Dayuling Premium High Mountain Oolong

10g sample weighed in at 10.8g. Decided to brew gong fu first, using 6.8g.

Dry tea looks nice, large-medium sized balls but quite a lot of dust and tiny pieces. Dry aroma is subtle light floral.

Gong fu style:
Filtered tap water at full boil, quick rinse.

1st infusion, full boil, 30 seconds. Aroma is light, sweet floral and vegetal. Aroma of wet leaves is honey and osmanthus. Tea flavor and mouthfeel all typical of high mountain oolong: osmanthus, honey, slightly vegetal and a long sweet finish. But not tasting anything magical like the best (supposed) Li Shan or Da Yu Ling teas I’ve had. Still, a very nice tea.

Cutting this review a bit short – subsequent infusions were very similar. It’s a very nice tea with a very nice long sweet finish and I don’t doubt them when they say it is from the 95k marker in Da Yu Ling. And very fairly priced at $34.99/56g. But we’re getting above the $5 per gong fu session mark and given the quality of some of their other less expensive teas I’m not sure I’ll be ordering a larger quantity of this one. It really is nice though. Still tasting that sweetness.

Yesterday, I received my first BTTC order. Thus far, I’ve already finished the Taiping HoKui freebie and later found myself perusing their website for a teapot. (Please, please nobody buy that blue one tonight!!) My hand ended up back in the shipping box on its own accord, as if it were non-chalantly possessed. It picked the most expensive 10g sample, a high mountain oolong, of which I have little experience. Bare with me. I’ll do my best to not make the review too long or convoluted.

April 2018 harvest. 5g, 100mL gaiwan, 195F. 10 second rinse followed by 9 steepings at 10/15/20/25/30/45/55/1m10s/1m30s and final truly spent steep at 2m15s.

Dry leaf: orchid, vanilla and butter at their best with a whiff of muted ceylon cinnamon.
Rinsed leaf: buttercream, orchid and vanilla.

The aroma of the leaf remained strong and stable in the first three steeps: orchid, vanilla, brown sugar, violet and collards with butter coming in on the second steep and cream on the third. The aroma of the liquor started off all sweet vanilla and orchid. The taste of the liquor had an underlying mineral and grass theme throughout, starting off with vanilla, orchid, very light ceylon cinnamon with the addition of butter and cream. Nice and silky with a light cooling sensation in the third steep. At this point, I found myself sweating and very relaxed.

In the fourth through sixth steeps, the aroma of the leaf was much the same as the first three but with the vanilla fading out. I’d say the collards became the prominent scent, accented strongly by orchid, cream, butter, lily, violet and a hint of lilac in fifth steep.

Here is where the aroma and taste of the liquor began changing with each steep. Fourth steep produced an aroma of orchid, lily, violet and cream and taste the same as the third. Noticed some salivation here. Fifth steep had the base of the fourth steep with the addition of both the pronounced scent and taste of honey. At this point, the liquor began thinning a bit, and I noticed both a light drying and slickness on the tongue. In the sixth steep, the aroma changed but still had the base orchid, lily, and violet. I also caught fleeting orange blossom and banana. The taste of the liquor here was mostly mineral and floral, backed up by lettuce and grass.

In the seventh steep, the aroma of the leaf began to fade into spinach with honied florals. The aroma of the liquor also began to fade into just orchid, cream. Butter and cream made a reappearance in the mouth.

The eight steep saw the appearance of pine and camphor? in the wet leaf in addition to the spinach and honey. Liquor aroma and taste continued a pleasant fade with orchid and honey in the nose and orchid, butter and mineral in the mouth.

The ninth steep produced a nice, light ending with leaf smelling of peas and wood, aroma of faint rose, apricot and orange blossom and taste of mineral, wood and butter. I tried a tenth steep at 2m15s to see what else I could pull but it literally produced hot water.

This tea is delightful with it’s dominating notes being very sweet, orchid/floral and creamy and possessing a silky mouthfeel. It was well backed by butter, pleasant dark vegetal notes, grass and a not-overbearing minerality. Like I said, I don’t have much experience with high mountain oolongs but this Dayuling seemed very balanced. Nothing was out of place and I feel that it ended on a good note. Good for a treat given its price and lack of longevity.

