Taiwan Wenshan Black Tea

Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone is safe. Alistair, I hope you and your family are doing safe under the UK’s new lockdown!

My notes today are going to brief. I won’t go into depth into all of them, but I will wax poetic about the things that strike me. I’m still getting to know this one, but here it goes: this is a very solid tea. I wish I tried it before the Shan Lin Xi and Li Shan Blacks, but those are incredible to say the least.

Like the notes say, it’s more of a honey black tea. It’s clearly black tea, and it kinda reminded me of some Assams in its berry hints. It’s on the sweeter end, but mediumly malty and definitely floral. It’s a little brisker than I expected, like Assams and Ceylons, but it’s a hair more sophisticated than those in its floral-malt-tea combo. Gong fu has yielded more nuance in the berry notes so far than Western-Western makes it taste a lot like its Assam or Yu Chi counterparts. I usually got 4 rounded cups Gong Fu and 3 Western, and it got fruiter and more aromatic in the later steeps, but it was malty, woodsy, and floral in steep one. The later steeps have not changed that much.

I think I’m missing something about this tea. So far, it’s really just tasted like other Taiwanese blacks, but I’m a spoiled brat for what I get and chose. I could taste some of its oolong origins in its texture, but it reminded me of a Taiwanese Assam or a Ceylon. This one was a very tea tasting tea. I’m glad that I tried it, yet I’m going to hold off on the rating. I’m being too picky right now.