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What-Cha - Discover Vietnam Part 1
I’ve been sitting on these samples
for a while and finally decided to try them. I bought the Discover VietnamSampler from What-cha and while I am not that interested in the Wild Black or
Wild Dark teas, I am not sure if I’ll include my thoughts on those in the
second part.
Vietnam
Red Buffalo Oolong
Origin: Moc Chau, Son La Province,
Vietnam
Elevation: 1000m+
Dry
Leaves: This was the tea that was the most interesting, for some reason it
reminds me of a dark roast TGY. It has a lot more red and browns then the
picture suggests, although the leaves are predominantly black.
Temperature: 194oF
Brewing Time: One Minute (adding
thirty seconds each subsequent infusion)
Aroma: Charcoal and Oak
Flavor: Charcoal, Smoke, Floral,
Honey, Cinnamon and Malty
Tasting Notes: I didn’t like this at first, it felt too much
like a dark TGY. While I am not a big fan of darker oolongs, but with each sip
it grew on me. The initial charcoal taste was a little off-putting, at first I
couldn’t taste anything else, but I started to taste a smoky honey taste. It is
a little reminiscent of a purple tea; it has a nice smoky edge that gets
stronger with each subsequent steeping while the charcoal taste grows weaker.
This has a nice staying power; I got seven infusions out of this before I
started to notice a considerable loss of flavor.
This was the tea that I was the most
excited for, even though I prefer greener oolongs, and while it is not my
favorite it is quite nice. It did take me a couple steepings to appreciate this
tea, but at $9.60 for 50g it is definitely worth it. I may or may not buy this
again, I don’t like having a lot of dark teas, but I could see myself buying
this again if I don’t care for the new Indonesian TGY has sourced.
Vietnam
Flowery Oolong
Origin: Moc Chau, Son La Province,
Vietnam
Elevation: 1000m
Dry
Leaves: The leaves looked fairly typical of floral oolongs although there
was quite a bit of stems showing which was nice. In my experience the floral
oolongs with stems tend to be of a higher quality than the floral oolongs that
are just leaves (think Beautiful Taiwan Tea’s DaYuLing). Although
the pellets were really small.
Temperature: 194oF
Brewing Time: One Minute (adding one
minute each subsequent infusion)
Aroma: Floral
Flavor: Floral, Honey and Raw Sugar
Cane
Tasting Notes: This is definitely a
filler tea. I don’t mean this in a bad way, but it is a very non-offensive tea
that I could easily see this blended in with a Taiwanese High Mountain Oolong.
I’ve been hearing for years that Taiwanese farmers mix their oolongs with cheaper
teas of equal quality from Vietnam and Thailand, and never really believed it
until now.
While this is a very good flowery
oolong, I am not sure if I would buy it again even though it is easily worth
the $9.60 (as of writing this), but it has a lot of tough competition in this
price range. I know Alistair has sourced some High Mountain Oolongs recently
and I am curious how this compares to them. I can easily say that this is my
favorite of these three regardless while I like more complex teas, this was
quite nice. I said before that this is filler tea and I was considering trying
to be more diplomatic about it, but I decided against doing so. While the
leaves may have been rolled way too pass as a Taiwanese Oolong, it is the
perfect tea to blend with more expensive teas without changing the taste. In
fact I used my leftover leaves and mixed equal parts with Beautiful Taiwan Teas
DaYuLing and a nonpareil DaYuLing that I got from Teavivre and I honestly could
not tell the What-Cha/BTT Flowery DaYuLing & What-Cha/Teavivre
Nonparel-Flowery-DaYuLing from the unblended DaYuLings.
Vietnam
Wild Mountain Mist Silver Needle White Tea
Origin: Soui Giang, Yen Bai
Province, Vietnam
Elevation: 1200m+
Dry
Leaves: The leaves are fairly typical of Silver Needle teas, although they
were surprisingly crisp most Silver Needles that I have had has been very
pliable and soft. Besides that for the most part these leaves are fairly
uniform, I did notice the occasional fuzzy leaf, but for the most part the
leaves are lightly twisted and have a pleasant pine needle smell.
Temperature: 176oF
Brewing Time: One Minute (adding one
minute each subsequent infusion)
Aroma: Pine and Citrus
Flavor: Melon, Smoke and Vanilla
Tasting Notes: Wow. This is quite a
strange tea, even though the packaging clearly sells it has a gentle smoke
taste, I was not really expecting it; like the Red Buffalo, this taste like a
purple tea.
I could see myself buying this again
even though for 50g at $16 (at the time of writing) it is a little expensive; I
have not encountered any smoky silver needles before. Normally I am not a fan
of unscented silver needles, but those smoky notes make this tea really
interesting. At first I wanted to say that this was my favorite of the three
teas I looked at today, but I don’t often drink white teas and I always feel
Oolongs have an unfair advantage over all teas since it has an incredible range
of tastes; although the pricing isn’t that unusual, Teavivre
has two silver Needles for $17.90 for 50g (at the time of writing this) of
a comparable quality.
Overall I was very impressed
although, foolishly, I was expecting to fall in love with the Red Buffalo, but
I am not too disappointed. Perhaps I was being too optimistic about the Red
Buffalo when I have a history of preferring green and floral oolongs over
roasted ones. Regardless I am excited to try the three greens next and a little
anxious of the Dark and Black tea that was included in this sampler.
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