As of this afternoon, I can smell and taste again. I didn’t know how long that would last, so I decided to enjoy it while I could. That meant that it was time to break out a high mountain oolong. I had 4 grams of this tea left and decided to finish it off while I had the chance.

Naturally, I opted to prepare this tea gongfu style. After a quick rinse, I steeped all 4 grams of loose tea leaves in 4 ounces of 195 F water for 10 seconds. This infusion was followed by 11 subsequent infusions. Steep times for these infusions were as follows: 15 seconds, 20 seconds, 25 seconds, 30 seconds, 40 seconds, 50 seconds, 1 minute, 1 minute 15 seconds, 1 minute 30 seconds, 2 minutes, and 3 minutes.

Prior to the rinse, the dry tea leaves emitted subtle aromas of butter and orchid. After the rinse, I detected a pleasant mix of vanilla, butter, cream, and orchid scents. There was also a subtle hint of some kind of mild spice, but I could not place it. The closest I can get to describing it would be to compare it to sweet cinnamon. The first infusion produced a balanced bouquet with a slightly more pronounced vanilla presence. In the mouth, there were mild, balanced notes of cream, butter, vanilla, spice, and orchid underscored by a touch of grassiness. Subsequent infusions did not do all that much different. The vanilla, butter, and orchid impressions swelled. The impressions of grass were also slightly amplified. There was another kind of vegetal presence too. It may seem strange, but it reminded me of banana leaf. I got a hint of green plantain on a couple of these infusions too. The later infusions were typically mild and mellow, but with slightly more flavor than expected. There was not a ton of minerality to this tea. Instead, the later infusions emphasized a balance of mineral, cream, butter, and grass to go along with faint orchid and plantain notes.

I know my perspective may be skewed owing to my inability to do much with teas like this for quite awhile, but I greatly enjoyed this tea. It was not particularly busy or complex, but it had a great deal of charm. Though straight-forward, the blend of aromas and flavors on display was unique and instantly appealing. I also appreciated the texture. This tea had great body and was so silky in the mouth. I’m glad I had the opportunity to snag some of this before it disappeared for good.

Update: brewed it gongfu style and that slightly improved the taste but not by much. The real problem with this tea is it lacks depth/complexity of higher quality Taiwanese oolongs. I actually preferred the lower grade Alishan to this one.

Sipdown (119)!

Thank you Liquid Proust for the sample!

I’ve heard great things about Dayuling Oolong; and I’m very happy to finally get the chance to try one! The high, high altitude at which this tea is grown (greater than 2500 meters) and limited quantity that can be produced because of the geographical location are a giant part of what makes this tea so special. At $20 an ounce, this isn’t the priciest tea in my cupboard but it’s certainly up there – I can’t help but cross my fingers and hope it’s worthy of the price tag. Thankfully I’m not the one who paid for it.

I have to say, the leaf is very beautiful; dry the rolled up leaf gives off a very large, ‘thick’ appearance and has a weight in my hands. After the first infusion I could see why; the leaves are so giant – some of the biggest I’ve ever had the pleasure to brew up. Almost every single one is a completely full leaf, and I even picked out a stem that had not one, not two, not three, but FOUR completely intact leaves branching off it. Just stunning!

I certainly wasn’t going to squander this sample by Steeping it Western Style; so I enjoyed a lovely evening Gong Fu session. Sometimes I feel I can get a little stuck in my head when I’m drinking tea or doing Gong Fu in particular and I focus too much on the technical side of things while trying to pick apart flavour – and I didn’t want to do that with this tea so I just kept doing infusions without really taking physical notes; and I just kind of let the tea ‘speak to me’ while I drank it. It’s so delicate and fragile with very lovely, complex nuances! Teas grown at higher altitude tend to be more complex because, due to the altitude, they grow at a slower pace – and that comes through here for sure.

It’s quite a floral tea, that’s for sure – while the infusions I did blend together I remember the first couple had really lovely, pronounced floral notes of orchid, lily, and a bit of violet as well. Incredibly well balanced though; not ‘perfumey’, forced or over the top in the slightest. Other things I noticed were this very cool, crisp freshness. I kind of instinctively want to call that flavor ‘the smell before it rains’ but I don’t know if there’s a technical word for that. I know petrichor is defined as the smell of rainfall on dry soil/earth (and that’s my all time favourite smell) but this wasn’t quite that: it’s the smell of rain before any has actually fallen. No earthiness.

