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If I hadn’t read the note that says this smells like makeup, I might not have pinned that down but I totally see what Cynthia Lam meant. There’s a smell, even in the dry leaf, but that is more pronounced in the aroma of the tea and in the flavor, has a sort of perfumed powderiness that you might smell in a compact.

The dry leaf also has a peppery aspect to its fragrance.

Gaiwan. Rinse. 195F, 15 seconds adding five with each additional steep.

The tea’s aroma/flavor doesn’t have the pepper note. I expect that what is reading through power of suggestion as makeup is what the description means by fruit. I don’t really get a honey note in the first couple of steeps, though the tea has a sort of honey-amber color.

By the third steep, the perfuminess dissipates and the honey note does come out. In the third and fourth steeps, there’s a floral note that is elusive, but when found, is quite pronounced.

It’s an interesting tea. While it’s not my favorite, it gets points for being unique.

I had the same problem trying to break bits off of this cake today that I did with another yesterday. It was a little easier because I was able to stick the knife into the end of the rectangle.

The cake doesn’t have much of a smell at all. No fishiness, no leather.

Gaiwan. Boiling. Rinse, 10/10/20/30/40/60/120/240/300/360

I think I didn’t use enough leaf, and I’ll increase it next time.

The color started at a cognac and gradually became lighter instead of becoming darker first.

On the upside, there is no fishiness, and there is no standard earthy/mushroomy flavor.

On the downside, and probably as a result of too little leaf, it gave up the ghost pretty early. I could have stopped after 4, which is when the flavor started to fade.

Before it did, it started with a sweet, molasses-like note that was prominent in the first two steeps. In steeps 2 and 3, a nutty, pecan note came out. In steeps 3 and 4, there was a coffee aroma.

The tea has a smoothness and complete lack of objectionable qualities. Giving it a provisional rating in the mid-80s until I can try it again with more leaf.

Sipdown no. 8 of February 2019 (no. 26 of 2019 total, no. 514 grand total).

As with the Wild Orange from Chicago Tea Garden, this was close to the bottom of the ratings for shus in my cupboard. I had one little orange left when I went to make cold brew yesterday so I needed to supplement. One orange equalled about 1.75 spoons. I supplemented with this until it ran out, and then with a couple of tuo chas, also from Rishi.

I haven’t tasted the mishmash yet, but I expect it will be better than the Wild Orange was. Still, I’m bumping down the rating some because this tea was good, but not the best I’ve ever had. And I’m having a shu this morning that is much better.

BTW, No. 2 quite liked the Wild Orange. He said it tasted like the woods.

Sipdown no. 7 of February 2019 (no. 25 of 2019 total, no. 513 grand total). A sample teabag.

Today I tried it at 195F for 3:30.

The color is maybe a little darker golden than yesterday. It is definitely fruitier when steeped at a lower temperature. It still has the potato and sweet potato notes but they’re not as noticeable.

The fruitiness is hard to pin down. It’s a little like lychee with a grape accent.

Oh and I sniffed the bag this time. It smells, remarkably, very much like it does after steeping. Which in turn is very much like it tastes.

Sipdown no. 6 of February 2019 (no. 24 of 2019 total, no. 512 grand total).

It’s time for me to admit that I tried to like this more than I actually liked it. I loved the concept of the tea encased in orange skin, but I was not wild about this hot, and cold brew did not save it. It was bearable as cold brew, but I was pretty happy when I hit the last of it.

Dropping the rating.

I freaked out a little when I put this in the gaiwan because it seemed to be full of saffron-yellow powder.

Then I realized, those were osmanthus flowers. They look like the pictures of osmanthus flowers on the internet, anyway. I hope that’s what they are and not something that shouldn’t be there.

In the tin, the tea doesn’t smell much different from the usual green oolong smell. Mostly just a grassy smell with a light floral note.

Gaiwan. 195F. Rinse. 15 seconds plus 5 for each additional steep.

The tea is pale yellow, clear, and smells a little vegetal and somewhat floral. Nothing distinctive about either, to the point where a particular vegetable or flower jumped out and announced itself. It tastes the way it smells. It doesn’t have either of the things that make me love green oolongs — the butteriness or the juicy floral.

