Brandy Oolong

Smells sweet and fruity. Brandy colored.

Received as part of the blind tea testing pack from story of my tea. It’s not something I would normally buy for myself but happy I tried it! Somewhere in between a light oolong and black tea, beautiful colour.

Summer Vacation! I first tried this oolong at my local favorite cafe (and the only decent place in town to get a cuppa), Twin Beans. I think it was my first oolong that was closer to the black tea spectrum, and I fell in love hard. Twin Beans sources all their tea from TeaSource, so I ordered some on my next TeaSource order.

3g brewed in 350ml 200F water in a gravity well infuser. This tea steeps up a ruby brown color, and has this really satisfying medium malty flavor, with nice baked bread notes. It’s also a very sweet tea, with notes of honey, but also a slight fruitiness, with subtle hints of raisins and baked cherries. It’s very smooth, and has a nice natural sweetness, and reminds me a lot of those smooth Chinese blacks with honey and stonefruit notes and no astringency; it’s hard to believe this is a Taiwanese oolong, since all the other Taiwanese oolongs I’ve had have been very light and green with highly floral/vegetal flavor profiles.

A nice, smooth, bready oolong that holds up to resteeping in western style brewing well. I still need to explore this one in gong fu, as well.

I ended up with two cups of this tea tonight, since I brought my work kettle home because every cup of tea I make at work tastes weird — sort of metallic and minerally. I just always assumed it had to be the water somehow, but today I brought the exact water I use at home, that came out of my home faucet, was filtered through my PUR pitcher, chilled in my fridge, and then put into a stainless steel water bottle, transported the 10 minute trip back to work, and immediately put into my kettle at work to make tea. And it still tasted bad! So I brought the kettle home tonight, and made two cups of Brandy Oolong, with my home kettle (an Epica-brand temperature control) and my work kettle (an Aicok-brand temperature control). I had descaled BOTH just a few weeks ago. The cup made from the Aicok kettle has a strange smell that the Epica kettle cup doesn’t… the tea still has that “mineral” sort of taste to me. I just can’t figure it out, since I’ve cleaned that kettle to spotless; it is cleaner than the Epica kettle, which still has some scale in it I’ve never been able to get out. At this point I’m wondering if I have to just buy another kettle for work since I can’t seem to stop un-tasting that weird taste…

Another tea I had as a sample and had to buy. I’ve passed over this before because of the name as I thought it was some sort of flavored tea, but one sip showed me how wrong I was. It’s very oxidized so it’s wonderfully dark but doesn’t have the astringency of a black tea. I found it to be a bit peachy without much roasted flavor. I was a little put off to the description mentioning Ruby 18, but after trying the two side by side they do share some of that complexity that makes Ruby 18 so wonderful just without any of the liqiorice notes.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BHPc2kMDrT9/

Smells like bread in both the leaves and the brew. If you know your culinary/linguistic history, it makes sense: we get the word ‘bread’ from the same word as ‘brew’. It tastes like bread, too, with almost no after taste. A good palette cleanser, as well as an enjoyable, no-nonsense tea. I rated this one more harshly in the paste, because of its simplicity, but as I’ve gained more experience in tasting tea, I’ve come to realize that simplicity is not the same as one-note. This tea is just a good taste with a complexity that is very well blended.
You know how when you make a soup, it tastes better the next day because the flavors have had a chance to marry? The same effect seems to be going on here, except the flavors of bread and whiskey have been married to produce something else entirely, something more elevated.

this is a dark oolong without the “toasty” notes usually found in dark oolongs. instead, it is sweet and smooth, tasting of honey and subtle peach, and overall tastes like black tea but without any of the dryness, bite, or astringency that a black tea usually has. a really really nice tea, and a good value. it seems like it should cost more than it does.

This tea is on the black side of oolongs. In fact, I read that Brandy Oolongs are oxidized from 85 to 90 percent. So if Pouchongs embody the green exteme of oolongs, Brandy Oolongs are at the other end. Personally, I loved the tea, and would rate it at the high end taking only my own tastes into account. But I share these teas (and the expense) with my aunt, and she didn’t like this one at all. The label and description on the site says this tea has a “phenomenal floral/stone fruit aroma.” My aunt doesn’t like flavored teas. I could swear I tasted peach in this. It definitely had a floral/fruity quality more pronounced than in an unflavored tea I’ve tried. Which is a lot of what I did like—and I suspect precisely what my aunt did. So, since I try to rate these to help me decide which teas to purchase again, I’m docking this so it’s just out of that high rated range. But personally, I thought it a winner.