This was such a pleasant, relaxing tea though! I’m not sure how many infusions I got in total but it certainly lasted quite a while and made my evening magical. Probably well worth the price tag just to say I’d tried a Dayuling, but all in all a very delicious, serene taste experience too. I definitely felt a little tea drunk/buzzed afterwards.

I am really exhausted right now and I’m loving it. Being this busy makes me feel so alive and appreciate the moments in life where stillness occurs and there is time to just relax. Savoring that time wasn’t so easy when I was unemployed, so I’m glad to have some time to reflect on it.
It has been a great day as I am progressing at my job over these 9 hour shifts. Coming home to mow the lawn, cook, and read up on some legal issues with being an LLC (which was some BS scam letter that took 15 minutes to figure out) was actually fun. Now I’m sipping away at this beautiful tea while I prepare the gift bags for my sale next week for my birthday… purely because I can’t sit down and have tea with everyone in the world, so I figured a small way to give back is just that.

Anyways, this is wonderful and being tired while drinking this makes me feel high. My body is a bit worn because I’m in the mood to keep pushing after mowing the lawn. Sitting down and drinking this makes me feel amped with energy but not using it makes me just bug out a bit.

I’m happy and I’m quite glad to not just feel it but know it.

I was so excited when the owner of Beautiful Taiwan Tea announced he secured a small batch of DaYuLing and immediately bought a small sample of it. The question is, “Was it worth it?” Yes!

This is the first tea that I have got tea drunk off of the first steeping. I imagine if I drank the water I used to rinse the tea leaves I’d probably have gotten tea drunk off of that as well. Generally I avoid teas that make me feel drunk off of, but I may have to make an exception for this one in the future. I am only going to post my first four steepings, I got to twenty three and the tea felt like it still had more to give sadly I just had to much tea by then. I’ve had DaYuLings before, but none have tasted like this (I am starting to suspect those were not true DaYuLings) and the dry leaves looked fairly typical of a hand rolled oolong. The dry leaves had a slight floral scent.

After I rinsed the tea with boiling water, I steeped at 190 °F for one minute. Immediately I could smell a very strong orchid aroma. The liquor was a light yellow, but it was like syrup! The mouthfeel was so nice! I’ve had thick feeling tea before, but this was absolutely wonderful as it coated my throat. It was very buttery and it had a slight edamame taste, but it was very sweet. I got very tea drunk off this steeping.

For my second infusion I brewed at 190°F for one and half minutes. The aroma became more intensely floral (still mostly orchid, but there was some other flowery scents in there). The mouthfeel is slightly thicker and it is starting to become creamy. The taste is largely the same although it had honey notes this time rather than general sweetness.

Next I brewed at 195 °F for two minutes. The floral aroma started to become distinctly orchid and violet. The mouthfeel is still thick, but from here on it becomes slightly thinner with each infusion, although it was still creamy. This time I was getting a little roasted chestnut, there still was the edamame and honey notes to it and there was a mineral aftertaste.

For my fourth infusion I brewed at 200 °F. The aroma is starting to become more mellow, mostly violet by now, but there is a little spicyness now; still very creamy and has a pleasant feel. A new orchid flavor started to show here, the roasted chestnuts and honey from previous infusions are still there, but the edamame was gone completely.

In my subsequent infusions the chestnut started to wane and the floral and honey notes lingered on to the end. I loved this tea, it was very typical of the High Mountain Oolongs from beautiful Taiwan Tea, but there is something in it that I can’t quite put my finger on that makes it very different from BTT’s other teas. It might be my new favorite Taiwanese oolong. I can only imagine how the earlier harvests tasted. Definitly worth checking out; Taiwanese oolongs are always very easy to love and hard to hate, but this DaYuLing is simply amazing. My only advice is drink it slowly and savor it.

(More at: http://rah-tea.blogspot.com/2014/11/beautiful-taiwan-tea-dayuling-premium.html)