Tag: Oolong Tea

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DavidsTea’s Magnolia Oolong

Magnolia Oolong by DavidsTea
Oolong Tea / Straight
$12.98 for 50g

First Impressions

Part of an online order from DavidsTea, Magnolia Oolong comes in a familiar silver pouch with a familiar label – blue for the fact that it’s an oolong tea. The packaging lets me know that Magnolia Oolong is an oolong tea from the Anxi region of Fujian Province, China, and the tea leaves have been scented with magnolia and jasmine blossoms.

The tea leaves are a beautiful range of green – from a light spring green to a dark hunter green. The leaves are tightly bunched, with a bright floral aroma to them. They truly smell lovely and inviting – almost as if you’re enjoying a small bouquet of flowers and they’re bringing you in for a whiff.

Preparation

DavidsTea recommends steeping Magnolia Oolong in 90°C (195°F) water for 4 to 5 minutes. I opted to an initial steep of Magnolia Oolong for 4 minutes.

First Taste

Magnolia Oolong steeps to a light golden yellow after the initial steep of the leaves. The tea itself is quite aromatic, with a light floral fragrance. The flavour of Magnolia Oolong is delightfully floral, the texture is smooth. There’s a floral sweetness, floral flavour, with a light creaminess at the tail end of each sip. The mouth texture is pleasant with a way of coating the mouth, and zero astringency with the water temperature that I used to steep it.

A Second Cup?

Resteeping Magnolia Oolong was a joy. I resteeped Magnolia Oolong a total of six times (seven steeps total), and added an additional 30 seconds for each subsequent steep. The colour of this tea deepens to a lovely golden yellow with a nice floral aroma and flavour. The creaminess of the tea is present through all the steeps, and becomes more buttery in flavour by the second resteep.

My Overall Impression

I loved DavidsTea’s Magnolia Oolong. The experience from smelling the leaf to steeping to drinking was a nice journey, which was capped off with the many resteeps of the same leaves until I couldn’t drink anymore. The leaves resteep beautifully and the flavour of it was excellent throughout all of the steeps. I find the combination of magnolia and jasmine to be just a pleasant experience, because it made for a light, sweet floral cup of tea.

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Teakan’s Ya Shi Xiang, Phoenix Dancong

Ya Shi Xiang, Phoenix Dancong by Teakan
Oolong Tea / Straight
$30.00 for 60g

Ya Shi Xiang, Phoenix Dancong is part of Teakan’s Volume 4 Exploration Kit, a collection of five single origin teas. Ya Shi Xiang, Phoenix Dancong makes up 10g of the 60g kit.

First Impressions

Ya Shi Xiang directly translates to duck shit – and is surprisingly not smelling of poop if you know what the name translates to. Phoenix Dancong is a bit of a more forgiving name, that is for sure! This particular Ya Shi Xiang comes in a sealed, resealable kraft paper pouch with a white and black label across the front and back. To be specific, this oolong was harvested in spring of 2021 from Wudong, Guangdong, China.

The dry leaves are long, slightly wiry with a light twist. The colour of the leaves are a deep brown, with light pops of tan and lighter brown throughout. The aroma of the leaves is floral and sweet, nothing at all like the name suggests, with hints of what reminds me of the smell right after a rainfall.

Preparation

Teakan recommends steeping Ya Shi Xiang in 95°C (203°F) for 2 minutes (western style) or 98°C (208°F) for 5 seconds (gongfu style). I opted to steep western style, due to ease on my part.

First Taste

Ya Shi Xiang steeps to a clear light golden yellow after the 2 minute steep. The aroma of the steeped tea is mostly floral with hints of fresh rain and wet moss like you get when going for a walk through the forest, and it’s pleasant to the nose to be sure. The tea itself has a smooth texture, sweet, floral with very light nuttiness at the tail end of each sip. It has a thickened mouth texture but pleasantly smooth and easy to drink.

A Second Cup?

Ya Shi Xiang resteeps nicely – I did six resteeps of the same leaves (seven steeps total) – and added an additional 30 seconds for each subsequent steep. The leaves open beautifully – look at those lovely green leaves! The flavour gets a bit deeper for the first two resteeps, and then slowly begins to wane in flavour intensity, but I do enjoy each resteep thoroughly.

My Overall Impression

I loved Teakan’s Ya Shi Xiang, Phoenix Dancong. The tea resteeps beautifully, and has a lovely floral flavour with each steep. The flavour remains fairly consistent with each steep, and lends itself to a really tasty cup of tea – despite of what the name of the tea is! I even had a cup of it cold (due to leaving it too long), and really enjoyed it as well – so there’s that.

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Masters Teas’ Rohini Gold Wire

Rohini Gold Wire by Masters Teas
Oolong Tea / Straight
$19.00USD for 2oz

Masters Teas has provided me with Rohini Gold Wire for the purposes of writing an honest review.

First Impressions

One of my favourite types of tea is oolong – and I’m not shy about sharing that. It’s not one that I drank a lot growing up (mostly black and green), but it was one that was had on occasion. So when someone asks if I want the opportunity to try out a single origin oolong tea, I’m not about to say no. Rohini Gold Wire is a single origin oolong from Darjeeling, India. Single origin is an interest term that’s been used a lot lately in the tea industry (and probably other industries as well). Basically what it means that the tea is only from one area, or farm. When you get a grocery store tea, it’ll be (for example) a black tea, but you don’t necessarily know where it came from. Sometimes it’s from multiple farm sources and they get blended together. But a single origin tea is basically as labelled – single origin.

Rohini Gold Wire comes in a sealed, resealable pouch with some information on it from Masters Teas. As it came in sample packaging, I did have to go to the product page on their website to find out more information about it. This is the February 2021 harvest, and is said to be similar to oolongs from China – which makes me really curious and excited to give it a try. The aroma of it is sweet, fruity, and nutty. The leaves are really quite pretty with a nice range in colours that I get to enjoy. There’s that nice pop of spring green in there that is nice to see among the darker shades of green-brown in there.

Preparation

Masters Teas recommends steeping Rohini Gold Wire in 100°C (212°F) water for 3 minutes. I followed the steeping instructions for my initial steep of Rohini Gold Wire.

First Taste

Rohini Gold Wire steeps to a very inviting and friendly shade of yellow. The aroma of this tea is fruity – it reminds me of grapes and peaches – and it has a nice sweetness to it. There’s a slightly thickened texture to the tea, but it’s really quite smooth and I find no bitterness or astringency to it. It’s a nice tea to sip and has a really full-bodied flavour that that can be found throughout each sip and it just is easy to drink. I found the sweetness to remind me of honey and that there was a slight toasted note at the tail end of each sip, but I can’t really place what it reminds me of.

A Second Cup?

I resteeped Rohini Gold wire a total of five times (six steeps total), adding an additional 30 seconds for each subsequent steep. The tea itself became a more darker, golden colour. The flavour turned more fruity and less sweet, but nonetheless easy to drink and tasty.

My Overall Impression

I loved Masters Teas’ Rohini Gold Wire. There was just something really pleasant about this tea to drink. It had a great flavour from start to finish, and I found that the flavour stayed fairly consistent, despite getting less sweet. The leaves themselves performed beautifully and did a great job with resteeping, so I would highly recommend going that route so you can get your money’s worth with this tea. This would be a lovely tea to share with friends or family over some nice bites of something sweet to tea because I think it could compliment both sweets and savouries quite well (but I would reach for the sweets).

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