Laoshan White

Today was such a dramatic day I… left my job.
Wow.
I was shaking when I got home – it really didn’t sink in. And now? I’m elated! (Don’t worry folks, I have another temp job lined up)

And I reeeeally needed a calm down tea. But also a super special one! And so, out pops my best friend, Laoshan White. Thanks LW, for seeing me through this crazy time!

Just brewed some of this one up, and OH MY GOODNESS this smells so incredibly delicious! Like creamy caramels mixed with that delicious vegetal flavour… it is all I can do not to gulp this down, but I’d surely burn my throat quite badly.

Cool faster, tea!!! Updated tasting note to come…

Also, for reference, I brewed ~4g of this in ~6oz. of 175F water for about 30 seconds. All approximate, yep. If this is as delicious as the aroma, hopefully I can replicate it…

ETA: Ok, I have very little experience with straight white teas, but this one is absolutely amazing! I love love LOVE vegetal greens, particularly ones with a natural rock sugary sweetness (like the Dragonwell-style Laoshan Green), but this is completely something else. Not rock sugar, but definitely creamy, sweet caramel with that Laoshan background. Amazing. I only picked up a sample of this one, but I suspect a full ounce or two may be headed my way sooner than my bank account would prefer…

ETA again: Yummmmm. I would be hard-pressed to identify this as a white tea over a green, but I really don’t care… this one is so good!

ETA a third time: Second infusion, 175F for a minute, is astringent but not unpleasantly so. The vegetal, green-beany flavour is very present, and leaves a strong, caramelly, vegetal aftertaste. Oh so good. I do, however, think that a 45s infusion may have been a touch better – less strong! Or more water. Either way, this is one yummy tea.

Second Review

Feeling in a blue mood today and one of the best remedies is going through my big stash of tea’s to find just the right cure. What I’m looking for has to be at the top of my list of all time favorites, somewhere in the top 10!

Frankly, I don’t have many white tea’s but this Laoshan White is something unique. Something really special. This is the one!

I would advise not to drink white tea on an empty stomach because it has caffeine. But, you might feel a sense of centerdness which a high quality tea can provide and is a pleasant feeling.

I used a Gaiwan and kept my steeping time at 20 seconds which gave me a rich tea broth and very fragrant light green liquor that smelled like salty buttered green beans and spinach mash. It was a wonderful smell.

When I brought the liquor up to my mouth to drink I inhaled deeply and my sinus’s almost seized up…like an old vehicle…clanging “Wha’z this Bonnie?”..clunk clunk…! “Ouch!” The scent was soooo intense that it hurt! I have to be more careful!(It did smell good though and opened everything up for the tasting session ahead!) Wow!

I took a single sip. Water, like drinking hot tea over ice crystals and the melting ice slippery like little daggers then gone.
The flavor was young, sweet (but still vegital enough) snap pea’s and green beans.

Ah, Grandma’s pole beans. (Did you really think I could get through a review without a STORY?!…OH NO!)
WHEN I was a little girl my family lived so close to the San Francisco Airport (in Milbrae,CA) that when Jet Planes were NEW and flew over our house the TV would go out. AND we had a lot of SONIC BOOMS! You can imagine. I’d be looking for frogs or building a fort and BOOM!, then on my bike BOOM! Mikey Mouse Club, BOOM! NO TV!
My rich grandmother would come to our house every Spring and plant pole beans in the backyard. For some wierd reason her name was LOLITA (not a common Scots name)! (My middle name is LO. Just LO and no more because of her). Anyway, we had beans growing everywhere in long rows filling the whole yard instead of lawn. When I wasn’t busy digging a hole to China (and trying to avoid wherever the devil was), I was picking pole beans or eating the sweet young ones raw..snap…crunch. So good!

My second steeping was better than the first. Sweet. There was something floral…but not…then I thought there was a strawberry fruitiness…but no…ah some honey in the snow peas. Yes, a little honey! Clover honey! And saltiness.
Even though this is such a juicy tea it’s not really creamy. I don’t mind. Everything is so fresh and clean.
There is a draw, some sort of mystery that comes from drinking this Laoshan White. I feel the addictive longing for more. EEKS!

Finally, the third steeping while I am still fairly sane, is like walking through fields, row after row of tended beans along the Watsonville, Santa Cruz Coast in the early evening… right after late watering is done. The fog is about to roll in from the Pacific and I have picked a handful of dripping crisp beans. Snap. I pop several into my mouth to crunch. There is nothing fresher or sweeter.

This last drink reminds me of this coolness and juiciness. Fresh. Sparkling.

I can sit for hours in a beach chair sipping this tea, observing nature and enjoying how the tea makes me feel. So relaxed and centered.

This tea is not to be missed! I’ve upgraded my rating!

