What Oolong Are You Drinking

Semi-oxidized tea
Andrew S
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Sat Jan 22, 2022 8:14 pm

@Tillerman: coincidentally, I've been enjoying some of your Winter 2020 Laoshi Dong Ding today, brewed rather casually.

Perhaps I'll wait until I try it more 'properly' before I proffer any real comments, other than to say that it reminds me of what I enjoyed about Dong Ding when I started out more than a decade ago.

It's nice to have a tea bring back memories like that, even after so many other nice teas over the intervening years.

Andrew
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Tillerman
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Sun Jan 23, 2022 12:46 am

@Andrew S, Laoshi will be thrilled when I pass along your comments. Thank you so much.
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LeoFox
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Sun Jan 23, 2022 12:36 pm

Having a nice time with lazy cat's "fragrant" Huang guan yin.

http://www.lazycattea.com/product/huang ... ance-2020/
Huangguanyin is a cultivar that is gaining many fans every year thanks to its powerful aromatics filled with green notes and florals. Some describe it as having also a milky aroma.
Huang Guan Yin is a hybrid of Tie Guan Yin and Huang Dan.

A pretty dynamic journey from gentle roast notes to a spicy fruitiness, all with a comfortable mouthfeel. And what a price!

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Bok
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Sun Jan 23, 2022 6:47 pm

LeoFox wrote:
Sun Jan 23, 2022 12:36 pm
Having a nice time with lazy cat's "fragrant" Huang guan yin.

http://www.lazycattea.com/product/huang ... ance-2020/
Huangguanyin is a cultivar that is gaining many fans every year thanks to its powerful aromatics filled with green notes and florals. Some describe it as having also a milky aroma.
Huang Guan Yin is a hybrid of Tie Guan Yin and Huang Dan.

A pretty dynamic journey from gentle roast notes to a spicy fruitiness, all with a comfortable mouthfeel. And what a price!

I remember having a sample of that a long time ago, a nice tea indeed!
Stevelaughs
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Mon Jan 24, 2022 12:24 am

mbanu wrote:
Fri Jan 21, 2022 8:38 pm
Stevelaughs wrote:
Fri Jan 21, 2022 7:48 pm
mbanu wrote:
Thu Jan 20, 2022 10:19 pm
Had some Foojoy organic "Shui Hsien Wuyi Oolong" that was getting pretty tired (bought from a vendor who doesn't seem to sell much, then several months being neglected for other teas), so I decided to give it a go with gongfu brewing. A fine second life for an old tea. :D
I really want to learn more about aging oolong. It's interesting that you say your shui xian was "getting pretty tired." I've heard that it's theoretically impossible to age oolong as the enzymatic activity is, or should be, nil. So the tea is essentially decaying after a certain point.
I think there are four things going on (outside of marketing, which is sort of the unspoken fifth reason):

1. The oolong is indeed just going stale, but that helps because it was not carefully fired, so even though some of the tea flavor fades away, some of the char flavor fades away too. There were occasional travelers' remarks in the 19th century about how some oolong drinkers in China would intentionally leave the tea alone for a year for this reason. The Brits on the other hand, simply became frustrated enough with burnt teas that when they started their own industry, there was a heavy emphasis on avoiding even the slightest hint of it. This can often be seen today -- the closest it gets is a little malt in an Assam, anything heavier is rejected, and a lot of British tea-making's historical focus has been on developing and improving tea-firing machines.

2. The oolong is going rancid. Rancidity is a type of staleness, but it creates new flavors rather than just having flavors fade like with flatness. This usually happens with dry teas kept in dry places -- a similar thing happened with Keemun, leading to a small following in some places for "winey" Keemun, which develops fruity flavors during that window of time. With Keemun at least, there is a trade-off because it is impossible to cause rancidity without some degree of flatness, so it wasn't people trying to age Keemun for decades like pu'er, just enough to develop the new flavor while there was still some of the original flavor left. Also as the name implies, not all rancid flavors are pleasant, so this kind of waiting is not always a good idea.

3. The oolong is being preserved rather than aged. Usually this happens through re-roasting, and is something that developed in humid places like Hong Kong where the tea supply was not always reliable for various reasons, so it was important to find ways to coax extra life out of teas that did not do well in that kind of weather. However, a tea can only be re-roasted so many times before all it tastes like is roast.

4. The oolong was not given a proper kill-green. Sometimes this happens out of carelessness, but other times it is intentional due to a certain short-term advantages. Without a proper kill-green, it falls into the same category as "dry-stored" pu'er and old white tea, in that there may be enough enzymatic reaction left to cause it to do something unexpected.
That’s really interesting. Thank you for such a thorough response. I’ll respond to just a few things here.

My understanding of “waiting for the fire to go out” of the tea is that it’s distinctly different from long-term aging and is a regular practice observed for even carefully roasted oolong teas. With tea connoisseurs drinking last year’s tea on a regular basis. But not last decade’s tea. Nor, for that matter, tea from half a century ago.

