2-time Charcoal Roasted High Mountain Oolong
Sweet, toasty, clean, crisp, and fragrant - this oolong has it all!
Hand roasted in small batches over traditional longan wood charcoal by Uncle Liu, our tea farmer partner in Taiwan, this oolong packs great depth of flavor while still being very approachable for new drinkers.
These leaves are from Dong Ding mountain - one of Taiwan's most famous tea mountains, a name synonymous with top quality oolong.
High Mountain Teas
This tea comes from high altitude mountains in Taiwan, where the altitude's effects on weather, sunlight, and fog create cleaner, crisper tasting teas.
When I went to Taiwan to scout teas for this oolong series, I knew that a classic, roasted oolong had to find its way into the shop. I wanted something that drinkers of Tie Guan Yin (Iron Goddess of Mercy) would like - classic Taiwanese oolong flavor.
This twice-roasted oolong is not overly toasty or heavy - it has a clear but clean nuttiness from the roasting process that plays in the aftertaste of the tea.
Uncle Liu, our roaster, and Jayme, his great-niece, shared oolong of five different roasting levels with me, and this was the one I picked as a "standard" really good roasted oolong. Fans of heavy roasting should try our five-time roasted oolong, which is a real treat as well, but not as much for beginners.
Charcoal Roasting: A Disappearing Tradition
Me and Uncle Liu, who is showing off a HEFTY BOI piece of longan wood charcoal
Most roasted oolong tea is roasted in giant electric ovens, which aim to slowly remove moisture from the leaves, increasing its shelf life and improving flavor.
These electric roasters have almost completely replaced the traditional charcoal-roasting method, which involves using charcoal made from longan trees, which burns more evenly than other woods.
Uncle Liu, our roaster and one of the few remaining charcoal roasters in Taiwan, showed me how he carefully modulated the heat of the coals by burying them under ash - by adding and removing ash, the heat can be both controlled and evenly distributed.
Each roasting session takes eight hours under supervision from highly skilled roasters. The resulting tea is truly excellent, and the skill of the roaster can be seen in how the original flavor of the tea shines through the roastiness and is not overwhelmed by the smoky, nutty flavors.
OUR TEA PEOPLE
We will be working directly with Jayme and Uncle Liu, a third-generation tea family with farms in Dong Ding and Qilai Mountain!
Jayme and I at her family's tea farm on Dong Ding Shan. Jayme's family's teas are featured in Michelin Star restaurants across Europe.
Uncle Liu is one of the last people in all of Taiwan who still does traditional charcoal roasting, using only pure Longan tree charcoal to make small batches of maximum 6 kg at a time.
VALUE AND QUALITY
Want the best value? This tea comes in 100g and 200g sizes - check the drop-down menu above!
Jesse's Teahouse started because Jesse realized the quality and value of the tea directly from the tea markets and mountains in Asia was so much higher than what could be easily found in the States -- and around the world.
Jesse contacted his tea friends, they shipped their best teas to him, and he sends them to you. That's it!
These teas are high quality and can be re-steeped multiple times! Each serving makes between 4-8 cups of tea, so at around $.50 a cup, you get top quality Chinese teas at a price that you can enjoy every day.
NOT JUST TEA, TEA CULTURE
Jesse believes the key to making good tea is to help his Chinese tea friends share not just their best teas, but the best ways to make the teas.
That's why each box comes also comes with info that tells you:
- Tea Origin
- Steep Temperature
- Steep Time
- Directions for both teapot steeping and gaiwan steeping
Don't Forget Your Tea Pets!
In Chinese Gongfu Tea Tradition, Tea Pets accompany you at teatime and you "raise" them by feeding them tea! Check out the tea pets at the bottom of this page.
