Taiwan 'Shan Lin Xi' High Mountain Oolong Tea

Okay. I thought I’d brew this up after my session with the lightly roasted version earlier today and try to put some words around how it misses the mark that the light roast hits so well (for me).

The wispy green/jade/vegetal/grassy notes seem to tamp out the floral/butter/cream roundedness that the light-roasted version blossoms into so beautifully. Every steep sort of tastes muted and watery, like an anticipatory rinse that never quite arrives at Second Steep Magic™. I am tempted to experiment with wok-kissing this at home… those notes are in there, I’m sure of it, but need the lid taken off.

Like petting a cat through a duvet.

After last nights debacle with the pomegranate stuff, I decided to whip myself into shape this morning and follow some directions!
…
But as I write this, and look on the bag, I realize I only partially followed the directions. I did brew this tea at 194 as directed. I brewed gong fu cha style with about 7g of tea to about 6 oz. Water. I steeped 30 second steeps after a 5 sec rinse.

I don’t think this is a complicated tea. It’s very light and buttery with a sugarcane note in the finish. I’m picking up subtle florals with a hint of grassy ness. Very pleasant but not particularly mind blowing. I will gladly drink the rest of this tea but probably won’t restock it.

Sugarcane sweet.. Floral. Juicy.

Yes, I know juicy is probably not a flavour.

Another tea that never made it into my Steepster cupboard, still it’s a sipdown.
Western, 2min, 200F
Floral, smooth, buttery. I re-steeped it with the same flavors. Overall, not that memorable and not a re-purchase.

Now that I have cleared out the December 2018 backlog, I can move on to my first official sipdown of 2019. I finished a 25 gram pouch of this tea on either the second or third day of the month. I wanted to start 2019 out with something light and floral, so this ended up being the tea I selected to fill that role. Though it most certainly served its purpose, I have to say that I have had somewhat better Shan Lin Xi oolongs in the recent past. In general, Shan Lin Xi teas are incredibly hit or miss for me; I either freak out over them and love them, or I end up respecting and appreciating them to a certain extent before moving on to teas from terroir that I find more consistently appealing. The latter was kind of the case with this tea. It was very good for an unroasted Shan Lin Xi oolong, but like a lot of the Shan Lin Xi oolongs I have tried in the past, it was more savory and more vegetal than I would have preferred.

I prepared this tea gongfu style. After the rinse, I steeped 6 grams of rolled tea leaves in 4 ounces of 194 F water for 10 seconds. This infusion was followed by 15 additional infusions. Steep times for these infusions were as follows: 12 seconds, 16 seconds, 20 seconds, 25 seconds, 30 seconds, 40 seconds, 50 seconds, 1 minute, 1 minute 15 seconds, 1 minute 30 seconds, 2 minutes, 3 minutes, 5 minutes, 7 minutes, and 10 minutes.

Prior to the rinse, the dry tea leaves produced aromas of cream, butter, custard, and gardenia. After the rinse, I detected new aromas of cinnamon and vanilla as well a meaty umami presence and vague vegetal hints. The first infusion introduced an even stronger umami scent and new aromas of grass, violet, and zucchini. In the mouth, the tea liquor presented brothy, meaty umami notes as well as impressions of zucchini, grass, cream, custard, and butter. I also picked up some subtle hints of gardenia before notes of vanilla, spinach, green apple, and daylily shoots took over on the swallow. Subsequent infusions introduced subtle aromas of pear and stronger scents of spinach, green apple, daylily, and baked bread. Stronger and more immediate daylily shoot, green apple, and spinach notes emerged in the mouth along with subtle impressions of cinnamon and violet. New notes of sweet corn, hyacinth, pear, seaweed, daylily, minerals, baked bread, and orange zest also appeared. As the tea faded, the liquor emphasized lingering impressions of minerals, umami, zucchini, grass, spinach, daylily shoots, and pear that were chased by hints of green apple, cream, and custard.

This was a very good Shan Lin Xi oolong, but it leaned a little too heavily on its vegetal and savory characteristics for my liking. I prefer Shan Lin Xi oolongs that are creamier, fruitier, and more floral, and while this tea displayed plenty of cream, fruit, and flower aromas and flavors, it often seemed to place more emphasis on its other characteristics over the course of my review session. Still, this was a very good tea. I am willing to bet that fans of teas that are more savory and more vegetal would get quite a bit of enjoyment out of it.

I sipped this down a few weekends ago. I have tried a few new teas I could upload too, including from What-Cha, Whispering Pines, and Terroir Tea. This one was my go to tumbler oolong. I also tumbler-fu’d using the Spirit Tea tumbler they sell. That one will need a whole review in itself. This tea was the most reliable tea so far, balancing floral, green veggies, butter, and melon each time.