Yay, I finally get to try this tea! This was really the main impetus for my swap with Angrboda, because of this tea that everyone raves about and sounds perfect for me. Thanks for sending me a sample, I’m very excited!
The dry leaf smells wonderfully like raspberries. Not fake raspberry flavoring (like the other Raspberry Oolong I have from ZenTea), but real, juicy raspberries. The leaf is interesting, and especially when it’s steeped it almost reminds me more of a black/green blend in appearance than an oolong. Hmm, my nose seems to have stopped working properly since I last blew it, so hopefully it will come through for me and let me enjoy this tea! Right now I can get a bit of the aroma from the steeped cup, which has that same lovely raspberry aroma with some roastier oolong notes behind it, I think. Kind of like raspberries baked in a tart or something.
It doesn’t taste quite like what I expected (not quite sure what that was, but whatever), but it’s nice. The raspberry is light and certainly doesn’t overwhelm the cup. My first impression is that of a light, roasted oolong, then I get a hint of bitterness (not sure where that’s coming from), then the raspberry comes out, a little bit tart, and finally back to a somewhat bakey oolong. I don’t really get any sweetness from this one, rather it’s an overall fairly tart cup, surprisingly. Overall it’s very pleasant, and I will enjoy my sample, but I’m kind of glad I’m not blown away by it because now I don’t have to be sad about shipping from Denmark. :) I will of course try it again when I’m not sick just in case my nose was messing with me a bit on this cup.
And at 84 points, I believe you are one of the people who were least impressed by it. That’s why it’s such a favourite for me to share. :)
Yup, I always love sharing favorite teas to see what others think of them!