Thursday, June 25, 2009
Posted by Miss Neddy at 09:18 AM | Comments (1) | Permalink
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Here’s a little tidbit to tide you over till July. The teahouse manager, A, braved the H1N1 epidemic to travel to China recently in search of fresh spring tea. Her travel was rewarded with some excellent tea, which is now flying its way to Singapore, and she personally brought back a batch of Tie Guanyin which she states is serendipitious. The tea master who created the tea simply cannot replicate his work, though he did try with subsequent batches. So the few precious kilograms she bought are truly unique.

If I did a blind tasting, I would have sworn up and down that this was not a Tie Guanyin, and might even have mistaken it for a green tea. The tea leaves are a light but brilliant mottled green, some parts light almost to the shade of yellow. The tea is also extremely pale in colour, and with a tinge of green to it. The fragrance that emanates from the leaves and the tea is incredible, almost as if someone had spilled essence oils in the room. Taste-wise, it is not impressive, having little to none of the distinctive, almost overpowering cleansing taste of a typical Tie Guanyin - but the fragrance and the sweet aftertaste makes up for that shortcoming.

I still prefer the regular top-grade Tie Guanyin that the teahouse has, as it excels in both fragrance and taste. But it has been a privilege to try this little treasure, which may never come our way again.