Yezi Tea

A classic. This tea never disappoints. It is everything that a Shui Xian should be. Complex, smooth, brisk, sweet… I wish I could say more… but, running on three hours of sleep is making writing notes hard. XP (Note to self: update this note)

I prepared this in a porcelain gaiwan and drank it from an antique European tea cup. :3

Brew photo/gif here:
http://tea-pet.tumblr.com/post/93914429548/east-meets-west

I’m starting the morning with a random pick from my Sil-box.
This is a gentle sweet & fruity cup, not particularly bold, but nice to savor in bed. It has a peachiness to it, a lively tongue tingle, & no astringency or bitterness. Thanks Sil

After testing multiple brewing methods with this tea I have found my favorite:

I average 5-6 steepings in my 8oz yixing teapot using 1 heaping tsp of leaves (aprox. 4g)

The sweet honeysuckle and orchid aroma builds upon each steeping and diminishes around the 5th.

The color of the brew starts off a very pale yellow and turns into a deeper yellow/green at the final infusion.

The taste starts off very floral and strong and smooths out and sweetens with each additional brew.

I generally add 15 seconds to each steeping which is more than enough to get a new and unique aroma and flavor each steeping.

I highly recommend this tea!

This is my favorite oolong and I am currently testing different brewing methods and thoroughly enjoyed today’s brew.

In a 10oz Teapot:

60 second rinse and discard

2:00 minute steep – lite yellow brew with a very floral aroma. Strong flavor with a slight floral taste and no bitterness.

2:30 minute steep – A darker yellow brew with a floral aroma but not as strong as the previous steeping. A much more robust flavor profile in this brew with a nice rounded flavor with a slight sweetness lingering on the tongue.

3:00 minute steep – same color as the previous brew with little floral aroma. This steeping was extremely smooth and buttery. A nice rounded flavor and a lingering sweetness that left me wanting more.

another 3:00 minute steep – almost identical to the previous brew.

I’m looking forward to trying this in my new yixing and am thinking of buying a gaiwan soon as I have heard it is the best method for brewing a TGY.

Being fairly new to loose leaf tea, I am still figuring out which teas I prefer.

I took advantage of Yezi Tea’s sample promotion and received this tea along with their Puchong oolong and their Dragonwell green teas.

I was blown away with the fullness and varying flavor profiles this TGY offers. So much so that I returned to Yezi Tea to make it a staple in my cupboard. Yezi Tea offers a great selection of fine quality teas, has phenomenal prices, offers three free samples with every order, and has very cheap and quick shipping.

I highly recommend Yezi Tea’s to any tea aficionados and newbies alike.

I will provide a more thorough review after I receive my order and have the opportunity to play around with my steeping methods.

A sample from Yezi! I wanted to try this one since it was compared to scotch, it had to be their strongest black tea and the furthest from the Laoshan Black flavor profile (sorry Laoshan!) But I have no idea, since I’m not familiar with scotch. I used two teapoons of these black, long and twisty leaves that smelled very sweet and like some fruit I couldn’t place, or maybe sweet potato.

Steep #1 // a few minutes after boiling // 2 min
The cup color isn’t very dark – light brown. The first sip is actually woody, but not in the way that steeped-too-much tea leaves are like. Otherwise it’s tough to describe – it’s a little of everything, hints of smoke and spice, a bit of chocolate and sweet potato.. but many other things I can’t place either. I felt like I had sipped this tea before, and looking up Tealux’s Ying De, I think it was that one. (A big thanks to Steepster for aiding the tea portion of my brain!) It both looks the same and if I can remember correctly, tastes the same. However, this blend is from the Fujian province of China while the Ying De is from Guangdong province of China. At least they are both from China. Though this one is Fujian, I do not get the charcoal flavor that I usually associate with Fujian teas.

Steep #2 // just boiled // 3 min
Very much the same as the first cup just deeper and more delicious. I think the instructions at the top of the description page for this tea are not for western brewing. (Also for the Ying De I thought the second steep was better as well.) I think I like this sort of flavor better than Laoshan Black. I can’t say how much it’s like scotch but I love this one!

On a side note, I feel like I’ve been watching a ton of movies I’ve missed through the years.. classics I should have watched (also for some reason many movies that seem to be Abed’s favorites from ‘Community’). I feel like movies are the biggest gap in my pop culture knowledge (compared to music, books, and TV). But anyway, I saw Aliens last night and it was AWESOME… not really sure why Abed would want to dress as the alien for Halloween though!

I’m trying to gradually work through some of my samples of puerh. In part because i know of SOMEONE who needs to try more, so i can split my samples in two haha! I’ve had this one before, and i found that this time around, i didn’t enjoy this one as much as the first time. While the first few steepings were light and enjoyable, over the last few that i had, there was an almost metallic taste that developed that i was not a fan of. I’d be willing to give this one another shot in a future yezi tea order though, as i generally have enjoyed most of their teas..esp since the first time, i really enjoyed it!

This was a sample that I picked from Yezi tea. Their samples are individually packaged and i love that their black teas are in red bags, while the puerh are in black. Nothing major, but i like it :)

I’ve been drinking it this morning and i’ll try to capture some notes since this is the first tasting note.

I did an initial rinse of this and then steeped for 30 seconds. The aroma was very subtle and didn’t give much hint as to what the brew would taste like. Initial sips found this to be very mellow and mild, but not lacking in taste. There was a fresh taste to this, while still feeling like a puerh. It felt like a tea that hadn’t quite aged as much as i’d prefer.

More to come later, but initial impressions are that I can see myself getting more of this in the future. It’s not quite as developed a puerh as the ones that i love from Mandala (still my favourite puerh vendor) but this is nice. I’d be curious to see how this ages.