Floating Leaves : High Mountain Blind Tasting Sampler

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FloatingLeaves
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Fri May 31, 2019 2:43 pm

Hi all,

We are doing a blind tasting event with three of our high mountain oolongs. Basically, I will be sending out small samples (16 grams) of three different high mountain growing regions' teas (Alishan, Shan Lin Xi, and Hehuan Shan) without disclosing the names.

The price for the three teas is $10. You can find the sampler on our website https://floatingleaves.com/ on the banner that is currently on our homepage.

The sampler is available now, and will be available through Thursday the 6th at 6 PM PST. We will give you a couple weeks to drink them, and then reveal what each tea was on the 18th of June. We'll do a live broadcast on Facebook and Instagram, and I'll also come here and announce the names of the teas on this thread later that day. It will actually be double blind, Sara (who helps us pack tea) is the only one who knows which is which right now. So Shiuwen and I will find out about the same time as everybody else.

My goal with this event is to get conversation going in the tea community and give people the experience of tasting teas blind without too much preconceived notions. I'd love to see people post their favorite tea and guesses about which is which on this thread, Instagram or other outlets. If you have tea friends that you think would have fun with it, let them know too. Every time I do blind tastings, even though I have had the teas before, I usually get it pretty wrong :D It should be super fun!

Let me know if you have any questions, and I look forward to sharing tea with you!

Noah
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Victoria
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Fri May 31, 2019 5:48 pm

Sounds like a great idea. Look forward to trying your samples out :) .
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debunix
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Fri May 31, 2019 7:38 pm

Ordered the sampler, and a few other things. Looking forward to the blind tasting!
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Dresden
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Fri May 31, 2019 11:32 pm

This sounds fantastic! I am really looking forward to this!
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Brent D
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Sat Jun 01, 2019 7:14 pm

Thanks for the opportunity.
Looking forward to trying
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Victoria
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Mon Jun 03, 2019 4:05 pm

Got the blind tasting sampler + a few aged and heavy roast oolong to check out 🍃. This tasting reminds me of Chip’s TC OTTI’s.
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Dresden
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Mon Jun 03, 2019 5:40 pm

Victoria wrote:
Mon Jun 03, 2019 4:05 pm
This tasting reminds me of Chip’s TC OTTI’s.
Those were my thoughts exactly and precisely why I am so stoked for this event! :mrgreen:

The OTTIs introduced me to so many wonderful teas that I otherwise would not have tasted.
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debunix
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Tue Jun 04, 2019 1:59 am

Samples are here! Too late to try tonight.
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Dresden
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Tue Jun 04, 2019 9:37 am

Thursday is going to be glorious. Both my Floating Leaves samples and my YS order are supposed to be delivered that day! :mrgreen:
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Dresden
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Wed Jun 05, 2019 1:55 pm

Samples are in! I love it when packages come in earlier than estimated. :D
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debunix
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Fri Jun 07, 2019 9:51 am

Sometimes you have to improvise. I didn't have available the usual tools for a proper tasting session with weighed tea, matching porcelain gaiwans and cups, so I did the best I could with available resources: I infused leaves in matching glass cups grandpa-style, and these splendid teas rose to the challenge well. It's quite appropriate because I so often drink this sort of Taiwanese tea grandpa-style in a chawan, so it is quite relevant to my usual gaoshan experience.
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It was all delicious, and a good promotion for the quality of Floating Leaves teas (my first experience with their selections), but I'll save my notes for a bit, while keeping some of each sample in reserve to compare again after the reveal.
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Tillerman
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Tue Jun 11, 2019 4:02 pm

Oops - I goofed! I posted my photo and comments on the "What Oolong Are You Drinking" thread.
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FloatingLeaves
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Wed Jun 12, 2019 4:26 pm

This is awesome! I'm glad to see so many people got the sampler. Debunix, I like your improvised setup. Looks like something that would happen at my house.

This is super fun to see how people are liking the teas. It's something we do in the shop, make kind of a class/club meeting out of it twice a year. I had to look at the names to pack bags last week, so unfortunately I now know which is which. But Shiuwen still doesn't know, so she will be going in blind on the 18th. I don't really expect people to guess too precisely, but I'm hoping it can open the door to new oolongs that people may not have tried because of the name. A friend on IG said "A is fancy, B is farmer's tea, and C has a lot of stems." or something along those lines :D I think that's so excellent and also so cute. Look forward to hearing more impressions.

I'm curious, what is Chip's TC OTTI? A cursory google just directed me back to this thread.

-Noah
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debunix
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Wed Jun 12, 2019 8:52 pm

This evening I'm going to do another small session, but this time with a scale, to be sure that my first impression's weren't biased by the actual quantity of tea that I used.
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Dresden
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Wed Jun 12, 2019 10:06 pm

FloatingLeaves wrote:
Wed Jun 12, 2019 4:26 pm
I'm curious, what is Chip's TC OTTI? A cursory google just directed me back to this thread.

-Noah
It is something Chip had organized on the old forums. It was called the OTTI (Official Tea Tasting Initiative). Essentially he would select a type of tea and acquire a selection of 4-5 high grade teas in that category that people may not have access to due to a variety of reasons (price for example). He would then divide the tea (and cost) up between the numbers of participants. We would then share our tasting notes on each of the teas in an official thread. It was great fun, but a lot of work on Chip's part.

It would eventually evolve into not only tea, but also handcrafted teaware, such as a Hagi OTTI.
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