Fukamushi-cha with a Gyokuro and a Sencha

When I was at Sanko last week getting more 2010 Gyokuro I also found some (beautifully packaged) Fukamushi-cha and thought it time to go a bit deeper into the Japanese tea world and do a taste comparison.  I'm only just beginning to scratch the surface of its many variables -- types, steaming level, amount of sunshine, seasonal plucks, etc.  This is the first Fukamushi-cha I've (knowingly) tried.

What is Fukamushi-cha?  From O Cha's site:  "Fukamushi Sencha, known in Japan as Fukamushi-cha, is sencha which is steamed for a longer than normal period of time during it's processing. This green tea is often grown at lower elevations. An expert tea grower will steam his tea according to the right conditions for each individual yield, and much knowledge and experience is required in order to adjust it just right. Fukamushi-cha tends to have a thicker, cloudy consistency and the loose leaf is finer."   

Being a steamed green tea, the water temperature should be quite low and again, I found ranges of recommended temperatures from 65C to 75C.  The steaming process starts to break down the leaves which makes them fragile so they need to be treated gently with cooler water than, say, any black tea or even a Chinese green tea which is more traditionally baked than steamed.

I was not aware until recently that Japanese green teas can be lightly, medium or deeply steamed.  This would affect their ideal brewing temperature and how you steep them too.  Oy the head spins.  (I'm keeping in mind the mantra that it's all in our own taste buds though and forging ahead.)

From left, the dry leaves of Gyokuro, Fukamushi-cha
and Organic Sencha.  Click image for a closer look.

So here goes -- because I have three different types of tea I decided to compromise on the water temperature and brewing times and do all three at 75C for 1 minute.  I don't know what I was thinking, really, since it wasn't perfect for any of the teas.  But, it certainly exaggerated their flavours which wasn't a total disaster for a contrast-and-compare type tasting.  For subsequent tastings, I brewed each individually at appropriate temperatures.  

Dry Leaves
Very different look to them from colour to texture -- some beautiful rolled needles in the Gyokuro, very powdery Fukamuchi-cha and rather rough looking organic Sencha with some whole leaves evident.  Hard perhaps to see in the photo above, but, although all three are deep, rich greens the Gyokuro is bluer-green, the Fukamushi-cha more leaf green and the Sencha lighter, more a yellowy-green and with yellow stalks through it. 

Wet Leaves
The Gyokuro leaves give off rich, soft, buttery spinach and seaweed-marine aromas.  By contrast the Fukamushi-cha has a noticeably sharper aroma dominated by what I think is a nut paste, like chestnuts.  On the second brew at a cooler 65C there was an initial almost unpleasant rotting aroma and then the nut paste notes.  The organic Sencha was very different -- after a nice sharp green tang, more like sweet wet hay with a whiff of mustiness.

First hot brew of Gyokuro, Fukamushi-cha and
organic Sencha.  Notice how cloudy they all are
from the too-hot water.

Liquor
As you can see in the photo, all three teas were quite cloudy as a result of the hot first brew I did, although the Sencha was the least affected.   On subsequent cooler brews none were as cloudy although the Fukamushi-cha was always quite cloudy, a result of the extra long steaming.

The Gyokuro gave me what I love and is very smooth and oily/satiny and big on the mouth (no astringency at all) with a soft buttery spinach flavour, with some of the nut paste.  By contrast the Fukimashi cha has some very nice bitterness, also quite a smooth mouthfeel, raw spinach flavour and then fishy!  Yes, like salmon.  On the second, cooler brew (65C) there's, not surprisingly, less bitterness but still a nice sharp tang which lands in the middle-back of the tongue, and after the sweet spinach comes the salmon flavours.  It has very little astringency; is still quite cloudy but not as much and a beautiful rich green.

The organic Sencha is distinctly golden in colour as compared to the bluey-jade green of the other two, and in a completely different taste spectrum.  It's bright, tangy, quite astringent, with a thinner, lighter mouth feel, and a sharp fresh tongue furring bitterness.

Mmmmm. A lovely way to spend a few hours on this Christmas afternoon before the family feast.

GYOKURO 2010. Yum.

