Eco-Cha Artisan Teas

This tea is wonderful. Tasted immediately after their generic JX, I think I enjoy it about as much, although I believe this is higher quality tea. This one is much more floral and has a more noticeable, lingering buttery aftertaste and hou yun. However, this one is over twice the cost of the generic version.

The more interesting comparison to me is to their other Alishan. This is much richer and fuller feeling, while the other is lighter, crisper and juicier. Cool to see how vastly different the two are in profile. While their website does not list the cultivar for their other Alishan, I believe it’s safe to assume it is Qing Xin, as the majority of Taiwanese high mountain oolongs are made with that cultivar. And these two teas are from the same area and (I think) made by the same farmer, so the only significantly different variable is cultivar. This tea is like a bold, buttery chardonnay, while the other is akin to a juicy, light gewürtztraminer.

No bitterness or astringency. Medium sweetness (a bit more than generic version). Longevity is 10 infusions.

This was my last sample from Eco-Cha, and they have become one of my favorite vendors, along with Farmerleaf, Verdant, and Yunomi. My ONLY complaint is that they would provide the same detailed information on cultivar and location for ALL of their teas on their website and indicate the harvest on the bag (I bought right before/as the Spring 2023 teas were coming out).

Harvest: Winter 2022
Location: Ruili Village, Meishan Township, Chiayi County (1000 m elevation).

Dry Leaf: Floral, cream.
Wet Leaf: Floral, vegetal.
Flavor: Cream, butter, floral, sweet, vanilla.

I’m giving this 90 points not because it deserves it by the flavor, but because it achieves that flavor at $0.07/g, which is outstanding! This is incredibly smooth, thick, and flavorful at that price point. Definitely more refined and complex than What-cha’s Mei Shan JX.

No bitterness or astringency. Medium-low sweetness. Mouthfeel is buttery and pretty thick. Longevity is 8-9 infusions.

Harvest: Winter 2022?
Location: Songboling (elevation 400 m).

Dry Leaf: Cream, butter.
Wet Leaf: Same.
Flavor: Butter, cream, honey, sweet, fruit, vegetal.

Another great tea from Eco-Cha. At this price point, it’s wonderful.

No bitterness or astringency. Flavor is very floral, but not overwhelmingly so. Aftertaste and mouthfeel are fairly thick and very fragrant, floral, and perfumey. Minimal sweetness.

Harvest: Spring 2022
Location: Songboling (400 m elevation)
Cultivar: Si Ji Chun (Four Seasons)

Dry Leaf: Floral.
Wet Leaf: Spinach.
Flavors: Floral, rose, green apple, cream.

First GABA oolong and I’m glad to try this type of tea. Apparently, the tea is fully oxidized like black teas, but made via an intensive oolong like process.

I don’t get all of the apricot, dark fruit, or papaya flavors that others get according to reviews on the Eco-Cha website, although I do get undertones of banana. To me, the predominant flavor is gingerbread and graham crackers.

Very sweet (though not as much as yesterday’s moonlight white), with ever so mild bitterness and no astringency. Mouthfeel is unimpressive, but hui gan is nice. Longevity is 6-8 infusions. Overall, the tea is very nice, but the flavor lacks depth and structure. I also wish that, as with some other teas I’ve tried from Eco-Cha, this one had information about its location and cultivar.

Harvest: Fall 2022
Location: ??? (400 m elevation).

Dry Leaf: Ginger, gingerbread, graham crackers.
Wet Leaf: Ginger snaps.
Flavor: Ginger, gingerbread, graham crackers, banana bread, sweet, cream.

Having never tried a Li Shan oolong before, I have nothing to compare this to. However, I am aware of its prestige among the Taiwanese oolong mountains. Given its reputation and price, I must confess that I am disappointed in this tea. It’s a great tea, but does not live up to my expectations. The taste is not as complex as I would expect at this price point.

No bitterness or astringency. Fairly thick mouthfeel. Pleasant, easy drinker. Aftertaste of cream spinach and hou yun is like a piece of melted cheese resting on the back of the tongue. Longevity is 8-10 infusions.

For the price, their Alishan is better IMO. That said, the flavor profiles are similar and this tea is much richer and has a better mouthfeel and aftertaste.

Harvest: Winter 2022.
Location: Li Shan, Heping District, Taichung City
Cultivar: Qing Xin

Dry Leaf: Floral
Wet leaf: Same
Flavors: Floral, butter, cream, cheese, spinach, sweet, lemon.

