Yun Nan Dian Hong Black Tea

I had this for my morning cup. I did not have time to sit at home and sip. So I brewed a cup, poured it in a travel mug, grabbed my guitar and went out the door. This smells so cocoa and malt when it is brewing. I was so looking forward to it as I normally really enjoy this one. I was majorly disappointed to see how bad a travel mug sucks the life out of a cup of joy. I mean its not as bad as having it in a paper or styrofoam cup but sure isn’t the same as my ceramic mug. I did not realize what an important part of the flavor came from the sipping vessel used. I know a lot of you use travel mugs. Do you not notice the same thing? Maybe I am oversensitive, or maybe the convenience is just more important?

Today was my birthday!!! Which meant a self-assigned day of doing whatever I wanted. Well, for the most part. I would have really liked to sit around and chill a bit more, but I wound up going to a concert tonight and did other stuff and it was a bit busier than I’d intended.

But anywho. Had this for a morning cup, which was delicious. Then I made a resteep and put in the thermos to take on the drive to the concert… and then forgot it. Whoops. But that meant I still had it, all nice and warm and everything, for me when I got home to start watching my favorite movie. Shoulda left it in the thermos, that way it wouldn’t have cooled as I drink it oh so slowly. Ah well. Still delicious and masterful.

Also this may have been a sipdown? I’m not sure; I’ll have to tidy up my cupboard to see for sure.

P.S. After a month and a half of not getting any new teas (!!!), I used my coupon to place a Verdant order. So excited! … If only I’d not waited until after the Zhu Rong Yunnan was out of stock; that one has always intrigued me.

This tea is doing double duty – first tea in the new house and first review with the new system! I am using my phone but so far so good. The site is still super clunky on my phone but the font is actually legible now! I can’t use the slider bars though and I am at constant risk of losing my note. Hmmm.

Anyway, I served this tea for the beau and our first guest in the house and everyone liked it. It is very affordable, rich in taste with a natural honeyed sweetness and some cocoa notes. It resteeps well and is never bitter. Lovely!!

This arrived yesterday and was an impulse buy thanks to the awesome Teavivre Black Friday sale.

The leaves are dark brown with some golden tips and stem amongst them. They are small for the most part but are squiggly and thin. It has a rich cocoa and sweet wooden scent.

Using my new Gongfu teapot which holds 200ml with 7g of tea.

1 minute – Smoky, sweet, musky and wooden. A rich first steep with a wonderful dark and smoky base that carries on through to the after taste.

2 minutes – The smoke has carried through but this steep is sweeter than the previous steep. Also getting some fruit behind the smoke and wood, like mature prunes. The after taste has some cocoa.

3 minutes – It’s still smoky and smooth and the prune is thicker in this steep. So very wooden and mature.

It’s a nice smoky black tea and though it will never replace my beloved Yun Nan Dian Hong Golden Tips this is a nice alternative for when I want some variation. Very happy I got this tea, it’s certainly a welcome addition to my black tea collection.

Mustn’t forget the queue! I’m not very good at not forgetting the queue, am I?

Last time I placed an order with Teavivre, I got this as a sample. I actually have a couple of samples here from them that I haven’t tried yet, including a dragon pearl one that I was rather looking forward to at the time when I placed the order. Unfortunately the first time I tried it was about an hour or so before it became very clear to me indeed that I had acquired some sort of food poisoning. I remember it tasting lovely, but it is now linked with illness in a way that makes me unable to really face dragon pearl yet. It’ll come eventually, just… not right now. (Once after having had a food poisoning it took me almost half a year before I could eat beans again)

At least I can do the other samples now. I’ve been sort of avoiding them, because I didn’t really want to have anything to do with the dragon pearl one. I didn’t even want to look at it. I know logically that the tea could not have caused the food poisoning (I’m fairly certain that was some mayonnaise), but it was still the last thing I had before it really started, so… Sometimes the mind is just not very logical at all.

ANYWAY!

You did not come hear to read about an illness I had months ago. As I said, I got this one as a sample with my order, and I was a little in doubt about it at first. Yunnans can generally swing both ways for me. Sometimes it’s awesome, other times it just tastes like a cup full of wet hay. Sometimes the same batch of a tea can give both these result even in identical brewings. I have, however, found much more luck with dian hong than I have with the golden ones, so eventually I decided to chance it and give it a go. It’s just a sample anyway, so no harm done if it turns out to be another round of straw.

