After almost three months, I’m finally back with a tea review! It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to open a new packet of tea so I had very high hopes for this one. The Taiwan Four Season ‘Red Pearl’ Oolong from What Cha was a mystery tea that I ordered last year and it’s basically been sitting around unopened since then. This is what the tea is supposed to be like:
A very smooth and sweet tasting red oolong, with a sweet stone fruit taste.
Apart from that, I also know that this tea was harvested in April 2020, so it’s about 1.5 years old.
First Impressions
The dry leaves were small, dark balls and they seem to be very tightly rolled. The leaves weren’t very fragrant, but I did detect a roasted note. I haven’t drunk many four season oolongs, but the ones that I have tried were lightly roasted teas so I was excited to see what this was like.
Tasting Notes
I’ve tried this twice so far, and strangely enough the tea tastes completely different from what the product description and reviews say it is. There’s very little sweetness and the dominant note can only be described as “coca-cola”. Yes, it reminds me of a soft drink. The aftertaste is more fragrant than the tea liquor, but it while it feels more like tea, it doesn’t have any discernable notes.
So far, I’ve been gongfu-brewing this tea and I’ve tried it with a range of temperatures from freshly boiled to hot and the tea liquor has consistently had the same taste. This didn’t really differ over steeps and the tea liquor from two sessions didn’t show any changes in the taste of the tea as the leaves opened up.
The spent leaves were rather rough and very dark in colour.
Concluding Thoughts
This was an interesting tea and not one that I would have purposely chosen to review after an absence. It’s a bit disappointing how my experience differed from the reviews, and I’m wondering why. I don’t think storage is the issue because it’s vacuumed-pack and has been a tea drawer since I received it. I did wonder if it’s due to the water in France/water filter jug I got but on the other hand, I haven’t noticed this in the wakoucha that I’m drinking so I’m inclined to think that the coca-cola taste is from the tea leaves.
Has anyone had this tea? What was your experience with it?
You’ve said the leaves are roasted, and that there’s a coca-cola taste. Could it be that the roasting caused some carmalisation? Just with caramel being the main taste of coke? Or maybe I’m stretching hahaha
Oooh that’s a pretty good theory actually! It could be something in the roasting – normally I’d get more sweetness but it could be a roast + cultivar + harvest thing?
Possibly!