I’m just back from a two week vacation in Europe and man, did I miss tea! First new tea I’ve tried on my return and the third from Eco-cha. This one is objectively great, but quite floral for my tastes. Much cleaner, crisper, and more complex than the Alishan I tried from TeaVivre.

Mouthfeel is full and creamy. Longevity is 8-10 infusions. No bitterness or sweetness. Would probably be hard to overbrew this. Drop brewed and the parameters were fine.

Harvest: Winter 2022? Can’t remember.
Location: Ruili Village, Meishan Township, Chiayi County (1200 m elevation).

Dry Leaf: Floral, vegetal.
Wet leaf: Same.
Flavors: Floral, butter, cream.

This is what yancha strives to be, IMO. Best roasted oolong I’ve tried. A perfect tea for fall/winter.

Medium sweetness with no bitterness or astringency. Mouthfeel is toasty and smoky. Nice hui gan. Longevity is ~8 infusions.

Another great tea from Eco-cha! They are super impressive so far. Their price-to-quality ratio seems pretty insane too! Will be buying more of this come fall/winter.

Harvest: Winter 2022
Origin: Yonglong Village, Lu Gu Township, Nantou County (elevation 700 m).
Cultivar: Qing Xin
Roast: Heavy but tastes medium?

Dry Leaf: Malt, wheat, bread, dark chocolate.
Wet Leaf: Same
Flavor: Toast, dark chocolate, hazelnut, coffee, smoke, sweet.

IM IN LOVE! This is perfection. One of the most complex teas I’ve tried. Flavors are plentiful and they pop into existence as the tea sits in your mouth. That said, the most predominant flavors to my tongue are papaya and cream. Even with so much complexity and flavor, there is NOTHING harsh about this tea. No bitterness or excessive flavor. Mild astringency develops starting at infusion 3. Yields ~10 infusions.

Drop brewed this beauty and I think the parameters were fine. Could potentially push the heat more in the middle infusions, but hard to believe this could get better :).

Mouthfeel is creamy and thick. Hui gan is strong and lasts many minutes. Hou yun is full and like rolling an “r.” Headiest oolong I’ve tried, and a cha qi that I enjoy. Relaxing, day-dreamy qi. Medium-high sweetness.

My first Shan Lin Xi (translates as Pine Forest Stream) and I’m thoroughly impressed. This batch comes from the Fanzaitan area specifically. I can’t claim to get any floral or pine notes as others have mentioned.

Do my eyes deceive me? Is this tea really so cheap? I’ll be buying this by the barrel. Thank you, Eco-cha, and I SO look forward to trying the other samples from your shop.

Harvest: Winter 2022
Origin: Fanzaitan, Shan Lin Xi (elevation 1400 m).
Cultivar: Unspecified, but usually Qing Xin.

Dry Leaf: Dried apricot, dried pineapple.
Wet Leaf: Apple pie.
Flavors: Cream, cucumber, broccoli, sugar, sweet, pineapple, coconut, sugar, papaya.

Leafhopper sent me this tea, so thanks!
Apparently, it’s quite old tea, but two of those three notes are “quite new”. And I almost never toss tea out, and never without trying it first.

I had almost 5 grams (4.75 gr to be exact); used all leaf for single gongfu session. Steeped as Daylon did, that’s: 25, 35, 25, 45, 50, 70, 90 (seconds), 3 min.

I read also his note as well Leafhopper’s, and I agree with both of them. But one more year in this tea and flavours were a bit more faded I think, or my leaf/water ratio was different, as I was steeping that 5 grams in 125 ml gaiwan.

First notes were indeed fruity, not sure if I point out papaya, but tropic fruits were there for sure. Second steep made those notes even stronger, third was weaker again and in fourth it was gone completely.

Instead those fruits a chocolate notes apperead. However again, they were quite flat, and while longer steeps produced more darker chocolate, some steeps were like a milk chocolate and as well a little waxy chocolate for me, which is something I really don’t like. Maltiness in those later steeps were stronger and stronger and in the last steep it was just malt and nothing else.

Sadly, I don’t noticed any pastry notes which I was looking forward to.

I can imagine it was awesome tea, but sadly it seems it has suffered by age a lot and as well as my not so perfect storage did not helped either. I have checked a few shops which carry it out here — two of them not showing harvest year (which seems to be crucial), two of them are having prices out of my range.