I hopped into Sanko yesterday and their fresh Gyokuro had arrived.  This was $10 for a 50gram bag.  I'm only telling you so you understand that this cannot be the really good stuff.  But OMG.  When I opened the bag I was knocked out by the rush of its big rich sweet aroma.  I decided that it would definitely be worth brewing this up in spring water (although I hate the plastic bottle it comes in) instead of (pretty decent) Toronto tap water.  Just to up the potential for the sheer joy in the tea, know what I mean?

Brewed in 72C water for 1 minute.

Fresh 2010 Gyokuro from Sanko -- if you click on the photo
you can really see the rolled needle shape and the delicate
tea dust covering it all.

The dry leaves show a more uniform needle shape than the batch last week, but then that was the end of the package.  The leaves are a lovely deep blue-green and are shiny and smooth.  It's also showing fewer bright green bits and those bits look more yellow than green when compared to last week's Gyokuro.

The wet leaves, wow, much more depth/nuance to the aroma.  Immediately get more of the wonderful marine scent, more of the vegetal, and great sweetness and something nutty, like ground hazelnuts or Brazil nuts. (I should know my nuts better!)






The liquor has quite a bit of colour -- jade blue-green, is lightly cloudy and has tea dust floating in it.

Gyokuro -- note the little bits of leaf dust.

The flavour is very nice.  Interestingly, while the flavours are bigger, broader, deeper than last week's Gyokuro, its mouthfeel is not quite as big and satiny smooth.  There's no astringency but I can feel a slight burr of the leaf bits.  It's quite pleasant but I wasn't expecting it.  This tea also has more of a distinct but light, and very nice, tang at the back of the tongue after it goes down. Overall this is the most flavourful Gyokuro I've every had.  A real treat, and yes, a joy.


I think I'm coming to the opinion that fresh tea is really the only way tea should be drunk.  (Except for Pu-er, of course.)  Definitely current year's production, and best not over six months old.  Sadly, I probably won't be able to find this tea most of the time.  And my overstuffed tea drawer(s) mean I'm guilty of over-aging the tea too.

I will keep brewing this tea over the next few days, and add some notes.  It's possible that in my rush I may not have let the water cool enough.   Which means, oh darn -- I have to taste more Gyokuro.

CUT TO: Two days later.
Ok, this tea improves with a cooler steep -- and it was already bringing me joy.  Yup, when those in the know say 'steep this at 60C to 65C' gosh darn it they know of what they speak.

Yesterday I steeped it for 1 minute at 64C and noticed it had a rounder, smoother feel in the mouth. And today I've done it at 62C and it's definitely rounder, smoother in the mouth and sweeter overall because it's lost pretty much all but a little note of its bitter tang.  I didn't mind the bitter tang with all the sweetness but it was, in hindsight, brought out by the hotter water.

The liquor is, naturally, a paler jade green, still abit cloudy but not as much.  The wet leaves give more of the wonderful ground nut aroma and a slight toastyness.

Oh Yum.

P.S.
It's tulip time at the corner grocery stores again in Toronto and I've a bouquet in the middle room that, every time I stride by, overwhelms with its wonderful sweet green-peppery aroma.  I love, love the smell of fresh tulips, don't you?

OK, nothing to do with tea but oh my do these tulips smell good!

GYOKURO, it's sublime

I got this Gyokuro at Sanko, a Japanese grocery store along Queen St West last winter.  They're a good source for good quality fresh Japanese teas, as I've posted here before.   I know I've gushed about Golden Monkey as my current favorite here a couple times but good Gyokuro comes a close second these days.

Gyokuro is a high-end Japanese green tea which is shade-grown for at least the final three weeks before harvest.  Dark netting or bamboo fencing is hung over the tea plants and the shading causes the plant, in this sunlight depleted environment, to struggle so it goes into overdrive and creates extra everything:  caffeine, theanine, chlorophyll, etc. This means it has a dark green leaf (lots of chlorophyll) which gives it a distinctive pale bluey-green liquor.  Gyokuro translates as Dew Pearls or Jade Dew and the jade reference is a good one for its colour.

Per The Story of Tea (p.183) the "extra boost of green chlorophyll pigment changes the natural balance of caffeine, sugars and flavanols in the leaf, creating the opportunity for the tea processors to coax added sweetness from the leaf.  In addition, the absence of photosynthesis increases the presence of naturally occurring theanine (an amino acid that is believed to induce relaxation), which is the component of tea that is responsible for giving tea its vegetal taste. Usually photosynthesis reduces theanine and increases tannins."