Another tea I haven’t had in ages! This is so tasty and I am definitely getting sugar snap pea flavor tonight. The mouthfeel is also super silky. I did the first steep for 20 seconds in my little glass walled teacup with a brew basket, probably 4 g of tea. Absolutely delicious! Going to have a few more tonight. See previous notes on this tea!

This is one of the many teas sent by Bonnie in the amazing package she sent to me!

This was the final tea of tea party today! I even changed where I sat so that I could make it just as they suggest. My guest and I thought it was GREAT!

It is hard to believe this is a white tea! The first steep was spinach, and we both like spinach! The second steep was buttered squash and more vegetal than the first. The third steep is still going strong. These steeps are short, too. The first ones – 25 seconds. Three and four – 35 seconds. Who could believe that this much flavor would come from tea leaves in such a short time?

Thank you, Bonnie! This was a fun treat for tea party day and I am saving the Laoshan Black tea for next week so we can all enjoy it together!

I was going to drink this last night but then I ended up cold steeping it. The only problem is that for some reason my refrigerator decided to be very cold, and I opened the jar to find some ice! So I think that kind of ruined the flavor, sadly. The end note is very bitter, which I’m going to say is either that or me sleeping so long it steeped for 12 hours, and if I had gone with 10 maybe the stupid ice wouldn’t have formed.

But before it gets bitter, it is so overwhelmingly creamy and tastes just like snap peas. It’s sweet and yet savory at the same time.

I probably won’t have time until next week to give it a proper steeping in my gaiwan, but I had to try the cold steep! And next time I try that, the refrigerator is already set to not be so cold.

I was a little skeptical of this tea before trying it, and that’s because I was a little disappointed with the Laoshan Green when I tried it. I mean, it was a good tea, I just think that Verdant’s poetic descriptions can get my hopes a little too high sometimes.

This one, however, was even better than I thought it would be. This tasted how I imagined the Laoshan Green would taste. This was what I wanted. It’s extremely smooth with luscious silky mouthfeel. The prominent notes are green beans and maybe a little bit of spinach (but not in the same way as a Japanese green). Besides that, there’s a pleasant mineral taste that fades into a sweet, delicate finish. But there is more to this tea flavor-wise that I just can’t put my finger on. There’s something enchanting about it. It’s the definition of refreshing, and this has been my go-to tea lately for moments of calm and meditation. It just puts me in a great, relaxed state of mind.

I absolutely LOVE this tea.

My tasting note went bye bye after Firefox crashed on me. :(

This is an exquisite white tea … the leaves are incredibly green. If I had not opened the pouch myself, I would swear that these were green tea leaves and not white. They are so tiny and delicate looking… and deeply green!

The flavor is amazing. Sweet and vegetative, tasting very much like sweet sugar snap peas as suggested by Verdant. I also taste the hint of almond to this, it tastes almost creamy like the creaminess of a raw almond, but, with the sweetness of a roasted almond (but not so much of the toasty flavor of the roasted almond). It’s really quite delightful. Delicate in the way that I taste generally only from a white tea, but, also quite green tea tasting. Very intriguing and lovely.

In subsequent infusions I notice more sweetness, like honey… reminding me of the honeysuckle of my childhood memories, but not quite that either. It’s somewhere between that honeysuckle and wildflower honey.

I really love this White tea … I can see why it has been so highly regarded by other Steepsterites. I’m enjoying this immensely.

very interesting tea – I had to get this in my latest order from Verdant as I love white teas. I am drinking this tonight in a wine glass, aren’t I sophistimicated?

Anyway, this is lovely! I am surprised by the flavors and everything going on here with this tea. I decided to steep it for two minutes at 165F — Western style — but would like to gongfu it sometime just to see what that’s like.

I got a nice, clear infusion and I agree with Doug that it has some similarities to a dragonwell; the light vegetal notes with a hint of butteriness is what struck me first about it. There is a definite light creamy element about it that is rather charming. The clover element is what sticks with me through the finish. I’m not really getting vanilla soymilk, but perhaps I need to steep it differently in order for that to happen? It isn’t as sweet as some white teas I have tried, but still rather nice all the same. A very nice offering from Verdant! I don’t know why I am so sleepy this evening, or I would try to write more… I feel like all I do is work, sleep, eat and drink tea!

Dry smell: The dry smell is light but thick. It smells like a mix of strong green vegetables. It is a mix of bean and pea smells that could go along with a meal like steak.

Wet Smell: The wet leaf smell is still light but loses the thickness that the dry leaf had. Now it has more of a thick nutty smell mixed with an array of dark green vegetables.

Taste: This tea is very light at first. There is no flavor that just comes out and immediately hits you. It’s almost like it starts off with a warm flavorless crispness. The next flavor that comes out reminds me of edamame. It has the same crisp bean flavor but with a smoothness at the back. When you begin to swallow you notice the nutty and dark green vegetable flavor. Even with the strong finish the aftertaste is very light and pleasant.

This tea would be great after dinner when still have things to do but want to add a little relaxation. It’s a nice light tea overall.