Spring 2022.

Last tea from my Eco-Cha order. Fairly good high mountain oolong with a decidedly floral flavor and fruity accents. Notes of hyacinth, daffodils, and gardenia. Light-medium bodied yet still coats the mouth nicely. It’s a resilient tea that handles any water temperature like a champ. Boiling water and long steep times never led to any bitterness.

While good, I found this one a bit lacking compared to other Li Shans I’ve tried. It had a somewhat generic high mountain taste, started fading after only a few steeps, and the flavor and aromatics disappeared quickly after opening.

Steeped this in my tea thermos on my way to work the other morning. 2g in a 10oz thermos, grandpa style using 205 F water.

This was a lovely experience all around. Flowery with a fudgey, medjool-date like sweetness that lingers on the palette. The roast is very light and accentuates the natural fruitiness of the tea.

As Daylon noted, this needs more leaf and higher temperature for best results. I had to brew it close to boiling to get any flavor out of it.

Spring 2022 harvest.

First time trying Eco-Cha’s Wenshan Baozhong and it did not disappoint. This is an all around excellent tea.

Out of the bag, the dry leaves are beautifully aromatic and fresh with a fragrant aroma of stonefruit, sweep sap, and flowers. Lilac and balsamic aromas appear in the wet leaf. It has that classic Baozhong lilac forward taste. This is accented with notes of water lily, bergamot, and orchid. Clean and medium bodied with lingering perfume in the finish. The top notes disappear and the flavor lightens when topped off but still very pleasant.

I mostly steeped it grandpa style @ 190-195 F topping off with boiling water. I preferred it this way to gongfu which was richer but missing some subtleties.

Spring 2022 harvest.

First time trying Eco-Cha’s Wenshan Baozhong and it did not disappoint. This is an all around excellent tea.

Out of the bag, the dry leaves are beautifully aromatic and fresh with a fragrant aroma of stonefruit, sweep sap, and flowers. Lilac and balsamic aromas appear in the wet leaf. It has that classic Baozhong lilac forward taste. This is accented with notes of water lily, bergamot, and orchid. Clean and medium bodied with lingering perfume in the finish. The top notes disappear and the flavor lightens when topped off but still very pleasant.

I mostly steeped it grandpa style @ 190-195 F topping off with boiling water. I preferred it this way to gongfu which was richer but missing some subtleties.

I think this is the first tea that I’ve almost exclusively cold steeped. I find that I actually prefer roasted oolongs this way. It brings out more of their sweetness and caramelized flavors and less of the roast.

For a budget tea, this one really impressed me with its depth of flavor. Elegant, brown sugar sweetness with notes of marzipan, raisin, and crème caramel. It’s fine hot steeped, but the roast is a little more assertive and loses its subtleties.

I tried the green version of this tea a few years ago and it was okay. The roasting takes it to a whole new level, unveiling real complexity and nuance.

I sent this tea to Daylon a while ago and thought I’d made a note about it, but I guess not. This is a summer 2015 harvest that has been languishing in my tea museum for seven years, so most of the tropical fruit notes mentioned in earlier reviews have dissipated before I could enjoy them. Why pay for aged tea when you can age it yourself, right? :P I’m following Daylon’s gongfu parameters to see if I can get more out of this tea, steeping 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml porcelain pot at 195F for 25, 35, 25, 45, 50, 70, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.

The dry aroma is of dark chocolate, cherry, pastry, wood, and malt. The first steep has notes of cherry, raisin, dried fruit, cocoa, pastry, honey, wood, and malt, with hints of maple syrup and some bitterness. I get whisps of papaya in the second steep, plus cherry, darker chocolate, wood, and pleasant sourness. The fruit is less noticeable in the next couple steeps, with honey, pastries, wood, malt, brown sugar, and tannins becoming more prominent. The tea is also quite drying. The next couple steeps retain their cocoa, honey, and pastry notes, but veer more toward wood, malt, earth, and minerals. The session ends with notes of honey, hay, malt, earth, and minerals.

This is an enjoyable tea, though I think I would have found more of the flavours I gravitate toward if I hadn’t waited so long to drink it. It fades rather early and can get a little drying in later steeps.

From the depths of the Tea Museum curated by Leafhopper, comes this 2016 Taiwanese Wuyi black tea.