And per The Tea Drinkers Handbook (p.199) Gyokuro "is made by a process introduced in 1835 at Uji" and the shading "increases the proportions of sugars, amino acids, and caffeine, decreases the amount of catechins and modifies the aromatic compounds of the leaf, which darkens in color."

Gyokuro's flavour, aroma and mouthfeel as result of all the shading is the wonderful trade-off for the extra caffeine.  Myself I can't drink it after 4pm or I'm up all night.

Gyokuro dry leaves showing the tea's distinctive dark
bluey-green needled leaves.  This is the very end of the
batch I bought so there's quite abit of dust here too.

Brewed at 75C for 1 minute.

The dry leaves are mostly a shiny dark green with flecks of bright green, and feature a lot of beautiful tightly twisted needles.  As I peer closely at them a sweet, rich almost floral scent wafts up, a bit of rose even.

Gyokuro is very delicate -- the plant is stressed to begin with and the steaming, as usual, starts breaking down the leaf anyway.  All to say it should be steeped at a low temperature.  Some say as low as 60C. to 65C.  I did this cup at 75C by bringing the water to a boil and pouring it off into two different creamer jugs (my own version of the yuzamashis in Japan) before pouring over the leaves.  (Each pour drops the temp about 10C and I paused and, yes, double-checked with a thermometer, before pouring onto the leaves.)  Another low-tech way to check for the correct temp is that if the cup is too hot on your fingers to comfortably pick up the water is too hot for Gyokuro.

Gyokuro liquor -- a lovely, clear pale "jade" green.

The liquor is a gorgeous pale blue-green and quite clear -- there are a few small flecks of green leaves in the brew.  In the mouth it is soft and oily and round and smooth -- no astringency.  Not to go too into left field here, but it's like the wonderful rich satiny oilyness of perfectly cooked salmon. 

The flavours are sweet, buttery, lightly vegetal with a whiff of the ocean, and a nice tang at the back and sides of the tongue at the end.

Japan alone consumes more than it produces -- it's gone to China and other parts of Asia to make up the difference.  As a result I understand very little of the really good stuff comes overseas.  To my young-in-experience tongue this is a very nice tea, and I feel lucky that Sanko is nearby and caters to a knowledgeable Japanese clientele so that it's on offer.  Imagining that there are even better examples of Gyokuro out there is truly something to look forward too.

GOLDEN MONKEY VS. GOLDEN MONKEY

As I have mentioned before, Golden Monkey tea from China is currently one of my very favorite teas.  I first had it, and continue to refresh my cannister, from Tao's tea shop.  But when I was in my neighborhood  Tealish recently I was delighted to find they had brought in a 2010 Golden Monkey.  Fresh tea and Golden Monkey -- two of this girl's current loves!

The two teas look very different and have distinct flavours but are both wonderful, exhibiting the tea type's classic sweet flavour and soft mouthfeel.

Golden Monkey is a black Chinese tea originating in the Fujian province.  On the coast, Fujian is the country's biggest tea-producer as well as the producer of the widest range of teas. From what I read, Golden Monkey is traditionally a Mao Jian pluck meaning it's a bud and one slightly larger leaf (as opposed to a Mao Feng pluck which is two equal-length leaves and a bud). 

I want to take a minute on this tea's name.  There are a number of explanations for it and then my own theory.

1.  From  Chinese Tea Supplier

In earlier times Golden Monkey was the tea of Taipans and local overlords. They claimed that the secret for this tea was that it had to be plucked by the golden monkey which centuries ago inhabited the forests of Fujian Province. This special tea was very rare and the Taipans demanded every ounce of tea because they claimed that it gave them ‘the agility and prowess of the patriarch of a golden monkey troop’. 

2. From many sites (probably quoting each other) including Wikipedia:

According to legend, this particular tea grows in lofty and precipitous peaks making it difficult to pluck the leaves so local people trained monkeys to pluck the tea leaves, hence the name.

3. From the Adagio Tea package:

The name comes from its unique appearance: the leaves resemble monkey claws.

