Cha Gloriette

Finished this Oriental Beauty today, but it is not one that will be stuck in my mind. It is fairly weak in its aroma and simply in its flavours, both qualities I would like to have in a tea like this. The mouthfeel is very soft, but not all that interesting either.

As for particular notes, the smell reminds me of sawdust, flowers, peach, coffee, and autumn leaf pile. The taste is super sweet and nectar-like, with a bittersweet aspect similar to the taste of burnt onion. The sweetness persists into the aftertaste, which is slightly sickly and drying with a citrusy note (tangerine).

Almost a year ago now, I got some teas from Cha Gloriette at the 2019 Toronto Tea Festival. This is one of them. It has a standard Ruby 18 scent with some sawdust, milk chocolate, and peat notes on top. Wet leaf aroma is then more like tomato vine, molasses, eucalyptus, and tobacco. The taste of this tea is not super distinctive, but it is well balanced with a strong sweetness and notes of vanilla, wood, and cashew nuts. The texture is very nice overall, even though the body is actually quite light. It has an oily mouthfeel with a light astringency to it.

Have you ever brewed a tea then fallen asleep before it cooled down?

Unfortunately, all I have to offer about this sachet I received from Togo is aroma notes :/ And thus it remains unrated.

I prepared this according to package directions: Western, 8oz, water off boiling, 4 minutes. The dry leaf smelled like sugar cookie, steamed milk and pine with a hint of anise. The liquor aroma was as expected for a no-provenance-given high mountain oolong: sweet florals like lilac and daffodil, steamed milk, pine forest and spinach.

Then I fell asleep. I awoke to a room temperature tea and in my grogginess, chugged it without paying attention. Oh well. I remember thinking it would be better to steep for a shorter time, maybe lower temperature and even with breaking open the sachet and steeping those nuggets gongfu. Hopefully Togo can offer his opinion of this tea soon.

Edit: I now see in the description that the tea is from Cui Feng mountain.