Songboling Natural Farming "Ruby Lily" Oriental Beauty Oolong Tea - Summer 2020

"How about making this harvest into an Oriental Beauty?" This was what we suggested our farmer Mr. Chen when learning how little the quantity is after inspecting the plantation. "Fine, do whatever you want. Just make sure I don't lose money on this!" Mr. Chen said as he exclaimed desperately after seeing the miserable output of this plantation at this season. "We won't fail you my friend." So did we promised him. 

Creating an Oriental Beauty using such a material is always a bless to us. Due to the nature of how an Oriental Beauty Oolong is processed, a processor's hand will have a very close contact with the material itself since the big waving stage must be done by hand rather than a big waving machine. Mr. Chen's material never disappoint us on how clean it is, and therefore there are no extra hardship when working with the material. 

We did not fail the tea Mr. Chen created, nor did we let him lost money on such a small quantity of tea. He was quite surprised by how the tea turned out to be, and he told us his wife was "blown away by how delicious it is" after he made her trying it. This tea does not require a fancy name to show how beautiful it is, "Ruby Lily" might be an ordinary name to some, but we think it reflects its beautiful nature truthfully. 

Harvest:  Summer  2020 / 春 貳零貳零

Varietal: Jin Xuan / 金萱

Elevation:  300 M / 參佰 公尺

Region: Mingjian Songboling / 名間 松柏嶺

Fermentation Level:  80% / 分之 捌拾

Roast Level:  0 / 無

  I'm 100% positive that Ruby Lily has the power to convert anyone who says they don't like Oriental Beauty. It's an absolutely stunning example of what masterful processing can accomplish! The bug-bitten character is bold and upfront without being overpowering like many Oriental Beauty teas. With each sip, I can't help but think of dark chocolate with an undercurrent of honey-drenched flowers. Truly remarkable and a more than worthy addition to the Taiwan Sourcing lineup!

 Boiling Water.....

 This year is a year blessed by lots of bug bitten-ness. The lack of production was due to severe pests all over Taiwan, which allowed us to create an Oriental Beauty from Mingjian.