Dry leaf base aroma is earthy-woody and sweet like wood buried within damp humus. The mid- to high notes are of red sweet potatoes baked with honey and nutmeg, a hint of dried and sweetened papaya.

First whiffs of the warmed leaf smell like pure honey soaking with nutmeg and golden raisins. Beneath that is “tea”, nectairine, passionfruit and plums. Overall, It’s a very intense woody-earthy, spicy-sweet aroma.

When I finally get around to drinking the tea instead of burying my nose in the leaf, it comes across first with the impressions of “tea”, a flattened malty-suede effect. Honeyed spring water follows and is chased by nutmeg, leather, plum and rosewood with barky tannins. A decadent apricot-squash-cream aftertaste comes out, dessert-like yet dense and savory. It is quick to present but morphs at the pace of poured molasses. and sticks to every surface before giving way to something more earthy. Infusions beyond the third hit me with sweet nutmeg and allspice top notes, while hanging on to the tea-malt-suede flat character. it takes 7 infusions for the tea to fade into something woody.

This is an incredibly aromatic tea with gorgeous spice and sweet taste and accompanying deeply warming energy. I’m not sure I’ve had a tea with those notes so prominent. Most bug-bitten Taiwanese blacks have a similar profile but this one is truly at another level of spice and sweet. It does suffer from that flat, suedey effect, though. Regardless, this tea is a treat! A tea I could devote to the month of November.

Leafhopper, this one is making me drool. Most of the Shanlinxi blacks I’ve had lean more towards papaya, and while this certainly has it, the tea gong fu or western is extremely thick and sweet. Western so far consisted of 3 min that became 4 min, 3 minutes again, and 4-5 min again. Gong fu was 25, 35, 25, 45, 50, 70, 90, 3 min.

Either way, it reminds me of Cocoa Amore in some ways in a more pure form. This is easily the kind of tea I could live with, and which is actually harder to find online for an affordable price. My only complaint is that it’s not long lasting. I’ve not been able to get it more than 6 steeps gong fu as it lost strength after steep 5, and it begins to really lose lustre after steep 3 western. I’d easily rate this 96, but the fading quality puts it at a 90 for me. Definitely my favorite black of the collection I got so far.

Finished this off yesterday-thank you Leafhopper! It would only last two-three solid steeps each session, 10, 20, 30, and then malty woodiness. The flavors were forward and had heavy honey, malt, some chocolate, dried papaya, a little bit of passion fruits, herbs, wood, nectarine hints, and of course, tea. It tasted like it was a ready boba with the brown sugar already in it, with a little bit of the Taiwanese fructose sweetness.

I liked this one quite a bit, and am glad I tried it.

Purchased as part of the Eco-Cha Tea Club sometime in 2016, this hongcha has spent too long in my tea museum. Its flavours are very soft and hard to coax out, and I have a feeling that’s due to age. I also laughed at the description of this as small leaf black tea, as the leaves of this tea are wiry and huge! I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 195F for 20, 15, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 90, 120, and 180 seconds.

The dry aroma is of rye bread, wood, honey, and cherries. The first steep has notes of rye bread, honey, malt, wood, minerals, and tannins, with aromas of cherry and raspberry that don’t make it into the cup. Mild raspberry appears in steeps two and three, and there’s a pronounced honey aftertaste. There could be some sugarcane in there too. The next couple steeps add raisins and spices. The tea fades into rye bread, wood, tannins, and minerals.

I wish I’d tried this tea when it wasn’t over six years old! It has some characteristics I associate with Taiwanese Assam (though I’m not sure this is actually an Assam tea), but I’ll be happy to see it leave my cupboard.

Better today and yesterday. I did short then long steeps and overwhelmed it a little. Today, I only did short steeps and the florals were more prominent. It was green, slightly grassy, and orchidy with some clear cardamom notes going on this time. Really cool tea. I’m not ready to rate it because it’s still so finicky. I’ve been so tempted to get Eco-Cha’s Yushan, but I have too many oolongs already.

I thought I’ve added or written about this one before. Guess I’ll write about it now, which maybe again.

I got this one because it was the same growers and roasters as the Phoenix Village Dong Ding that was in the club. This is a spring 2020 or 2021 crop, it the box notes the florals and dry fruit more than anything else.

