Hoku

I don’t think I’ve ever noticed how much weird stuff is in this sachet. Not only the green oolong balls and some flower petals, but chunks of dried pineapple, a ton of little silver dragees, pink peppercorns, and some bizarre spiky light blue candy thing (?).

I accidentally steeped this a little longer than I normally would but it seems to have suffered no ill effects. Lupicia’s flavored oolongs seem to be remarkably robust to differences in steep time and temp. This certainly makes them good traveling teas! I know I can take this oolong sachet with me and not have to worry about fussing with water temps or things like that.

I tend to like Lupicia’s flavored green oolongs and this one is no exception. It’s like their pineapple oolong, but instead of pineapple and coconut it’s pineapple and guava. So it makes a fruitier and more refreshing cup rather than the creaminess that the coconut brings. Also I love guava so it’s extra awesome. I would love to have enough of this to try cold steeping it as well because I bet it would be outstanding. Maybe I’ll be able to pick some more up eventually!

TTB Tea #13:

Another tea that isn’t on the website. I’m glad it’s here though because the tiny and tightly scrunched oolong leaves could almost be mistaken for green unless inspected carefully.

1 bag (3.4g)/6oz water.

In addition to the leaves, I can see yellow strands of something I assume to be flower petals, pink pepper corns, and silver balls… odd. The aroma is very fruity with a hint of floral.

After 3 min. the liquor is a medium peachy golden color… the kind that is lovely in a tea cup, but ugly in 1970’s flooring lol.

The aroma is that of pineapple and peach… I’m assuming the “peach” is guava- I have no clue what guava smells or tastes like.

The flavor is exactly what you’d expect from the aroma. Fruity, but not overly sweet… kind of the difference between fresh pineapple and canned. This is fresh. You can almost taste the firm texture of the fresh pineapple. The fruityness is grounded by a smooth, light oolong base. Quite lovely!- and I don’t even especially like fruity teas… or fresh pineapple for that matter lol.

Holy Fruit Salad, Batman! Thats what this smells like, a fruit salad on a summers day. This is a sample of some Hawaii only tea that was brought back from a recent trip. Generally I like it. Its very interesting in the sachet, with little silver balls and whatnots. It tastes a bit like a fruit salad as well, which makes a good tea for a morning like today, where the temp is going to be way up high. A refreshing oolong.

Even 3 years later, this tea is still good. I picked this up from the Ala Moana store in Honolulu in 2011. It has a nice pineapple and guava taste at the end with a clean oolong taste up front. It is naturally sweet, but doesn’t have the complexity in flavor that most oolongs have.

oh dinosara even if i hate all the other teas in our swap…this one makes it worth it. I am loving this tropical taste. Lupicia does flavoured oolongs in such a way that i love them. the pineapple, guava delicious yummy taste to this is everything i wanted it to be. EVERYTHING.

Another Hawaiian flavored tea bag from Lupicia. At first when I opened the packet and took out the sachet, there looked like there wasn’t enough in there. Lo and behold… after steeping the bag was full, the leaves really plumped up and unfolded nicely. The tea has a light fruity scent both before and after steeping. The taste is mildly fruity too, it is nice in this tea I get the tea taste and its not over powered by fruit. It doesn’t need sugar to make it taste good but with sugar added, the fruitiness comes out more. When I looked at the dry bag, it looked like there was a couple konpeito candy pieces too so added sugar is not necessary.

I’ve been to Hawaii only twice, but after buying a small tiny tin of this the first time, I learned my lesson and bought 150g the second time around. This tea is just phenomenal. The quality of the oolong is out of this world. This is a very, very fresh tasting tea. It’s sweet but not too sweet. Fruity, but not like an herbal/tisane.
There are tiny little confeito candies in the tea, probably flavoured with juice, which really gives it that sweet flavour. This tea needs no extra sweetening, it’s really quite fabulous without any added sweetener. My friends who don’t even drink tea are always impressed by this one as well. I think it’s one of my favourite oolongs. Lupicia really knows how to do oolong well.

In the tin, Hoku is a tightly rolled green oolong with yellow flower petals, pineapple chunks, green sugar bits, pink peppercorns, and tiny silver balls that represent the stars that are Hoku’s namesake. The scent is pure tropical fruit, and the visual and the scent together are perfect for a Hawaiian tea.
This makes a medium yellow brew, with a lovely tropical fruit aroma. Unsweetened, the flavor is a medium oolong with a little fruit – most of the fruitiness is in the scent. Hoku practically begs for a little sweetener to accentuate the tropical fruit flavor. I think this would also be nice iced.

This tea is the best. It used to only be available in Hawaii, but now it’s on the website. The candied pineapple bits are what give it that awesome scent and flavor. I made 32oz. of this last week and brought it to work and people who aren’t normally tea drinkers said that it was amazing and asked how they could get their hands on more. LOVE. THIS. TEA.