Here's my theory.  Have a look at this Sichuan Golden Monkey's colour and lovely furry golden arms and compare it to the photo below of the tea's lovely furry golden buds -- now tell me, where do you think the name came from?

This image of the endangered Golden Monkey
was captured from the chinaexploration.com site

Please click on this photo to enlarge it to appreciate the
wonderful furry golden leaf bud tips in Tao's Golden Monkey
tea and compare it to the monkey's furry golden arms.  Nuh?

THE BREW-0FF
Just off-the-boil water for 2 minutes.

And while we're waiting for the teas to brew, a look at and deep inhalation of the dry leaves. (A colleague in the biz  passed along that if you exhale onto the dry leaves before smelling them you slightly infuse them with the moisture of your breath and they give off a stronger scent.  Neat huh?)

Two Golden Monkeys: Tao's on the left, Tealish's on the right.

THE DRY LEAVES
These two teas look and feel very different as you can see from the photo above. Tao's Zhenghe Hong Gong Fu (fine Golden Monkey from Zhenghe) is much fluffier, the leaves smaller and more spidery and it's comprised almost entirely of bright furry golden buds.  The aroma of its dry leaves is sweet, already giving off toffee notes.  The Tealish G.M.'s leaves are thicker and larger with fewer furry buds which are a darker, beautiful rich orange.  It is also giving a sweet aroma but less candied and more like lovely sweet buttered spinach.

THE WET LEAVES
Tao's G.M. wet leaves are an even light brown, and are long and even looking kind of like miniature brown pea pods.  This is the still-rolled leaf and leaf bud.  The Tealish G.M. wet leaves are broken, darker, and a more traditional coppery brown with a bit of dark green showing.

Both give off first notes that are sweet and soft.  Tao's G.M then comes through like buttered whole wheat toast, while the Tealish G.M.'s sweetness is more sweet buttered spinach and overall has a sharper, darker aroma --is that a breath of anise or liquorice in there too?

Tealish Golden Monkey wet leaves.  Some broken whole
leaves, some buds on left, and a slight green cast
to some of the leaves.

Golden Monkey from Tao's Tea House wet leaves.  Note
one leaf and a bud and the beautiful evenness of the pluck.

THE LIQUOR
The Tao G.M brewed liquor is distinctly orangey-red and abit cloudy which, on closer examintation, is due to the fine bud hairs floating about.  In contrast, the Tealish G.M. is very clear and bright and a lovely, red-brown.

Two Golden Monkey's -- sourced from Tealish on the left,
and from Tao's Tea House on the right.  They brew to quite
different colours -- much more orangey-red on the right.

Both are light to medium bodied with little or no astringency, and when they've cooled give a hint of smokeyness.  Although they both feature buds, I did not find either of these teas to be high in caffeine.  (In general, China bush teas tend to be lower in caffeine.)

I brewed each of these four times over a couple of days, and I must say it's easy to overbrew, especially the Tao's G.M., to bitterness.  However, when not overbrewed both these Golden Monkeys deliver on the type's renowned sweet cup -- caramel to toffee notes, over a light base of typical black tea tangyness.

IN THE END....
In a way this is a most unfair brew-off.  Tao's G.M. is a higher grade tea -- starting with its gorgeous good looks, but the Tealish G.M. has the advantage of being fresh and therefore offers a wonderful breadth of tasting notes. 


The Tao G.M is pronouncedly sweeter and smoother with more toffee'd notes.  It really is a very fine tea, and a fine example of a Golden Monkey.  (It's price point is almost double, not surprisingly.)  However, the Tealish G.M did not disappoint and, being fresh, offers some sharp, dark notes and a light toastyness which provide a balance to the sweet caramel notes. Because it's fresh it also gives hints of other things, like the possible flash of liquorice I mentioned.  Although I find it hard to believe, I've read that some people find Golden Monkey too sweet -- the Tealish G.M. could be just right for them.  

Personally, I generally keep Tao's G.M to savour as an afternoon tea but have been digging in to the Tealish G.M. for breakfast. 

TWO CEYLONS, ONE A 2010....

My current constant quest is to find really fresh, current year or, if possible, current season tea.  On the very rare occasions that I've had the pleasure of  tasting such fresh tea the flavour has been down on your knees astounding.  So much more breadth of flavour profile it's revelatory.  The first time was a Kenyan tea that a classmate (who had recently admitted he was a tea blender/importer) provided which had been made just three weeks earlier.  Wow.   High notes, bottom notes, fuller middle notes.  Huh.  Who knew.

