Fun and FlirTea

Last weekend, I was finally able to breathe through my nose again and, thus, was able to TASTE things again. What a relief it was (and is)! As a special treat to myself, I had my first side-by-side(-by-side) tasting of the same kind of tea from multiple vendors/sources.

(I’m about to go on a bit of a tangent, so if you want to skip ahead to my actual comparisons, click here!)

You know what… somehow I think I’ve managed to write this blog so far without really discussing what types of teas are my personal favorites. I’ve always enjoyed a nice black tea blend (especially the British blends so common in the UK) and oolong has worked its way up my charts in more recent months. Sometimes pu-erh is my favorite, but at the moment my tea life is dominated by oolong – more specifically, it’s dominated by Da Hong Pao (Big Red Robe) oolongs.

My first experience with Da Hong Pao was within the last few months. I received a glorious box of tea in the mail from my brother (currently living in Wuhan, China). I knew he was sending a package, but thought it was going to be quite small with a few samples for me to try. Boy am I glad I was wrong! It was a larger box than I expected and every last inch of it was PACKED with tea and teaware! It’s true… my brother is amazing.

In any case, one of the teas was listed on his helpful notecard as “Da Hong Pao: An oolong from Fujian across the strait from Taiwan – Spicy red flavor.” The idea of a “spicy red flavor” in tea was extremely intriguing to me and I ended up loving it. Since then, I picked up an oolong sampler set from Verdant Tea which included the Wuyi Mountain Big Red Robe and enjoyed some tea at Vital Tea Leaf where I ended up bringing home a good amount of their Aroma Red Robe.

I had read a bit about how one of the great ways to really develop your palate with tea is to have side-by-side tastings of the same tea type from different sources to get a solid feel for how the flavors can vary. I had wanted to do this ever since and was super excited when I realized I had 3 different Da Hong Pao teas in my cupboard!

And now… onto the actual comparisons! (more…)

I wholeheartedly admit that I fail this week. Sorry!

While I have my Monday NovelTea and Friday Photo ready and scheduled for the week, my more formidable post (about Rooibos and Honeybush… just you wait until you see the post title next Tuesday. It’s a good’un!) has been postponed to next week because I’ve been gnarly sick until just the past day or so! (This guy just below is demonstrating how I’ve felt for the past 10 days!)

The worst part about my super cold wasn’t the perpetual cough, the stuffy nose, and the headaches – it was the fact that I couldn’t indulge in my favorite relaxation technique… drinking tea.

I discovered this unfortunate fact the first day of my sickness by thinking, “Oh dear! I seem to be getting a cold. The best possible thing I can think of to make this feel better is a lovely pot of tea.” Upon making this pot of tea and beginning to sip it down, I realized that the general astringency from the black tea seemed to agitate my throat further, bringing upon me another coughing fit. I later discovered that even smoother teas led to a similar response, so I had to give it up.

Not to mention the fact that with how stuffed up my nose was, I could hardly taste my food, nonetheless the subtleties of tea!

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Before I get into the discussion on oolong tea, let’s take a step back and crack up a wee bit about that title. If you don’t get it, say it out loud with a really bad, stereotypical asian accent. (I swear I’m not racist. I just appreciate a bad pun… emphasis on bad.) Got it now? You can thank FyreTyde of A Koala Tea Blog (get it!?) for this gem.

In any case, back to the story of tea and – more specifically – oolong tea.

One day, my brother and I were wandering the streets of Kunming talking about tea. I mentioned how much I enjoy oolong teas and he started laughing and told me, “The Chinese make jokes about how foreigners love oolong because it’s a naturally sweeter tea and foreigners like sweet things more than they do” (not necessarily an exact quote).

This conversation remained in the back of my mind every time I read about, found, or tasted an oolong tea. Since I was on a bit of a ginseng oolong kick at the time, this seemed especially on point. I remember one day on Tea Chat, I was asking for some advice on what teas to order and from where. I said I was partial to oolong teas and it was suggested to select a sampler pack from Life In Teacup.

It was upon receiving a few Dong Ding oolongs and a nice Tie Guan Yin sample that I experienced my first truly natural oolong tea. It was exciting and leafy. The flavor was herbaceous and complex. It tasted somewhat roasted and delicious to me. It did not carry the same kind of sweetness that I had come to expect of oolongs, so it was both shocking and exciting.

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