Doke Rolling Thunder

The second of the Doke teas I brought to work this week. For some reason best known only to me, I tend not to drink oolongs at home. I guess because in the morning I drink black tea, and then in the evening I’m usually looking for a herbal or rooibos blend before bed. I’m at work the rest of the time, or at home and completely exhausted.

So anyway. I’ve been meaning to try this one, and work seemed to be the best place to achieve that. I followed the recommended parameters, and gave 2 tsp of leaf 4 minutes in water cooled to about 170. The liquor is golden yellow, and has very little aroma.

It’s similarly light in flavour. The first sip seemed very delicate to my tastes, and I couldn’t actually detect that much other than a vague sweetness. Successive sips bring out a gentle apricot note, maybe a tiny touch of raisin. Burnt sugar very slightly. On the whole, though, I’m surprised by how mild this one actually is. It reminds me more of a white tea than an oolong. It’s very smooth, though, with no bitterness or astringency, so I might try slightly hotter water or a slightly longer brew time to try and coax a little more strength into my next cup.

For some reason I was just really set on ordering this tea! I don’t know if it was the name or what, but I had to have it. And it was really inexpensive, so that’s always a good motivator! The leaves are quite beautiful – they’re long and thin. There are large twisted leaves that are almost black, and then there are also silver tips which are smaller and thinner. I didn’t get much of a dry scent from this tea, just a vague sweetness and a bit of hay perhaps.

The brewed aroma, however, was very present! Definite dark, tart dried fruit notes, perhaps raisin or prune with some tart cherry. I also get a strong molasses scent – but it’s closer to black strap molasses, you know, the really strong stuff. Yum, the first thing I taste is molasses too, mixed with a bit of burnt sugar. It’s definitely a milder molasses, and super delicious! I also get the lovely dark, tart dried fruit note from the aroma. This tea just seems to be a lot of my favorite flavors from dark oolongs, all mixed together! As the sip progresses, I start to get a slightly creamy toasted nut flavor that really lightens it up. And behind it all, there’s that mellow autumn leafiness that I’ve found in every oxidized oolong I’ve had so far.

Really, a very lovely tea! My only comment is that as this tea cools, the molasses and fruit flavors start to wane in favor of the autumn leaf, and a little bitterness creeps up. So be sure to drink it hot. :)

Found this in a stash I took to work to try. Initial scent of the dry leaf was very Darjeelingy. I suspect my temp was a bit too high for this but I didn’t have a way to measure at work. To me, this tasted very much like a Darj as well. Dry, bit of muscatel notes, hint of sweetness and light fruit. It was a little bitter though and that’s why I suspect my water was too hot. I wouldn’t turn this down but I haven’t decided yet if I need to order some to have on hand.

DeliriumsFrogs is the best friend a girl could want—she sent me a care package loaded with goodies (import chocolate bars!!), including this tea, just because she noticed I was curious about it. :D She is a master empath and I love her.

It doesn’t surprise me one bit this is a Butiki offering—it’s subtly beautiful and quite unusual. You know right away it’s not a black tea—it brews up a gorgeous bright light orange hue—but something about it tends to make one think of certain special Darjeelings without actually tasting just like one. There’s this nutty, almost savory yet also still sweet quality to it that reminds me a lot of some of the best green teas, but a floral note too that again, brings to mind the muscatel wonder of a Darjeeling without actually being that note precisely. And amazingly, there is in fact a tobacco note—not smoke, mind you, but unlit tobacco. And yet there’s nothing really exactly woody or grassy here. The body is marvelously silky, and there’s a cleanness to the end of the sip I quite enjoy.

The dry tobacco’s what sets this apart most, I think, and it works wonderfully with the floral and nutty elements, and especially the silkiness. This isn’t a tea to drink while distracted—it’s got a lot of unusual stuff going on, and deserves full attention. It’s an experience more than a blank comfort, if that makes sense; it reminds me of some of the perfumes I’ve sampled recently that are complex and special, more than mere adornment. And yet it’s not hard to drink at all, not “avant garde”. I feel lucky to have this chance to experience it.

I’m drinking my last teaspoon of this right now…
I only used 1 tsp for 8oz of water (since that’s all I had left), so I bumped up the temp to 180F and did the first steep for 4 min.
The cup was lighter than what I’m used to from this oolong (as expected, since I used less leaf than usual), with less bitterness and increased sweetness.
The second steep was still 180F, but for 7 minutes this time. The liquor was the exact colour of golden syrup in the jar (my jar was sitting right next to the cup…lol)… so beautiful! The taste was honey with the slightest bit of mineral at the end.
What a lovely cup for my first tea of the day. :)

Balcklog/sipdown…I had this a few days ago, thanks to Cavocorax and I do seem to remember liking it. It was light, but has some sweet notes to it, but I’m afraid I don’t remember exactly. I only had enough for one serving, and I made two steeps of this for work.

Like I said, it was pleasant and tasty enough, but I can’t recall specifics about the taste.