Not that most tea one buys at a reputable place isn't quite splendid but, really.   You know when you pick fresh basil from your summer garden and you get the greeness, the fresh-air quality, the exotic, almost bitter full spicyness of basil as compared to perfectly good dried basil that gives you that, well, basil flavour....?  That's the difference between really fresh tea and just regular good tea here in North America.  I saw a short film on Japanese tea at the recent Coffee & Tea Show here in Toronto and one of the short scenes that struck me was of a corner tea store (booth, really) in an urban residential area offering it's seasonal fresh tea for tasting by the local residents as if it was apples or lettuce.  Shoppers came and sampled the teas and then bought their weekly tea.  Fresh tea comes in almost every week.  A far, far cry from our situation here in North America where my sense is that most tea is container-shipped by sea which takes several months, then it's often stored before being sold to our local tea merchants where it may sit for many months before it's all sold.  Sigh.

However, my lovely local tea shop Tealish has recently stocked several late spring 2010 teas and I've just discovered that my local Japanese grocery store, Sanko, imports fresh senchas, gyokuro, hojichas, etc (more on that later!) for their discerning Japanese clientel and anyone else lucky enough to stumble upon it.  Like me, two weeks ago.


I decided to taste the 2010 Berubeula Ceylon next to another from Tealish called Golden Garden Ceylon (reviewed here on August 26/10) because sometimes contrasting the taste and texture helps focus the tastebuds. 

Wet and dry leaves of the Golden Garden Ceylon on the left
and the 2010 Berubeula Estate Ceylon on the right.

BERUBEULA CEYLON
Berubeula  is in the Galle district of Sri Lanka and being generally under 2000 feet in altitude their teas are classified as low-grown Ceylons.

The dry leaves are long and wiry and a dark charcoal grey -- there is a handsome evenness to the look of this tea. After brewing in just-off-the-boil water for two minutes, the large broken leaves have opened and show some green in the coppery brown.  Oddly, there are a lot of what I think are leaf centre-ribs ie: no leaf on it -- they're definitely not buds and there was little gold or silver tipping in the dry leaves.  The leaves' aroma is full and sweet off the top, like a sweet bun baking really -- with a very light vegetal note, perhaps a hint of dark, dark chocolate and finally a nice light tang of bitter sharpness in the nose to finish it off.

The liquor is a bright ruby-red-brown and, surprisingly, light to medium bodied and smooth in the mouth.  Being low-grown I was expecting a really full bodied, rather rough tea but that is definitely not the case.  The flavours hinted by the leaves come through and the cup gives a lovely, smooth, full, balanced sweet-bitter cup with lots of flavour.  Milk smoothes the edges (although there were no really sharp edges here) and sweetens it slightly.  If you're someone who finds the classic, high-grown Ceylon's zingy lemon briskness too harsh this could be for you -- this is a really nice, smooth Ceylon that, being fresh, delivers great flavour.

GOLDEN GARDEN CEYLON

In August when I originally tasted this tea I couldn't find any information on the Estate and it's altitude, etc.  However I came across a list of the Sri Lankan tea estates with links to satellite views of each one, and noticed a number have names in Sinhalese.  Aha!  In the Sinhalese language Ran means golden and Watte means garden and when I googled that I finally found some information on the estate.  It's in the Uva district which has both medium and high-grown tea estates as it's altitude ranges from 2000 to 3500 feet so this tea could be either.

This Ceylon is very different from the Berubeula, starting with the look of the tea:  the dry leaves are small and fine and quite black with an occasional gold tip.  Used just-off-the-boil water for a two-minute steep and the wet leaves are a uniform dark copper brown, showing no green and the liquor is clear, bright reddish brown.  The wet leaves give off a strong, slightly smokey, dark earthy aroma with a nice bitter tangy follow through and the liquor has, no surprise with those aromas I suppose, a pretty full body without being very brisk.   

Unfortunately this is the moment that I realise that my nose and taste buds must still not up to 100% since the cold/cough of weeks ago!  It's not possible (is it?) that this tea has dried out and faded in flavour that much since August 26 when I last did a tasting.....?  (I store my tea in glass jars with an airtight rubber seal.  The glass is clear but they're kept in a dark drawer.)  Ah life.

