. Overall, I liked the citrus and rose notes, as well as the pronounced bready, nutty, and honeyed characteristics, yet I would also probably not reach for this over a Taiwanese Gui Fei if that makes any sense.