Taiwanese Orchid Oolong

You’ve GOT to be kidding me!

This is SO UNIQUE…I don’t even know where to begin!

It’s smooth but it’s sweet…it’s sweet but it’s creamy! It’s creamy but it’s candy-like! It’s floral but it’s NOT grassy! OMG!

Let’s chat about the candy-likeness first, I guess…

You know those hard pieces of candy – old fashioned – that have a tad of powder coating on them…loose powder – right over the top!? That’s what this reminds me of! This has a texture both loose leaf – dry and the actual tea liquor texture that I have NEVER come across! Then once the sip is complete the taste morphs and lingers! It’s very hard to describe but I am totally LOVING this! It’s almost like a licorice…not a hardcore licorice…but a sugary sweet toothy type candy licorice NOT the black tarry kind.

There is an awesome raw sugar type taste to it too! Very unusual but I say that with the utmost respect and interest as I am already a HUGE fan of this!

I’m going to ponder on this one more but for now I’m going with a 95 and I think the rating can only go up! This is so unique and so different – I’m truly impressed!

Wow, what a great way to start off my weekend: I was digging through my room, looking for my iPod, and I found this sample mixed in with some Classic Rock CDs. I don’t know how it got there, but I’m not going to question it…

Anyway, I’m re-tasting this tea after several months, and I have to say that the taste is much better than I remember. It is similar to my Art of Tea orchid Oolong, but creamier, which makes the whole experience so much better. The aftertaste is also a bit stronger, lingering for three minute (It lasts even longer than Tie Guan Yin! How does that happen?!?!?) on the roof of my mouth. Needless to say, I’m bumping up the rating, and I can’t wait to see how it develops.

Alright, second infusion same temperature, steeped fro three minutes. The tea has developed a pleasant sweetness, which reminds me of some sort of confection confection. I don’t know exactly which one, but I would guess it reminds me of one of the Japanese sweets I got from a friend. Anyway, the tea is so delicious, I actually regret only having a small sample left, as this is the perfect desert tea.

Third infusion, four minutes, 205 degree water. The tea lost a lot of sweetness, but it still reminds me of some sort of confection. the aftertaste still lingers for over a minute, and it still retains the creaminess that made it so appealing in the beginning. It’s still an exceptional tea, but I think it’s a bit past its prime now.

Forth infusion, five minutes. The tea has started to loose the creaminess, but luckily the sweetness did not degrade further. Overall, the strength of the taste didn’t change, which is the beauty of Oolongs: Their flavor lasts for a very long time, providing many cups of wonderful tea. I think I’ll probably get eight cups out of this, mostly because it’s a green Oolong, which tend to loose their taste a bit quickly then others.

Fifth cup, stopped keeping track of time, just going by color from now on. The creaminess lingers, but it’s mostly gone now. Interestingly enough, the tea retains its sweetness, as well as the lingering aftertaste.

Sixth cup, process the same as before. It’s starting to get a bit bland. It has lost all of the creaminess, it isn’t as sweet, and the aftertaste doesn’t linger very long. I’m gonna call it quits on this one. That being said, it lasted a long time, and it tasted great. I’ll miss this a lot when I finish off the sample.

Once upon a time Verdant sold this tea, and I bought a oolong sampler than included it. That was ages ago! I found the remainder of this sample kicking around the back of my tea drawer and decided to use it up. I decided to give this one the gongfu treatment and put what was left in my little ru kiln teapot. The dry leaf still smells green and floral and lovely.

I used the general oolong gongfu instructions that Verdant provides: quick rinse, ~5 second first steep. The wet leaf smells remarkably charred and roasty, which was totally unexpected. Guess I forgot this was a half-oxidized oolong base. The tea, however, smells floral in a thick, rich, dark way, and tastes ridiculously sweet. Seriously, did someone put sugar in my pot when I wasn’t looking? On this first steep I can’t quite get beyond that candy-ish, slightly floral flavor, like pure sugar. At times there are notes in the background of green-ness and a very slight hint of toastiness, but mostly an overwhelmingly sweet aftertaste that lingers in your mouth and the back of your throat, reactivating every time you breathe in. It’s quite extraordinary.

Unfortunately my subsequent steeps weren’t so awe-inspiring… the sweet aftertaste remained, though growing fainter, but the main part of the sip is just kind of vegetal and a little roasty and bit boring to be honest. But I have kind of consistantly been unable to make multiple tasty steeps when I do gongfu, no matter what I seem to do, so it’s probably more me than anything else.

I tried cold brewing this last night and at first I liked it better but I still can’t quite dig the aftertaste. If anyone wants to swap please let me know. I’ll probably end up blending it with something else to mellow it out.

OMG! Amazing! Ahh-mmmmmm-azzzz-ing!

Of the few Orchid Oolong teas that I’ve encountered, this one possesses the strongest Orchid essence I’ve ever tasted. The others were like … yeah, ok, that’s orchid…maybe… but this is ORCHID. Don’t get me wrong, I really enjoyed those others too. But, this has the most amazing and well-defined orchid essence.

It also has this incredible sweetness to it… like old fashioned rock sugar candy that I used to get from the candy shop on Main Street at Disneyland.

If you like Oolong – put this on your MUST TRY list … and at the very top of your shopping list.

Gosh, if I had been aware that I had not already posted about this one, I would have picked something else.

Very tired, can’t think.