Well despite, and perhaps because of, my apparently still-compromised taste buds, the Golden Garden is a very nice afternoon tea but I will choose the Berubeula, at least for a few more months, for the extra breadth of flavour and aroma, as well as its smoothness.  It's not offering the revelation of flavour that I got from the ultra-fresh Kenyan tea (which will forever stand as a benchmark for me), but it is offering more, and would be even more rewarding on fully functioning taste buds. ;)
 

3 OOLONGS

It's taken three and half weeks to shake this cold but I think my taste buddys are finally back in order -- so I'm diving in to some tastings today. 

I've been looking forward to trying the sample of Thousand Arrows oolong I got at the Coffee and Tea show in late September and decided it would be helpful for my ongoing oolong education to taste it against some others.  Remembering my lesson from mister Marsland, you see.  So I hauled out two other oolongs I had in the drawer, both from my local tea shop,Tealish -- a Formosa Tung Ting Jade and a Ti Kuan Yin.  Interestingly there is no origin noted on the latter, although it's traditionally a Chinese oolong.  Since I tasted a steamed sencha-type tea that turned out to be from Bolivia last spring though (courtesy of that same Mr. Marsland), I realise this Ti Kuan Yin could be from anywhere.

THOUSAND ARROWS OOLONG
This sample came from Shanti Tea Importers based in Ottawa which deals in fair trade, organic and biodynamic teas.  Thousand Arrows is an oolong from the organic and fair trade Idulgashinna Tea Estate in Sri Lanka's Uva region -- speaking of everyone everywhere making everything these days, no?  The estate is owned by Stassen, "one of Sri Lanka's premier corporate conglomerates, with diverse business interests in exports/imports, manufacturing, banking, hotels, plantations and insurance sectors" and its elevation ranges from 1000 to 1900 metres (3200 to 6200 feet), so the tea is considered 'high grown.'   (More info on the major Sri Lankan tea regions.)  Stassen also owns the organic Venture Tea Garden, whose black tea I tasted earlier.



Thousand Arrows oolong sample in a nice
single-serving airtight package.

















This is an incredibly handsome, hand-made-looking tea with its large rolled spears of leaves.  The spears are beautifully uniform in size and twist and very satisfying to hold in your hand too, I must say.  Under the magnifying loop the twist and the glimpses of leaf-bud fuzz is gorgeous, and when I shake out the pack there is lots of fuzz (ie: pekoe) on the inside of the packet and fluttering into the teamaker.  

Thousand Arrows oolong -- the leaves danced
during their infusion.  Typical of needle-shaped tea,
I think.






















The sample's directions suggest 1tsp of leaf per cup (I'll guess that's 5 oz), bringing water to a boil but letting it cool for a minute before steeping the tea 2 to 3 minutes, with re-infusions.  I'm not sure how you'd measure a teaspoon of this stuff without breaking up those gorgeous spears though so I opt to use the whole sample pack, about 3 grams and about 6.5 ozs of water.  I don't let the water cool for a full minute since these are tightly rolled leaves and will need some good heat in the water to unfurl them, at least on their first infusion. 

I use 88C at 1 minute and 10 seconds steep and get a strong golden colour liquor.  The liquor's colour and the wet leaves's colour indicate this is a medium oxidised oolong.  The fairly large-sized wet leaves, partially or fully unfurled show a uniform, classic bud and two leaves pluck -- really lovely to look at.  The leaves are a soft coppery brown mixed with a bright green.  As I sit tasting and writing I notice that a lot of the green is changing to brown as they oxidise while sitting.

Thousand Arrows wet leaf showing a classic two-leaves-
and-a-bud pluck, next to the tightly twisted spear of dry tea.

The leaves give off a light toasty sweet and vegetal scent with floral and sweet applesauce notes.  The liquor has a refreshing light to medium body with very light astringency and its flavour follows the leaf's aroma.  It has a pleasing sweet fruity taste-note of applesauce, with a toasty finish.  On the second steep there is a more forward flavour note of sweet dried fruit, like raisin.  I left this on the counter while I prepared the other two teas and when the liquor had cooled, came back and finished it up.  There's a surprising hint of fresh, tart, berry flavour like a bowl of raspberries.

