Laoshan Green Oolong

I had this tea last night and I am drinking the Laoshan Bilochun now. As I said in my note for the Bilochun, the two Laoshan greens and the oolong taste very similar. The only difference that I can pick out without a side-by-side comparison is that the original Laoshan green is much more in-you-face with the flavor (vegetal, bitter, sensitive to an oversteep, but still sooo yummy!)

I was expecting to pick out some floral notes in this oolong, but I couldn’t detect any.

Smells like buttered green beans but the taste has no bean quality to it which is nice. Has a mineral flavor with a touch of butter. Interesting!!!!
Thanks to Terri Harplady for this sample!!!!

First steep; 5 seconds: Little sweet, but mostly savory vegetal. Mild astringency.

Second steep; 7 seconds: I under steeped, but not bad. Mineral spice and more subdued savory green. Maybe faint floral. Some astringency, but pleasant.

Third Steep; 12 seconds: Smooth, savory, and a little grassy. Creamy mouth feel developing.

Fourth Steep; 17 seconds: Less savory, more sweet with some grassy flavors. Maybe vague honey notes.

Forgot to log the rest of my notes for this one. This wasn’t bad, and it’s from 2015, but it basically tasted like a green tea mostly. I think I might brew this one western style as said on Verdant. The other times I brewed it like that I got better flavors.

Not sure what happened with this one. I didn’t read the reviews of this beforehand, but treated it as a green tea from the get go so it doesn’t seem to be an issue with my brewing temps (as it seems from a glance that other reviewers used even higher temps) but out of the 4/5 5 for 5 samples I’ve tried from Verdant now, this was by far the worst. From reading the reviews, I’m not even sure I had the same tea as other reviewers (perhaps the quality changed drastically in the last few years or a bad batch?). Even the last infusion from the leaves that I tossed into a thermos for a grandpa brew came out starting like a green and ending with a terribly bitter note. Palatable, but never something I’d willingly repurchase.

Reserve Laoshan Green Oolong
He family collection spring 2020
5 g, brita water, 176F, 130mL

Leaves: smell very green sweet matcha buttery type of feeling. A small amount of small leaves are crushed but most survived and are in little coiled shapes.

1st 10s: a little cloudy yellow infusion. Same smell but add a bit of roasted smell to it. Tastes rather unremarkable, a little bit of burnt matcha with a hint of sweet.

2nd steeping 10s 165F: similar to before but tastes more bitter

3rd steeping 7s 156F: same as before

Stopping here and tossing leaves in a thermos for grandpa brewing. In sum: smells and tastes like a burnt matcha, even with relatively low brewing temps. Passing on this one. Nothing particularly oolong like in the generic sense. My infusions never cleared up and were always a cloudy light yellow.

1.5/5 stars

This is a rather atypical oolong. It looks and tastes more like a green tea. You have to look real hard to find any trace of oolong in it.

It has a very similar profile to Verdant’s other laoshan green teas. In the nose and on the palate, I get toasted soybeans, nuttiness, and grain. Around the 5th or 6th steep, the mouthfeel becomes fuller and you get the barest hint of some light fruitiness and butter. For the most part though it’s vegetal and doesn’t distinguish itself from a green tea. There’s none of the floral, fruity, or mineral flavors that characterize oolongs.

This tea is a light oolong that is yellow in color with a vegetal aroma. It has a green tea taste that is sweet with flavors of soybean and asparagus. I feel like I am drinking a green tea instead of an oolong.

