What is High Mountain Oolong?

Here's another article I recently wrote for The English Tea Store blog.

What is High Mountain Oolong?
By William I. Lengeman III

For many years now I’ve seen the term “high mountain oolong” being bandied about, but I never really gave it much thought. Until recently, when I started to wonder exactly what that meant.

Obviously, since I’m not completely dense (that’s my story and I’m sticking with it), I can pretty much deduce, based on the name, that this is a type of oolong tea that grows high in the mountains. No, duh. But wanting to verify this and to see if there was anything more to it, I decided that a little bit of research was called for...

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Tea Review 136 - Le Palais des Thés Bao Zhong Imperial

Bao Zhong Imperial
Le Palais des Thés

Most of the tea I drink is either black or green. I tend to forget about oolong sometimes but then I run across something like Bao Zhong Imperial, by Le Palais des Thés, and I realize that I need to expand my horizons more often. While I'm not very fond of the heavier, more fermented oolongs I do quite like the lighter varieties. Le Palais des Thés claims that this one is about ten percent fermented and it's got a very delicate but pleasant aroma and a flavor to match. While it doesn’t quite match up to my favorite green and black teas I'd have no problem drinking it on a regular basis.

Here's what Le Palais des Thés has to say about this one:

This is one of the most celebrated teas from Taiwan. Its name means "wrapped in paper" in Chinese, because the tea is wrapped in white cotton paper before fermentation to preserve the delicacy of its leaves. A beautiful tea with large, twisted leaves that produces a straw-yellow liquor with a flowery, almost peppery taste, it evokes narcissus and jasmine flowers with a perfect blend of green and sweet notes. Should be enjoyed according to the rules of Gong Fu Cha. Low in caffeine.

Sample provided by Le Palais des Thés
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Tea Review 88 - Anteadote Oolong

Tea Review 88 - Anteadote Organic Oolong Tea
Adagio Teas

I don't drink tea with milk, sugar, lemon or anything else. I don't look down my nose at anyone who does - it's just a personal preference. Ditto for bottled teas. Right off the top of my head I can think of a few (lightly) sweetened ones that were okay, but none that really bowled me over. Which is why I like Adagio's Anteadote line of bottled teas so much. No sweeteners.

I've reviewed several of the Anteadote flavors already (black, jasmine, white), but I recently had a chance to try them all again, including the newly released oolong. This one debuted in early October, according to Adagio. It's made with a Ti Kuan Yin tea variety from Fujian, China and, like all Anteadote flavors, contains nothing else but water and citric acid.

I've never been a fan of the heaver, more oxidized oolongs, but fortunately this is not one of those. It has a nice light, slightly floral taste. While it won't unseat Anteadote's white as my favorite of their five flavors, it's good enough to take the second place slot.

Recommended.


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tea, green tea, food, food and drink

Specialists Revisited

I don't consider myself an expert on business or tea. But if I were looking to get into the tea business nowadays I think I would specialize in one small niche. For my money, it seems that there are too many tea merchants out there trying to do it all.

I wrote about a few of these niche companies previously. There's Kyela Teas, which focuses on Darjeeling and O-Cha.com, which narrows its focus to Japanese green teas.

Here's an interesting informational site about Pu-erh tea called Pu-erh, A Westerner's Quest. Oolong fans might want to try OolongOz.com, which is run by "a dedicated group of High Mountain Oolong Tea aficionados living in Australia."

What got me thinking on this topic again was an email I received yesterday announcing that Matcha Source had opened their "doors" for business. Matcha, of course, is a Japanese green that's probably best known as the tea used in Japanese tea ceremonies. Of course, nowadays it might be better known as a tea used in assorted and sundry Starbucks drinks.

Image: Matcha Source

tea, green tea, food, food and drink, Darjeeling, matcha, oolong

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Name A Taiwanese Tea

From Taiwan, a country that's probably best known for it's oolong tea, comes an article about a tea variety simply called Taiwan Tea No. 1. The Taipei Times reports that the researchers involved in devising this black tea are looking for a snappier name for it.

If you'd like to contribute a suggestion, send it to them at tres202@ttes.gov.tw. Read the full article here.

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Blue Tea

Here's a new addition to your palette of tea varieties - blue tea. Who knew?

Now, if the truth be told, blue tea is really just another name for good old-fashioned oolong tea. Or at least so say New Leaf, who make a bottled beverage called Blue Tea in raspberry and lemon flavors.

As New Leaf's press release would have us believe, "According to the Ancient Chinese Tea Masters, teas are classified in six different tea families, each categorized by a different color. Due to the bluish reflections of the Oolong Tea leaf in its dried form, Oolong Tea is classified as 'blue tea.'"

This was news to me, but then again I never claimed to be the last word when it comes to tea knowledge.

Blue Tea is not mentioned at New Leaf's Web site yet, at least not that I could see, but if you want to check out the site anyway, it's here.

New Leaf's other flavors - in case you were wondering - include White Tea Strawberry, White Tea Tangerine, White Tea Honey and Ginseng, White Tea Honeydew Melon, White Tea Grapefruit, Green Tea Plum and Green Tea Ginseng.

For some additional info on blue/oolong tea, here's an interesting piece from Tea Masters.

tea, green tea, food, food and drink, blue tea, oolong

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The Other Tea - Oolong

Okay, so we've heard so much about the wonders of green tea and white tea now that we're all just about blue in the face. Then there's black tea, the old tried and true standby.

One tea that doesn't seem to get a whole lot of press is oolong, a tea that, to oversimplify quite a bit, falls somewhere between black and green.

But since we're speaking of oolong tea getting press, we should speak of TeaMuse, Adagio Tea's monthly newsletter. If you cruise on over to the latest edition you'll find an eminently informative article - Oolong Tea: Covering the Basics - by Richard Goodness.

Now, if you ask me, Richard Goodness sounds a little bit like a pseudonym. But you didn't ask me and that's beside the point, so go read the article. It's located here.

While we're at it, here's a brief piece from the archives about oolong tea and here's a review of a few of Adagio's oolong varieties.

Image: Adagio Teas

tea, food, food and drink, oolong, Adagio

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A Little Bit About Oolong

I was sniffing around at the Nala Web site the other day when I came across an interesting piece about traveling Taiwan in search of rare oolong teas. It's worth a look. Check it out here.

While we're on the subject of oolong it's as good a time as any to mention OolongOz.com. They are, as their Web site points out, "a dedicated group of High Mountain Oolong Tea aficionados living in Australia." Sounds good to me. I could think of worse ways to live your life.

Tea Review 37 - Adagio Opus Pouchong

Opus Pouchong
Adagio Teas

When it comes to oolong tea my descriptive vocabulary - which is no great shakes in the first place - tends to break down. To paraphrase that age old cliché, I don't know about oolong, but I know what I like.

Opus Pouchong is a Formosa oolong, a reference to the island - now Taiwan, once Formosa - where it's grown. Oolong teas may run the gamut from lightly processed and resembling a green tea to heavily processed and much closer to a black tea. Pouchong refers to an oolong which falls into the former category.

Opus Pouchong has large green leaves that brew up to a light amber color in the cup and give off a nice delicate fragrance. As for the taste, well, here's where my vocabulary breaks down, but I can say that it's a very pleasant flavor, very smooth with almost none of the "bite" that tends to put me off of some oolongs.

Available, as always, in four sizes, from a $2 sample tin to a half pound size that goes for $28.

Recommended.

Contents: Sample tin
I paid: na