I'm not sure this has the distance that we've come to expect from great Chinese oolongs, but there's still plenty happening in this beautiful looking oolong.   In fact, I think I'd get more of this tea just for the pleasure of its look and feel.

TUNG TING JADE  (aka Dong Ding) and TI KWAN YIN (aka Tieguanyin)
If I don't see these together I can easily mistake one for the other, since both are traditionally folded-leaf or ball-rolled and have a a similar colouring of blue-green with blotches of dark charcoal grey and a spit-shiny sheen.  However, I find that when seen together the Tung Ting Jade is usually smaller, and has more variance in piece size and fewer stems.  You can see this in the photo below, especially if you click to enlarge it.  On infusion, the liquor of the Tung Ting is slightly more golden, and its leaves have a touch more copper colour, both indicators of more oxidation.  Looking at the infused leaves of both teas though, they are very close in oxidation level which is quite modest -- according to the high amount of green in the leaf.



Wet and dry leaves of Ti Kwan Yin oolong on left and
Tung Ting Jade oolong on the right.

 



















Do you notice the torn edges of the Ti Kwan Yin in the photo above?  If I understand my colleague Tao correctly, he tells me that in order to achieve the look of a more lightly oxidised oolong some producers in China have workers tear the copper-coloured edges from the leaves.  (!!)  I don't know if that's the case here, nor if I understood the story correctly - it seems so labour intensive.

Both oolongs were infused for 2 minutes 10 seconds in 90C water.  They are definitely more lightly oxidised than the Thousand Arrows, and that's evident when comparing their lighter liquor colour as well as the greener wet leaves. 

In flavour and scent they both have more vegetal notes than the Thousand Arrows, and are generally more floral and sweet scented, with little astringency and light to medium body.

Of the two, the Ti Kwan Yin has a stronger vegetal flavour with more of the toasty notes in its taste and has abit more body .  The flavour sticks to your tongue more.  When it cools some lovely peach notes comes through.  I often find that flavour notes come through more strongly on cooler liquor -- odd.  In fact this cool, room temperature tea is very refreshing and pleasant.

In the Tung Ting the swoosh of vegetal and lighter toasty notes are followed by a lovely sweet spicy note of cinnamon.  On the second steeping the spicy sweet note became more vanilla and floral -- is that what orchid smells like?  The Tea Drinker's Handbook talks of this tea having a lightly oily, rounded mouth-feel but I'm not getting that from this tea.

3 oolongs: Ti Kwan Yin, Tung Ting and Thousand Arrows.

I'm so glad I decided to taste these three together.  They provided a great illustration of the general differences in oolongs based on their oxidation levels.  Oolongs, by definition, are partially oxidised, varying from roughly 20% to 80% oxidation.   Generally you'll find that the lightly oxidised leaves develop intense floral and vegetal notes, while the heavily oxidised have more fruity, woody almost spicy notes.  Even though the Thousand Arrows is not heavily-heavily oxidised, it did exhibit more fruit notes than the Tung Ting Jade and Ti Kwan Yin.

SOUP ON A RAINY DAY

It's been too long since I posted here but I've got a dastard cold, a slo-mo beast that spent days as a tickle in the back of my throat, taunting me, lulling me into the belief it would blow over.  It's been almost two weeks now and it's been toying with my chest for several days.  All to say -- taste buds have been compramised.

I went to the Coffee and Tea Show on September 26th and have some tea samples I'm looking forward to tasting, and also have three different maple syrups I'm dying to try next to each other too.  But must wait until I stop with the crumpled tissues.  

So I'm making roasted beet soup this rainy, grey morning, along with all the slighted wilted veggies in the bottom of my fridge.  I think it smells pretty good.



Sautéd a few onions then added chopped
beet greens, and a lone leek.







Almost forgot the tomatos that had gone slightly soft.

Added water, salt, pepper and then a
few fresh leaves of sage (from a bouquet
I created for the desk the other day) and
some fennel seeds. Why not.

Simmered down by about 1/3, then put through the blender.

Crumbled abit of feta on top.  From what I can taste I have
to say it's pretty good -- the hint of fennel is nice.  At least it
all tastes good with these cold-challenged taste buds.