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Just finished a wonderful virtual tasting with 8 others. We all had the same set of tea and brewed them in our own homes. As with the tasting we did with TeaForum, we explored the differences that elevation and roast make on the flavor and complexity of the of the teas. All teas were from the winter 2019 harvest.
Alishan
Shan Lin Xi
Lishan
"Sweet Scent" Dong Ding
Roasted Dong Ding.
I love doing these comparative tastings; I never fail to learn something new.

Tillerman wrote: ↑

Thu May 28, 2020 2:41 pm

Just finished a wonderful virtual tasting with 8 others. We all had the same set of tea and brewed them in our own homes. As with the tasting we did with TeaForum, we explored the differences that elevation and roast make on the flavor and complexity of the of the teas. All teas were from the winter 2019 harvest.
Alishan
Shan Lin Xi
Lishan
"Sweet Scent" Dong Ding
Roasted Dong Ding.
I love doing these comparative tastings; I never fail to learn something new.

Glad to hear you had a successful tasting @Tillerman. As you posted this, I’m sipping on your winter ‘19 roasted Laoshi DongDing. Rich. It’s cold and foggy here today so a perfect compliment. Wondering when you’ll get Spring shipments of DongDing? Any news as to overall quality of harvest this Spring in Taiwan?

OCTO wrote: ↑

Wed May 20, 2020 9:53 am

Some ZhangPing ShuiXian for the night.... hahaha....

That looks lovely!

Bok wrote: ↑

Fri May 22, 2020 10:08 am

Rare treat for the end of a stressful week... yancha. Stuffed in Zhuni it shines for many, many rounds - unusual for Yancha to be so enduring. Powerful and lovely.

Good stuff, I like the sound of this...stuffed Zhuni Yancha! Nothing like a little teatime to melt the stress away.

Fushoushan tea private farm

GARDEN ELEVATION
2200m to 2300m

It is a rich and buttery with tasting oolong with an aroma and flavor that does not lessen with repeated brewing. It has become my favorite high mountain oolong.

Qilai Mountains tea

Chilai Tea District

Garden altitude 1600m


It is floral aroma, reminiscent of a cream of corn soup. The taste is sweet and floral, velvety texture, & mouth-watering. Second infusion is even better: more balanced, with a touch of spiciness.

I rarely like Baozhong. Until I met a guy who is specialised in sourcing Baozhong. This tea is one of them. So called ye-fang, semi wild tea bushes, abandoned for a long time, so they become almost wild teas. Has the typical underlying note that only wild or semi-wild teas have, indicative of the lack of use of pesticides and/or fertiliser.

This tea is almost bland on first sip, but becomes quickly very powerful, when it invades the throat and sticks to it. Not a the tea for someone who just started to drink tea, very subtle in its expression. Still has a little fire from the processing, so it’ll need a bit of rest to show its full potential. My friend suggested to drink it slowly and put some aside for future years. So I did.

I'm drinking Tea Masters Spring 2020 Da Yu Ling 98k.

Scent: light mango, cherimoya, sweet petrichor
Taste: Sweet, bright on the palette

Something interesting about this tea is that it seems to be pretty low in caffeine. It's never been a high energy tea even in past years but this year's harvest seems to have a very quiet energy.

Honyama oolong from Den's Tea. This was a 'that sounds interesting, why not add a pouch to my emergency sencha order' purchase, and first impression is a lightly-oxidized, light or no-roast oolong with twisty green leaves. Pleasingly delicate flavor, maybe more like a light Baozhong than high mountain oolong, but I've diluted the tea with cool water because I'm thirsty and it's still fairly warm today, so can't yet say much more than that about the flavor. I look forward to a better tasting to confirm its characteristics better.

Having a cup of Milan DanCong ......

Finished putting a patio in my backyard and now enjoying some high mountain oolong while enjoying the perfect weather we're having today.

Having a simple and casual cup of RouGui before bed.

103k dayuling tea

This is the most oily, coating the mouth, and it is increadibly smooth.

Long taste in the mouth. 5 minutes in the mouth.

After drink relax feeling.

It's always a good day when I get a box from Taiwan! 2020 Spring gaoshan
Alishan and Lishan

I was told that 2 jin were Dayuling 89k. She romanized the farm to BiLuXi, but I can't find info on it. From what I see on this forum, "real" Dayuling is higher up the road than 89K. Plus, the price would make me think it is not high altitude Dayuling.

I started out with the Alishan. Is amazing how fresh gaoshan compares to the 1 and 2 year old stuff I just finished up. The tea is nice, not overly amazing, but quality daily drinking tea.



I'm using extremely soft spring water (20ppm TDS) that I add some concentrated CaCO3 to to get about 45ppm. I play with NaHCO3 also, always keeping the combined TDS to below 75ppm. This has been working pretty well for me. I can collect 20 gallons every month or two and make up the concentrate with my soda stream (see water water everywhere thread for details). ]

@Rickpatbrown Biluxi is one of the next lower elevations under Dayuling, where it is still allowed to grow tea. Usually you won’t find info on these locations as sellers prefer to just label them Dayuling and price it accordingly. I think it’s not worse and often better than Dayuling. If the sellers marks it as such it is definitely a sign that they are honest business people!

You won’t get much real Dayuling outside of Taiwan anyways and if you’ll notice with the price...