Re-roasting the tea in more humid climates for preservation purposes is really interesting to me because it is completely practical and could offer an explanation as to that particular taste preference: heavy, overly roasted oolong. But as you point out, that is also distinctly different from long-term aging.

In a way, the aged oolong market appears similar to the early 2000’s pu’erh market in that a lot of aged oolong is being sold as premium tea, when it would have had to have been an excellent tea in its youth to age long-term into something worthwhile and special... but again if it that were the case, why wasn’t it drunk to begin with!? Rather it was left in a warehouse somewhere, forgotten, until aged oolong came into fashion.

I could be off base with that, but it seems a bit rich to me.. I’m particularly skeptical as to the quality of some teas which certain vendors purport to have been aged since the 80’s or 90’s.... like... it seems odd, no?

I’m honestly curious to explore. At the same time it’s a question of what do I -or we- as the consumer want to spend money on? And honestly, living in the states (as I am), it frequently seems like a choice between questionable aged tea and questionable fresh tea 😅 So when I see an aged oolong marketed to me online where I do most of my shopping, I am disinclined to take a chance on it. But I’ll grant you, there may be excellent aged oolong out there. I just haven’t given it a chance yet.

ALSO, with regard to the lack of heat applied during the kill-green... I think that’s one of the reasons I remain open to exploring the world of aged oolong tea, as pu’erh tea’s age-ability can be directly linked to that same sort of processing idiosyncrasy - and clearly there’s a lot of potential there.
Stevelaughs
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Mon Jan 24, 2022 12:59 am

Andrew S wrote:
Fri Jan 21, 2022 11:02 pm
Stevelaughs wrote:
Fri Jan 21, 2022 7:48 pm
I really want to learn more about aging oolong. It's interesting that you say your shui xian was "getting pretty tired." I've heard that it's theoretically impossible to age oolong as the enzymatic activity is, or should be, nil. So the tea is essentially decaying after a certain point.

I recently bought a 2013 Ma Tou Yan Shui Xian from Red Blossom... I need to try it again, but my first impression was that it really lacked the freshness and vibrancy I seek even in a heavily roasted oolong.
I'm currently drinking some yancha from the late 1990s which definitely disproves whoever told you that wulong can't age.

Ageing wulong is also something that I'd like to learn more about. It seems to be a topic that is neglected, at least relative to how much people talk about ageing puer. It feels like some tea drinkers store yancha and similar things for their own consumption, but don't really talk much about it.

Perhaps there's just not that much to talk about. Hide some nice tea somewhere, forget about it, and try it again in a decade or two. There's probably additional things that people in humid climates would need to do or look out for, but that's not much of a problem for me.

You probably shouldn't draw too many conclusions from a single example of an aged tea. I suppose that it is fair to assume that an aged tea will no longer taste 'fresh', but that's not to say that it should taste stale or tired. It would all depend on the ageing conditions and the tea itself.

In my very limited experience, it feels like a few years can make the tea a bit more precise and focussed, as well as letting the roast integrate better with the flavour, and changing the overall flavour profile. There's a lovely fruitiness that can come with a bit of age, and time changes the way that the tea 'feels' for me.

I had a small amount of a fairly lightly-roasted bai ji guan which I left around for a decade; more or less accidentally. It felt comfortable and relaxing, with an elegant fruitiness and a deeper flavour than I expect it would have had when it was fresh. Of course, if you enjoy bright and fresh flavours, then you might simply prefer to have that kind of tea when it is young.

I'm curious to learn more about the Asian market for aged yancha and similar things, and whether there are businesses that are stockpiling large quantities of tea for the purpose of ageing it.

Andrew
Yeah, you make some really good points. I definitely want/need to explore more aged oolong offerings, but I know that my own personal tastes at the moment tend towards fresher teas across the board.

I actually used to be very into Liu Bao, Shou Pu, and I even had some decently aged Sheng as well. But I find myself now really turned off by that same earthiness that first turned me on to those teas.

Of course, I’ll probably feel just the opposite another year from now.

I hope you enjoy the 1990’s yancha! I will def have to get my hands on something like that soon 😉
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Bok
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Mon Jan 24, 2022 2:25 am

Stevelaughs wrote:
Mon Jan 24, 2022 12:24 am

Re-roasting the tea in more humid climates for preservation purposes is really interesting to me because it is completely practical and could offer an explanation as to that particular taste preference: heavy, overly roasted oolong. But as you point out, that is also distinctly different from long-term aging.
It does not have to be over-roasted to be aged. Nor does that need to happen when re-roasted. Skillfully done it does not need to at all. Heavy roast is more often a sign of inferior material covered up.

