Summer 2006 Guei Fei (Concubine) Dong Ding Oolong

I've been finding myself in the mood for Taiwanese Dong Ding oolongs these past few days. Rummaging through my tea canisters at home, I found a few Dong Ding oolongs from Stéphane Erler of Tea Masters that are long overdue for revisitations. Tonight, I decided to brew the Summer 2006 Guei Fei (Concubine) oolong from Fenghuang, Dong Ding, Taiwan, which I have never noted before in this blog.

Tasting Note: The tea soup was medium amber in color and it has crystal clear clarity. The base perfume was of deep floral notes, accompanied by a fruity and acidic high notes that are commonly found in Oriental Beauty oolong. I thought the high notes reminded me of an unripe green mango or, to borrow Stéphane's accurate description, "sour pineapple." The mouthfeel was rather thin. This tea left a fruity and acidic aftertaste long after it's swallowed.

As noted in Stéphane's blog, this tea was still in the experimental stages, and therefore, its quality may be inconsistent from one vintage to another. I thought that given the amount of high oxidation that this tea received during its manufacture, it was worth comparing it to the 2006 Dong Ding "Hong Shui" (Red Water), which I noted quite some time ago. So I brewed the two teas one after another (with an hour of rest in between sessions). I found the Hong Shui to have a deeper and heavier overall perfume while lacking the high notes found in the Concubine tea. The Hong Shui, however, had a certain sweet, gingery warmth to its characters, which reminded me of entering a cozy home when gingerbread cookies are baking in the oven.

Notice the side-by-side picture of the wet leaves (left side is the Hong Shui): they are quite similar in appearances and colors. The green part of the Hong Shui's leaves is a bit greener than the Gue Fei's, which is closer to being black-green. I wonder if it's caused by varietal/clonal difference, the degree of sunlight exposure or human factors such as processing techniques.