Da Hong Pao (Big Red Robe) Wuyi Rock Oolong Tea Fujian

Dry leaves: sudden bright scent of passionfruit / mango.

1st infusion: (25s)
Leaves smell like a complex mixture including bitter chocolate and seaweed. Tea has that roasty, mineral flavour I associate with Fujian oolongs. Drinking this with toasted leftover dimsum now and it pairs alright with the oily sweetness, imparting chocolatey tones.

2nd infusion: (30s)
Liquor is still a beautiful reddish bronze. Flavour is mellowing out from the initial infusion’s harshness. This is growing on me.

3rd – 5th infusions:
More of the same goodness, the colour shows no sign of letting up while the flavour gradually lightens.

6th infusion: (120s)
The leaves are left with a fruity aroma like grape or plum. The liquor has finally turned a coppery amber colour, and tastes a very pleasing, mild flavour with the bitterness all gone––mineral and roasty with fruit aftertaste. Really like this infusion.

Mild smokey, good tea, smooth and sweet!

I received a sample of this tea from Angel at TeaVivre. Thank you!

This sample is about a year old. While the nugget was cooking it completely made me disinterested in drinking any tea, or hot drinks for that matter. So this one sat. I am so sad that it sat as long as it did, because it was so delicious. I spent the weekend at a friends house this weekend. Her and I took on our 5 kids all under the age of 3. It was intense, but we managed some down time to enjoy tea in the evenings. She is a oolong fan and so I brought this sample packet along to have her try. I want to sit with this one again this week to get a better feel for it, but it was remember able and made me want to buy copious amounts of this tea to make sure I never run out.

Salty, hay and mineral aroma from the brewed tea.

Savoury roasted flavour. Light matcha-like note. Medium mouth-feel.

This is the second Da Hong Pao I’ve had. I thought I’d order a sample in my last Teavivre order and see what they have to offer. Teavivre teas are usually good quality, and I wasn’t disappointed.

This tea is roasty, with a delicious sugarcane sweetness. Yum! It’s smooth, warming and cozy. I didn’t get much of a fruity note, like I did in the other Da Hong Pao I tried, but it was still nice, maybe just a little less complex.

Oh no, it’s happened :( :( I have found a tea sample from a lovely Steepster, and I have no clue who it’s from. Well, that’s slightly untrue – it’s probably from Sil, and might be via Raritea, but I’m not sure. That’s my best guess though, since I don’t think I’ve received any of this from Teavivre previously.

Anyhow! I need to brew up the second half of the sample more carefully, but YUM! What a delicious tea. I just love roasty oolongs so incredibly much, and this is a great example. Makes me want to grab all my Verdant ones and start brewing them up soon, too (that’s not a half-bad idea, actually. I’ve been craving straight tea recently, more than flavoured.) Can’t write much detail here, other than this was amazingly delicious and I want more :D I’m sure the resteep was good too, though I’ve been brewing up so many things lately that I can’t tell one from another, and mix re-steeps together if they smell compatible enough. Haha.

I have been committing tea sacrilege with this wonderful tea…but you know, it really works for me. I’m so busy at work that I can’t make myself a proper cup, so decided to start doing ‘grandpa style’ until I find my new work groove.

I have discovered that I really like grandpa style with roasted oolongs, and will probably continue to drink them in this manner. I really like the mineral, salty notes that seem to come through when I brew in this manner. And when the flavour starts to become weak I just add a few more leaves.

I expected to find some strong bitter notes with grandpa style and oolong, but I didn’t get that. This tea holds up really well to this style of brewing. When i’m out, I will definitely see if my other roasted oolongs do as well.

Now that I’ve gone grandpa style, I probably won’t go back (at least with this tea)….so easy, convenient and ridiculously delicious.

Here I am to enjoy a big red Robe. Its leaves are long and have an incredible volume .

The smell is forested, mostly wooded . This type of tea is very famous and is even extremely famous but I read anything and everything about it ( picked by monkeys wearing red dresses in honor of the emperor, tea trees dressed with a red dress honoured by the emperor to thank this tea to have healed the mother of the Emperor … ) I cannot tell why this tea is called like that but it grows well on Mount Wuyi and that’s the point.

A translucent orange liquor is obtained.

A the first sip , my olfactory impression is confirmed , I have the impression of riding into a forest : moss, mushrooms , bark, wet earth , nuts … that’s what this tea reminds me immediately.

Mushroom is for me the most prominent flavour followed by wood. This tea also has a mineral note , some rock-y taste , which must be explained by its origin.

Some cocoa notes are also present . The texture is very light, very refreshing , and while cooling I begin to detect a little fruity note .

This tea is complex. I imagine it must be very suitable for Gong Fu Cha session and reveals incredible flavors in short, multiple infusions. But … it is already very good Western style .

You can see pics of my session with this roasted Oolong here : http://thevangeliste.wordpress.com/2014/12/31/fujian-da-hong-pao-big-red-robe-wuyi-rock-oolong-tea-teavivre/

As I shuffled out of the bedroom this morning to find that my wife was WAY too awake for 5:30am, she very perkily asked me if I wanted some of the Big Red Robe she was brewing. I think I must have grunted yes, because that’s what was in my travel mug when I left the house. It was so good. Woke me up as much as coffee would have (which wasn’t much, I still napped most of the way to work – I wasn’t driving, I take the bus). This tea was delicious. I know I’ve had a da hong pao before, but the flavor has never struck me like this. It was rich and grassy and leafy, tons of depth and interest. Usually oolongs have a bit of a buttery creamy finish, but this had a much sharper flavor – in a good way. Definitely going to be one that I reach for often from now on.

My new way of trying tea samples is to steep three different ones at once…maybe that’s not the best way of doing it, but it keeps me more focused and distracted from everything else. So that’s just what I do now. XD
Out of the two other teas that were steeping right next to this one, this tea smelled the strongest. It smells incredibly roasty.
The flavor is pretty much the same. Think I’ll enjoy this one more later on when I’m back on my roasty tea kick. xD