TeaLife Hong Kong

Delicious – I would happily drink this all day. Roasty and very smooth, feels buttery in the mouth. I see what the description means by a little sourness – this comes in at the end and is not at all unpleasant.

Drank from a gaiwan, starting with very short steeps (5-10s) as it was picking up colour and smell instantly for the first couple, then lengthening.

Felt I’d finally given the puerh from my Tealife HK order some time to air out and acclimate, so it was time to start tasting.

Did 7g of this one, quick wash and flash steep. The liquor started out fairly amber in color, with a bit of a mushroomy taste, but light and clean overall. The texture was smooth and a bit airy.

Busy times at work interrupted my session, so I returned to this tea two days later and was met with a redder liquor, similar aroma with more of a piney flavor. It also had a bit of a grapefruit-like bitterness and some enjoyable sweetness.

Very enjoyable, and a very valuable tasting experience for me!

While sick on Saturday I remembered that I still had some of this sample left. I threw the rest of it (a 10 gram chunk of roasted orange, oolong and herbs caked together) into my kyusu and steeped this all weekend, including Monday when I stayed home sick. The chunk wasn’t even falling apart and still had flavor after all that so I brought it to work Tuesday. I’ve been grandpa-ing it for the past two days. That is 5 days of steeping so far.

No joke, this tea is a beast when it comes to longevity, it’s soothing, and it’s got a distinct taste without being overwhelmingly medicinal. I am seriously considering buying a full orange since it’s pretty well priced and can be resteeped so many times.

I knew that I wanted to give this one a go at home, so I waited until the weekend to try it with rhinkle. As recommended, I steeped this in a larger pot that I have—a porcelain kyusu—and more or less went at it western style.

It doesn’t take long to tell that it’ll be an interesting experience. This tea smells like maple syrup with a hint of citrus. The first steep tastes a bit like an aged oolong with a medicinal twist. Quite interesting considering this is really not old at all. The texture starts out a bit syrupy, as well, with a slight sweetness at the end that I assume is probably licorice.

I only get to steep this out once before I have to head out, but I steep it again in the evening and then brought the leaves in to work today, where I’ve steeped it a few more times. The leaves still seem to be nowhere close to fully opening up, and I’m still getting a very nice aroma off of the liquor.

I’m not sure of the exact blend of herbs in this, but they remain pretty consistently apparent across steeps. I decide to take a whiff of the leaves and they smell super roasty! Almost like char. Funny enough, this doesn’t carry over into the flavor at all.

I like this one, and could definitely see it being a nice go to for when feeling under the weather, or even when I just want to drink something in a larger quantity to warm up. No one flavor in this is too overwhelming for me and it’s just soothing and comforting to drink. I think it’s at least worth a try for anyone interested!

Second of the samples that I got that I’m getting around to trying.

The dry leaves smell quite chocolatey, and I proceed with this session without doing a wash since the leaves aren’t tightly rolled or anything. The darkness of the liquor from the very first steep is shocking. I’ve never had an oolong that steeps out so dark!

The texture is extremely smooth, and the flavor is a blend of dark chocolate and roast, though it lacks any harshness whatsoever. One steep has a very sweet finish, the next a slight sourness, the next simply clean and smooth.

Overall, I’ve enjoyed this one, and I’m pretty sure I can get some more out of it, so I’ll come back to it tomorrow.

This is my first time trying something from TeaLife HK, and I’ve really been looking forward to it. Since I ordered a bunch of samples I’m doing smaller sessions with these, so I put about 5 grams in the gaiwan. There’s not a very strong aroma off the dry leaves, but I do get a faint whiff of roast and minerals.

The aroma of the roast really emerges with a quick wash to wake the leaves up, and the liquor is a lightish brown in steep one.

The flavor starts out as sweet roasted nuts, light in flavor—clearly the tea is still waking up—and there is a hint of butter in the aftertaste.

The brown darkens in steep two, with notes of chocolate emerging. rhinkle is getting mint, which I also get a hint of at the bottom of the cup, but not with any cooling sensation, just the actual raw flavor of chocolate mint leaves.

These flavors strengthen and sweeten in steep three and last pretty much throughout the rest of the session. Definitely enjoyed this!

Tea swap sample

I may have liked it less (or more?) if my sinuses weren’t out of control, but it helped relieve some issues considering taste. So, with that said, I can only rate it upon my session today.

This is an outstanding tea. The vendor, Tealife Hong Kong, is one of our own in the Steepster community, who is making some unique Hong Kong teas available to us. I purchased 4 oolongs. Today I sampled the first, the Hong Kong-Roasted High Fire Three Stamp Shuixian. I am a big fan of roasty oolongs, so I was excited to try this. On the website, the picture of the brewed tea looked like shu, and it was described as having an uber roast. All of this made me very interested…

The website description of this tea is spot on. The first steep was like thick chocolate soup, with a touch of astringency that was perfectly balanced. It tasted of raisins and cinnamon. Velvety smooth. The roast is all about bringing out new and interesting flavors rather than creating a roasty flavor. You can tell this tea was roasted by a craftsman, it is a deep dark brew. Very complex flavor profile, it already tastes almost like an aged oolong in some respects. This is going to be an excellent tea to store for aging. The tea energy was popping – I am so wired right now after only two steeps that I had to put it down and wait until I calm down a bit. I’m posting this in the meantime so I don’t know how this will steep out, but the description says I should get maybe 4 good steeps. This is a big tea…

Liquid Proust, I bet you will enjoy this one…

I will be purchasing more to age. I’m in love…