April 2015 harvest

Right. okay, so this is my fourth session with this tea since I got it a few weeks ago. Basically it reminded me of a laoshan green that was thicker, fuller and lasted longer in the first 2 sessions. Amazing, right, but the third one tasted super like stale, but moreover, the whole bag has since smelled like.. club soda? Pretty much no smell now. I don’t know what happened ):

Anyways, okay, so it’s not very sweet, but i can taste some of that laoshan soybeany roastiness, there’s bits of lime, a bit creamy, some carrots, spinach. The astringency is pretty heavy for such early steeps. Okay, maybe I just messed up in the third session I did, I think my temperature was too low, cause I’ve got all that delicious laoshan greenness up in here (greenness is a wonderful word)
Yes! I heated the water to about 90 C, and now it’s bringing out what I want. It’s actually gotten a bit sweet, lots of roasty soybeans, edamame, cooked asparagus, very vegetal, there is a looot of astringency, but it mostly resides low in the throat, it’s also quite tart, ooh there’s even pear notes.
Okay, I love this, I admit it. It is quite similar to laoshan greens, but it’s still very distinctly its own. Like, it’s darker, less creamy/buttery, fruitier and more astringent, it actually is starting to make me think of key lime pie in these late steeps. I’m sorry but oh my god. the last time a tea made me feel this good was Menghai tea factory’s 2016 Year of the monkey sheng, which I had on an empty stomach.. wait, I have an empty stomach now! oh dear, maybe this is a thing..
Okay, I’m tea drunk and i’m watching the matrix for the first time, so I’m gonna go focus on that.
Buy this.
I’ll be trying to resist starving myself in search of tea highs.

It has taken me awhile to really get my thoughts together on this one. The first time I had this tea, I thought it was solid, but kind of simple. Every other time I have had it, however, it has just about blown me away. Today, I tried brewing this tea a couple of different ways and it continued to impress me. So, after all of that, there was nothing left for me to do but review it, so here goes.

I brewed this tea using a three step Western infusion. The temperature was set at 175 F. Note that while this temperature may seem too low for brewing an oolong, the merchant recommends it. Furthermore, with this being such a green oolong, keeping the temperature low ensures that the tea doesn’t develop any weird, bitter, and/or cooked flavors. The tea was then steeped in increments of 3, 5, and 7 minutes.

First Infusion: The infused liquor showed a pale greenish gold. Aromas of soybean, lettuce, spinach, honey, cream, and orange blossom were present on the nose. Strong flavors of soybean, lettuce, honey, cream, steamed buns, and orange blossom were underscored by notes of spinach, kale, minerals, and sticky rice. The finish had gorgeous orange blossom, honey, and cream notes with hints of minerality and leaf vegetables.

Second Infusion: The color of the liquor seemed to be pretty much unchanged. Floral, honey, and cream aromas really took center stage on the nose. The palate followed the nose, with robust, expressive notes of honey, orange blossom, and cream. I noticed that the mineral, steamed bun, and sticky rice notes were a little stronger here too. The vegetal notes took a backseat, but were still present enough to round things out a bit. The mineral notes were really apparent on the finish. I also noticed slight hay-like and buttery notes on the finish as well.

Third Infusion: The liquor was lighter in color here and appeared to be more gold. Very delicate aromas of cream, minerals, steamed buns, and sticky rice were noticeable on the nose. In the mouth, I picked up mild notes of kale, spinach, lettuce, and soybean balanced by steamed bun, sticky rice, and mineral notes. There was still a touch of honey and orange blossom, as well as what may have been hints hay and butter in the background. The finish was short, and really emphasized the interplay of cream and minerals.

Truthfully, I was tempted to attempt a fourth infusion of around 9-10 minutes, but decided to stick with my usual three. By the third infusion, the flavors were very mild and were starting to wash out more than a bit, so I stopped there. All in all, I really, really like this oolong. It is unique, very approachable, and to me, displays the best qualities of both a Tieguanyin and a Laoshan green tea. I would recommend this tea very highly to oolong neophytes and aficionados alike.

This tastes more like a green than an oolong but I’m not complaining. It’s still delicious. It’s got a rich green asparagus taste to it and nutty sweetness. Nope, not much like an oolong but still an excellent tea. I brewed it in my mug at 190C , the temperature I always used for oolongs. Maybe I should have gone a lower temperature since it’s so close to green tea but it still came out great. I brewed for one minute and it’s perfect.

Not quite as impressed though accurately described on here. Very, very green and soybean like. I wasn’t a huge fan, but still a good tea.