Phoenix Village Light Roast Shui Xian Oolong Autumn 2014

I am enjoying this tea this afternoon. It came as one of my selections with the YS dark tea club selection.

Probably not one I would have ordered myself, but it’s interesting the lighter roast means the tea color brews up pretty light and it has that lovely, mineraly flavor. Some floral with a bit of a bittersweet note in the finish. I think I’ll need to try steeping this Western style instead of the gong fu method I did this afternoon. It is nice but I’m not getting a ton of flavor from it.

The leaves are light and crisp to the touch which consist of dark brown and red colours with hints of green. They smell toasty and subtly creamy with floral and sweet wood tones.

Steeping Method: Gaiwan 100ml
Water: 100C
Tea: 7g
Rinse for 5 seconds.

First Steep
30 seconds
The liquid is yellow with a subtle toasted scent. Flavour is more complex than the scent, it’s buttery with a soft toasted base and a sweet floral after taste that lingers. Slightly bitter though it quickly smooths out.

Second Steep
40 seconds
Softer and highly buttery with an increase of floral flavours, such as lily, orchid and sweetpea. Also toasted hay elements. Some dryness in the after taste.

Third Steep
1 minutes
A wonderful balance, the flowers are now in front of a soft butter and toasted after taste which leaves my mouth perfumed.

Fourth Steep
1 minute 30 seconds
Lower levels of butter and a touch of bitterness but the flowers still blossom in this steep.

Fifth Steep
2 minutes
Very light, all that remains are subtle flowers and a dry after taste.

This was a delightful Oolong, filled with buttery floral notes and lightly toasted. The flowers eventually became perfumed and dry but remained acceptable.

2/10/2015 tea of the day while daying some tea/12oz mug/ boilingish water.

For my 100th tasting note, I have gone ultra informal. I threw about two decent pinches of this tea into the bottom of my favorite mug, and poured boiling or just boiled or about to boil water on it throughout the day while I did all my various things. Two nice strong brews, the third more mellow, not bitter but a nice astringency showing up in later steeps.

It was delicious. A very filling mouth feel and rich malty minerally toasted flavours were the perfect drink for a long cold winter day, and strong enough to stand up to salt cod cakes for dinner. I put most of my teas through this treatment, and very few stand up to it and show off their good side – this is one of them. Such teas almost invariable show beautifully in more careful brews.