Boyfriend quite liked this. I find it reminds me of ginseng oolong, with the licorice-y flavour right when swallowing. This happens with cooling. When it was still all fresh and warm and stuff, it was much more flowery.

This is all I’m capable off right now.

Could have lived without the ginseng-y flavour. That was not what I was looking for at all.

Thank you, TeaEqualsBliss! This is my first Verdant Tea, so I’ve been really excited to try it.

I felt today was the perfect day for this. I’m a bit stressed, as I got an order on etsy for a large number of knitted hats, and I need to pack for college AND everything else since my parents are moving. All in less than a month. This seemed like it would really help calm me down a bit.

Steeping, this smells so good. It makes me think of that feeling right when you get your blankets out of the dryer and just want to hide in them and be comfy. There is this slight scent in there that makes me think of baking bread.

I love how this tastes! So smooth and creamy. There’s this sweetness that kinda sticks on your tongue after each sip.

I look forward to trying more Verdant Teas…if I ever have the money! Maybe some free samples, eh? wink, wink But seriously, this tea is really good and it held up well to a second steep.

Thanks to Lindsay for this one. My first Orchid Oolong. Now I’ve seen Orchid’s, Licorice, Ginseng oolong, and King’s oolongs and they seem to be synonymous with each other. Or so I thought. Check out the package no coating on the dry leaf really like you might see on some licorice oolongs(that candy coated like shell). Brew up the first cup. Eh kinda of a semi roasty nutty flavor to it. I didn’t get that sweetness though till the end of the cup. I didn’t really enjoy the first steep. However, in consecutive steeps afterward this tea really begins to unfold like an orchid. In the second steep is where I’m starting to detect the orchid. It reminds me of jasmine scented teas, but you can definitely tell that it is orchid and not jasmine. Then you have that sweetness at the end of the sip. This I enjoy quite a bit. I might be wrong but there has to be a little bit of ginseng in there or licorice root to produce that sweetness. If I am wrong…fabulous. I am thoroughly enjoying this tea. So with steep 3 and 4 I combined it with a sample of Teavana’s Dokudami Umami. The combination with licorice root in the umami was fantastic. I can’t wait to finish the rest of this, and try more to come!

This is my second tasting of this magnificent tea. I used the Gaiwan again with generous leaf. My steep was approximately 2 minutes. The result is a glorious golden nectar. This flavor is lingering in my mouth. This tea is awesome. So much better this time. And, as we know, it going to get better with the following steepings. I gave the second maybe a little over a minute. This tea is like having dessert. Without hesitation I recommend it. I have to up the score. I cannot believe the taste that’s In my mouth. Sublime…

Ohhh wow this… is… incredible. Simply yet ever so complicatedly incredible. As in my tongue and my nose do not believe what they are tasting and smelling. I have never had an orchid oolong and I wanted so very much to try this when I saw it on Steepster a couple months ago. I inquired first with David as to if it would be returning, when it seemed not, I turned to Steepster and used it for what it is: a community, a community of very generous tea lovers. So I asked around, starting with the locals and those who didn’t care as much for this one. The good lady Angrboda who is in no way local, answered my plea and sent me this and some other lovely samples from Europe! Thank you so very much for giving me the opportunity to try this, I am so grateful.

The teas from Ang arrived a couple weeks ago, but alas I had a sinus infection and put them off. However if I had known what this tea was going to do to my throat ans nasal passages i probably would have drank it right away. It is so cooling and cleansing and tea gods don’t strike me down, but it does remind me of my brew of Throat Coat and Twig Tea. However I am glad I waited to take the time to fully savor this, I probably would have thought I was crazy for that observation then anyway. For today I have the house to myself, a rare blessing, as my mother has taken the toddler to a parade. I took a shower, lay down for awhile and treated myself to this very special tea for my 99th tasting note and after this I think I may do some art!

Upon opening the pouch I was met with an unexpected aroma, true I didn’t know what to expect, but definitely not dark grassy Gyokuro. I have not found this grassy note in the cups I have brewed and infact it changed as soon as the leaves hit the warm mug, to something strange and culinary I just can’t put my finger on. I did the quickest of steps with water just off the boil and the smell changed to something more earthy and illeagal, the word hash sprang to mind, though I only have one vague years old memory that. The aroma of the liquor shape shifted in the cup as the taste did in my mouth, starting out sort of charcoaly and morphed into that cool almost medicinal brew (medicinal in the most natural herb and root sense).

I was worried at first that I had scorched the leave as it started out toasty, then came a slight sweetness, then a coolness at the back of the mouth, developing into candy and flooding my nose from the inside out. I have never had ginseng oolong, but I can understand the comparison as this is all ginseng and anise and only the slightest bit of floral, candied flowers, orchid concentrated, sweetened and made into a cough drop and a nasal spray and I love it. Yes it is sweet but it’s also intense, almost harsh at moments, but with a self-soothing mechanism built in.

So I can understand why a few didn’t care for it, but I immediately want to share it, in a tasting with Yabao and the ‘04 Yanxin’s Reserve Shu Nuggets. Me thinks this would have to be the last tea tasted though. I wish I had enough for that and a cold brew, but sharing wins out. But for now I am going to see if I can draw out more that these first five infusions, it’s getting a bit ashy, but I think there is still life in them yet. Thank you Angrboda for sharing this and David Duckler and Verdant Tea for supplying and sourcing it!