I get those, but this tea is extremely tricky. Either I under leaf or over leaf this bad boy. Given Eco-Cha recommends a whopping 9 grams for western, this tea really needs to be pushed to coax out the full flavor. Every session has been refined, but earlier teas would mostly give me vegetal impressions of fruit, florals, and honey. The honey notes were shy, and usually showed up later. Doing this tumbler style over does the tea, making it too vegetal, and too malty somehow, reminding me of those raw fruit based fruit rollups or That’s It! bars.

As I’ve kept the tea for a little bit, my dry leaves have breathed out. I get more florals and fruit, and less vegetal qualities lately. It’s not super forward, but it’s complex having shifting tones of mineral, macadamia, plumeria or lilac, maybe vanilla, and other florals under a swiss chard body. Western has been the better method so far because it draws out the flavors instead of forcing them out at once giving me more complex mugs that change flavors as it cools.

I’m not sure what to rate it, but maybe between the 80s and 90s. It’s got high marks for aroma, complexity, and individual notes, but it’s harder to brew than the Club’s counterpart of the same kind of tea. I like that it’s easy going and not astringent or super grassy, yet there are so many aspects that are easily missed or overwhelmed by other qualities. I do think this is a much higher quality tea in taste than I gave it credit for, yet it took me a while to get down to it. I still think I overspent when I got it. I am, however, thankful I got so much so I can play and experiment with it. I still recommend Eco-Cha, and especially recommend this for someone willing to do a professional tasting of it. I can easily see some one meditate with this tea, and drink it in one large cup, slurping in spoonfuls after a busy day.

From the vaults of the tea museum, here’s a Wuyi hongcha from the beginning of the Eco-Cha Tea Club in the spring of 2016. I’ll call it “aged” instead of neglected. I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 195F for 10, 12, 15, 18, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.

The dry aroma is of sweet potatoes, honey, raisins, earth, and medicinal herbs. The first steep has notes of raisins, plums, sweet potato, anise, earth, tannins, malt, sugarcane, wood, and spices, perhaps nutmeg. The plummy stonefruit is more prominent in the next steep, but so are the tannins and the astringency. The next couple steeps add cream and apricot, and I got a floral edge in one of my gongfu sessions. Fortunately, the medicinal character is gone, though there’s still sugarcane and faint anise in the aftertaste. The next few steeps have notes of spiced plum, raisins, squash, honey, cereal, tannins, earth, wood, grass, and minerals, with a nice honey/sugarcane aftertaste.

For such an old tea, this is complex and full of flavour. The honey and spices remind me of other Taiwanese black teas. I wonder if the strong raisins and stonefruit are due to aging, as they’re not noted in the few other reviews of this tea when it was younger. I’m sure Derk and Daylon will be able to add some nuances to this tasting note, as I’ve included it in their swap boxes!

I’ve had this sample for a while, and rediscovered it entombed in my White Lotus bag Whispering Pines sample as I was trying to find what happened to my other Zhao Zhou Jun Chiyabari black tea sample. Hysteric understates my mentality when trying to find my sample-because it was not where I thought I put it. So sifted through layers of my reused bags to see if I put it in a weird place, and I decided to finish off the whopping 7 grams I had of this at once in a full teapot using flash steeps.

I think this tea is underrated because it combines a higher oxidized tea with gardenia scenting. I wasn’t in love with it at first because it was cloying and bordering on tannic, but it’s grown on me as I’ve fallen in love with similarly profiled teas like Qilans. It is sweeter and ruddier, but I like it enough to at least have two cups of it. I get notes of incense in the dryleaf smell, and woody incense again in the taste, gardenia, brown sugar, and a little bit of tannin.

I still wouldn’t buy this, though I appreciate it now more than I have over two years ago.

This is from SkySamurai, quite a while ago now. Thank you! This has always been a puzzler for me. Even the name of this “small leaf” seems like a joke because the leaves here are HUGE. The flavor is on the lighter side — hints of peach possibly, but then wafts away until it is mostly mineral and cotton tasting. Maybe sweet hay turning into dried black cherry. I’m sure this tea is very old by now. Somehow with these flavor notes I’m making it sound both better but also worse? hmm… I don’t think even fresh leafed that this tea would have been something I would gravitate towards. It’s too light for me.
Steep #1 // 2 teaspoons for big mug // 21 minutes after boiling // 2 minute steep
Steep #2 // just boiled // 3 minute steep