I didn’t notice much of a change through four steeps. I got none of the overt sweetness Auggy mentioned, and frankly, I felt like this was missing something.

It was supremely average. It will be going into the cold brew queue.

The last Andao in my cupboard that hadn’t been tasted and written about.

In the tin, it has a roasty aroma, mostly mild but with a sharp note that is common in my experience of dark oolongs.

Gaiwan. Rinse. 195F, 15 seconds plus 5 seconds for each steep thereafter.

The tea is a light amber color and clear, and it has an amazing, amazing smell and flavor. I think the amazing part is mostly because this flavor is so surprising from the smell of the dry leaves.

I totally expected one of those roasty toasty dark oolongs. This has almost nothing in common with those flavors except in the dry leaf.

The overwhelming impression I got was of sweetness in the aroma, and something fruity. But sweet to the point of almost being candy like. My first thought was ripe pineapple, but it doesn’t have the sharpness that’s present even in a sweet, ripe pineapple.

The second steep gave a darker amber color and an equally sweet and fruity aroma and flavor. This time I thought of plums, though that’s also not quite right.

The description from Andao mentions orange floral tones — not sure what those are like and whether they are like oranges. I tried to find a citrus note in this but that’s not what I’m getting.

This is a special one.

Adventures in pu erh: Morgie vs. sheng cake.

The cake smells like chocolate, which is awesome.

See how in the picture, there is a piece of paper on the cake, and tea is over it? This made things more difficult than they needed to be.

The cake was packed really tightly and I found it very hard to loosen any part of it. So I went for the little indentation in the middle, and managed to break on through to the other side, but the result was I hit the paper without realizing it. So there were little bits of paper among the tea.

Also, the tea was pretty dusty because I am sure I broke some of the leaves trying to pry it apart.

Any suggestions on how to do better next time?

Somehow I managed to pry enough off to get about 2.7g of tea. I got most of the paper out before I rinsed, and another couple of bits out after. But I suspect there was still some in there…

Gaiwan. Boiling. 5/5/7/7/10/10/20/30/40/60

Because of the dust, the liquor was cloudier than I’d ever seen with a sheng. It was the color of a lemon cough drop in the first few steeps. Later, it became gold, with a copper tinge and clearer.

I didn’t notice much change from steep to steep. For the most part, I got that buttery, white chocolate aroma and flavor that I have discovered is pretty standard for me and sheng.

Around steep 4, something happened though. The tea got sweeter, and also seemed to be more vibrant in flavor.

And around steep 6, it developed a crispness and a brightness I hadn’t observed before.

I liked it quite a lot, though I am not sure it’s the best I’ve had so far.

Sipdown no. 5 of February 2019 (no. 23 of 2019 total, no. 511 grand total). A sample teabag.

I forgot to sniff the bag before I put it in the water. Good thing I have another one of these. Next time I’ll use lower water temp, too. I really wasn’t thinking this morning about this because I was too busy trying to conquer a pu erh cake so I could rinse some leaves and let them sit for a bit.

Anyway, this tea is golden yellow, clear, and has a pleasant, mild smell that I would have called sweet wood, but I guess is close enough to fruit. It’s a bit like sweet potatoes, heavy on the potato. Yeah, that’s it. It’s more potato than sweet potato, but I get both.

The flavor is also very mild, but it doesn’t give me the bloaty, waterlogged feeling I sometimes get from first flush darjeelings.

Nice to watch the British version of House of Cards by.

I finished Broadchurch, and what surprised me the most about the series was the tea bag references. I always thought Brits were too serious about their tea to bother with tea bags.

Sipdown no. 4 of February 2019 (no. 22 of 2019 total, no. 510 grand total).

I’m pretty much through all my low rated green teas, so I’m into sipdown territory with ones I’ve really enjoyed. This was a very nice, mellow, take it to work tea. It’s flavor perhaps wasn’t as strong as it was when it was fresher, but it was surprisingly tasty even though it was fairly well aged for a green tea by the time I sipped it down.