It smells a bit straw-like, but it’s not the dominant note. I can’t really pick up much in the way of pepper which is another thing I associate with Yunnan, but that’s mostly in the golden types. I’m also getting a bit of cocoa and something vaguely fruity. Berry-y. Generic fruit, really.

It does have a fairly characteristic Yunnan flavour, with the straw note, but again it’s not the dominant note. There’s also a fairly grainy note with a faint hint of dark cocoa to it, but the generic fruit-note remains only in the aroma.

It’s quite nice this, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to acquire more of it. I might get some if I were shopping anyway, but it would be unlikely to be the cause of an order.

I really like how this turned out after a 24hr cold steep. Normally when I brew this hot, it’s earthy and comforting. But this iced experiment felt very refreshing and light, with an almost citrus-sweet flavour.

6 tsp in a 1 liter iced tea jug, cold steeped over about 24 hours.

This one surprised me. It’s rich and malty. There was a hint of dry hay like I get with Bai Mu Dan. I did find it to be a tad bit smokey. The hay and smoke were totally unexpected but they did work rather well. If I couldn’t find some thing like tarantula tea I would probably pick this one. It’s totally different but it really has a lot of character.

Experience buying from Teavivre http://steepster.com/places/2857-teavivre-online—

Date of Purchase/Date of Steeping: Received in the fall of 2011 as a free sample (Thank you Angel!), steeped up March 2012.

Appearance and Aroma of dry leaf: Very aromatic, woodsy, earthy, and like other Yunnan read teas I’ve had; mostly small dark leaves, with a few golden colored ones here and there.

Brewing guidelines: Glass Bodum pot, leaf free to roam; stevia added; used my standard Chinese red tea steeping times and temperatures; I did five steepings.

Color and Aroma of tea liquor: light coppery color, smells very aromatic and like any other Yunnan red tea.

Flavor of tea liquor: Very sweet and malty; it had good flavor up through the third steeping, and even some mild flavor on the fifth (at boiling, 10 minutes).

Appearance and Aroma of wet leaf: evenly colored, brown, medium-to-high grade CTC type leaves; << no notes on the aroma >>

Value: This is where this tea stands out: it is a great value $6.90 / 100grams (3.5 OZ) which is less than $2/OZ!

Overall: I am surprised there are so many reviews on the higher quality Yunnans from Teavivre but not on this one. Granted, Yunnans are one of my favorite black/red teas, still, I really liked the flavor of this one; I did not know this was a Yunnan until after tasting it, as ‘Yunnan’ was not in the name, and the leaves were darker that the other Yunnans I have seen (oh, how funny … I just looked at the first part of the name ‘Yun Nan’ humm Now I see it … Yeah, I’m an ‘airheard’!). I highly recommend this tea for those that love Yunnans and are looking for a very affordable everyday tea. I generally don’t include the value of the tea when I rate it (I typically rate it on merit alone), but if I were rate it simply on value, I’d give it a 5/5!

Continuing on with Teavivre Black Tea today… Yunnan! It’s like we’re taking a tour of Chinese tea, ha!

I did order a sample of basically every black tea they had at the time (they’ve added two since). It’s great of them to offer samples so you can get a good sweeping view of their product line.

This is the Black Tea, the most economically priced yunnan black they have, at a little less than $2 an ounce. The flavor is bold and malty, with a hint of smokiness to it. Not a lapsang, and probably not as strong as the keemun I tried from Teavivre, but there’s definitely smokiness to it (which surprised me a bit).

Compared to the yunnan full leaf that Missy brewed next to this one, there are striking differences. This tea is bold and malty, where the full leaf is refined and mellow. It is definitely an interesting comparison.

We brewed these both a little on the strong side (7g for 16 oz). Made the flavor pop out good and strong for comparison ;)

Oh, the winner? Hrmm… hard to say. They’re just different.

So I requested samples of all three of the Yun Nan Dian Hong and unintentionally started with the most affordable. As such I won’t give this a numerical rating until I’ve tried the full leaf and the golden tips, which hopefully will be today.

However initial observations are that while this is a very good value and has decent leaf, it is not well suited to short steep times, which is fine as I am looking for a Yunnan for my husband who prefers western brewing anyway and I will prepare it for him in that matter. At the moment I am just trying to educate myself on this variety, I’m very curious how my taste buds will react to more tea buds.

This third steep at around a minute is really quite delicious and has much more flavor that the two previous at 15 and 30 secs. I unfortunately have a sore throat today, but this is quite soothing. This is the sweetest of the infusions and it also has some initial spice that smooths out later in the cup. Thank you Angel and Teavivre, I will add more are I do a side by side brewing this weekend with the husband.