Okay, revisiting this one today.
I get none of the same oily Chinese food smell from it now. Maybe it was just something from the packaging.
I’ve steeped this twice for four cups so far. I still get no apple notes at all. But I do get quite a bit of maltiness, no bitterness at all, and wow, do the leaves ever expand! There is a fair amount of stems in this, though maybe that is to be expected with these kinds of dark oolongs. And while I’m here, Mountain Tea Co. lists this in the Dark Oolong section of their site, but the description just says “black tea.” So I’m not really sure if this is an oolong or not. But I am liking it more than my first time around.
Photos of the steeped leaves:
http://s1165.beta.photobucket.com/user/dagony/library/Black%20Pearl%20by%20Mountain%20Tea%20Co
