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“This is one of four teas I ordered from Yuuki-Cha. This tea vendor first caught my attention when I was looking around to see who was selling Japanese black tea. Currently there are 4 of those on...” Read full tasting note
“DRY LEAF Aroma: Dried apricots. Cocoa. INFUSION Appearance: Translucent mahogany red. Mouthfeel: Full with a very mild, pleasant astringency. Aroma: Stewed fruit. Oranges, cinnamon, and...” Read full tasting note
From the summer harvest, a limited oolong-black tea from Gokase Town in Miyazaki, which is made from the seemingly versatile Sakimidori varietal.
The combination of summer harvest leaves and a longer oxidization time than your typical oolong tea really helps to develop the wonderful fragrances of this unique tea. The whole leaves when brewed offer really sweet, rounded, succulent flavors in the mouth and a perfectly smooth finish with basically no astringency at all. Perhaps the nicest of all the oolong-blacks we were lucky enough to sample from the 2011 harvest and one we are very happy to offer!
About Oolong-blacks:
Oolong-Blacks, an innovation from a grower in Gokase Town, Miyazaki! Oxidized longer than your typical oolong tea, yet shorter than your typical black tea. Slightly different withering and firing techniques are also employ to create quite a unique category of Japanese tea! These are limited and still very much a new concept, so if you try them please let us know what you think!
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Organic Miyazaki Sencha "Sakimidori"
O-Cha.com2011 Organic Miyazaki Kamairicha Sakimidori
Yuuki-cha2017 Organic Miyazaki Kamairicha Sakimidori
Yuuki-chaOrganic Miyazaki Oolong-Black Tea Minami Sayaka
Yuuki-chaOrganic Miyazaki Oolong-Black Tea Kanayamidori
Yuuki-chaOrganic Miyazaki Kamairicha Sakimidori (Hand-picked)
Yuuki-chaThis is one of four teas I ordered from Yuuki-Cha. This tea vendor first caught my attention when I was looking around to see who was selling Japanese black tea. Currently there are 4 of those on their website and I bought 2. But what really compelled me to make a purchase (besides extra Christmas cash) were the addition of 2 “oolong-black” teas. And I’m trying one of those as my first to review and taste.
Drinking from the first steep the orange-red liquor has a really really soft feel in my mouth. Then I pick up on a pulpy/grainy texture and some sweetness. Very weird tea. Almost reminds me of Huiming Hong Cha from Camellia Sinensis. What always struck me as strange, was with each sip the tea body was so soft and not astringent at all. It’s like anti-astringent (I know.. not a real word, just work with me!). It’s a strange feeling you’d have to experience first hand.
I then steeped it a second time to see if it would change much. It’s still sweet, and has a pulpy/grainy feel. This time the liquor changes to a dark amber color (lighter than previous). It’s obviously weaker but has enough of the first steep’s characteristics to stay satisfying.
This wasn’t what I expected at all from this tea. To be honest I’m not sure what I expected but this wasn’t it. Not that it’s a bad thing, but this was an interesting tea experience for sure. I would certainly appreciate this tea more if it had a stronger body, but perhaps I’m just being picky. I’ll be sure to experiment with this one to see what flavours I can get out of it.
Anyway, I can see where the name oolong-black comes from now. It has the charm of both. However I think it would mostly appeal to people that enjoy black tea because it is very oxidized. Definitely worth a try if you are looking for something new and interesting.
About 120ml of water in a small glass teapot, 1 tsp (about 2-3g), 2 steeps (3min, 3:30min)
DRY LEAF
Aroma: Dried apricots. Cocoa.
INFUSION
Appearance: Translucent mahogany red.
Mouthfeel: Full with a very mild, pleasant astringency.
Aroma: Stewed fruit. Oranges, cinnamon, and allspice.
Taste: Mildly sweet. A very tiny bit of savoriness.
Not a bad tea by any stretch, but not very exciting either. Tastes remarkably similar to this year’s (2012) Charleston, South Carolina First Flush (which isn’t exactly a compliment, this year’s FF was pretty unbalanced) but with a little more complexity and sweetness. If you’re an insatiably curious black tea fanatic, it’s worth a try.