Also more roast does not equal more traditional, as some assume. Some traditionalists (who were actually there when what was called tradition was contemporary), insist on proper oxidation instead of heavy roast. Some tea makers are just lazy/unskilled and try to cover the low quality leaf or workmanship by roasting it away.
Ethan Kurland
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Mon Jan 24, 2022 10:40 am

Stevelaughs,
.
It is so hard to draw conclusions from memories over time. Tea sessions are not scientific experiments.

You mentioned aged sheng etc. & earthiness. Earthiness is so often tasted when drinking pu. Drawing a conclusion about aging is not logical in this situation regarding earthiness. Pu-erh can be earthy whether raw or aged etc.

Bok mentioned that a lot of tea is not produced well. This means conclusions might be drawn about a type of tea based on drinking a poor example of that type of tea. For some types, most of what one might try are awful for drinkers who are not adding sweetener and/or milk, while the very best of those types could be wonderful when drunk straight. (One whose only attendance of opera being Nixon in China should not conclude that opera is not for him.)

If the pandemic ends, we should drink together sometime when you come into the city. Cheers
Andrew S
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Mon Jan 24, 2022 3:45 pm

2019 Chen De Hua rou gui from EoT.

Fruity, almost tropical, to start, then darker and more savoury elements emerge, with a long aftertaste that evolves from infusion to infusion, and a mild relaxing feeling that crept up on me.

After drinking the same kinds of yancha more or less every day for a while, as is my habit, I'm trying to go back and play with some smaller samples, just for fun and to learn what else is out there more than anything else.

I've also been playing around with different styles of cups for different teas, but that's another topic all of its own.

@LeoFox: I'm grateful to read your comments regarding lazy cat teas. Is it fair to say that, overall, they tend to be medium or medium-light in overall style? I wish their website (and other people's websites) could show the wet leaves more often, since they tell me more about the character of the tea than the dry leaves.

Andrew
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LeoFox
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Mon Jan 24, 2022 4:31 pm

Andrew S wrote:
Mon Jan 24, 2022 3:45 pm
LeoFox: I'm grateful to read your comments regarding lazy cat teas. Is it fair to say that, overall, they tend to be medium or medium-light in overall style? I wish their website (and other people's websites) could show the wet leaves more often, since they tell me more about the character of the tea than the dry leaves.

Andrew
I would say most seem to be medium to high roast. This one was described as very light, but I found it to be closer to medium - for me at least.

I wonder if you might like this one, which I have heard great things about, though I haven't tried myself

http://www.lazycattea.com/product/lao-yan-cha/
Andrew S
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Mon Jan 24, 2022 4:59 pm

Thanks; that does sound like something I might enjoy. I've got too many EoT and DXJD samples still lying around, but I should probably try some lazy cats as well, given the positive feedback about them from various people.

My usual problem is that I get a few large samples instead of small packets, and it takes a while to get through them all unless I'm disciplined about doing so, which I'm not.

It is fun to learn, though.

Andrew
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teatray
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Wed Jan 26, 2022 11:52 pm

Dongfang meiren 'Grand Superior' from Sazen. Looks beautiful, smells super nice, but taste, esp. aftertaste, is ever so slightly off, more so in later gaiwan steeps/grandpa refills. The bouquet doesn't quite come together for me, due to some sickly sweet flowery overtones that don't quite turn into honey; they remind me of soap. Or maybe I haven't acquired the taste? In any case, this 'defect' is not large enough to detract from an otherwise very nice session. As I write this, some time after finishing it, the weird notes are gone and the lingering taste is fresh & pleasant. I have another Dongfang meiren from a different shop on the way to compare, as this was my very first one. (Also, the other oolong I tried from Sazen, Dong Ding Ying Xiang, was very tasty and what spurred my interest in Taiwanese tea.)
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Bok
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Thu Jan 27, 2022 12:40 am

Sickly sweet sounds about right to me for OB. Haha, hate it
dyungim
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Fri Jan 28, 2022 11:37 am

TeaTotaling wrote:
Thu Jan 20, 2022 6:52 pm
dyungim wrote:
Fri Jan 14, 2022 7:46 pm
Can anyone here recommend oolongs (ideally dancong but not necessarily) that are similar to Wuyi Origin's Old Bush Mi Lan Xiang from Li Zhai Ping village?

I'm not a fan of greener oolongs and it seems to be increasingly more difficult to find ones that are not too green in this style.
I liked the 2021 MLX from Tea Habitat.
Which village? There are two
Andrew S
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Fri Jan 28, 2022 4:14 pm

Enjoying a very generous sample of a type of yancha that I have not even heard of previously, ku gua lu (苦瓜露), courtesy of Maple.

Nice persistent flavour and aftertaste, with a minty cooling feeling that intermingles with more herbal and mineral elements. And yes, I suppose that there is a bitter melon (苦瓜) quality to it.

There are so many varieties other than the 'usual' ones that I still know nothing about...

Andrew
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