Pi Lo Chun

[tissigirl]

My boyfriend is currently working in Shanghai, so for Christmas I asked for some tea varieties. I was both surprised and happy when he came home that he actually did a lot of research on it before he made any purchases (he's a coffee drinker so doesn't know much about tea).

In his research he found that the number 1 favorite, or highest ranked, green tea in China was the Pi Lo Chun, and a close second was Dragonwell. He ended up getting me the Dragonwell. Which was great because that has always been my favorite basic green tea.

So I was wanting to know everyone's opinion on this tea. I wanted to get some while I was visiting him in China a few weeks ago, but was unable to get it. Mostly because of the language barrier, and also partially because they saw a westerner and thought i'd just want to walk in and say "ooh green tea, smells good, i'll buy it!" instead of actually knowing something about the differences in teas .

So what is you opinion on this green tea??

[silverneedles]

Pi Lo Chun, Bi Luo Chun, BiLuoChun , Xia Sha Ren Xiang, Tai Hu lu cha, Green Snail Spring, Green Snail Springtime or whatever else they call it,
i like its taste, green + fruity (i say its apricot)

[hop_goblin]

Pi Lo Chun, Bi Luo Chun, BiLuoChun , Xia Sha Ren Xiang, Tai Hu lu cha, Green Snail Spring, Green Snail Springtime or whatever else they call it,
i like its taste, green + fruity (i say its apricot)

Interesting.. Apricot you say? Hummm.. Just like a particular dancong oolong that I enjoy. I must investigate.

[tissigirl]

Yeah, i'm thinking the many names of it along with the language barrier may have contributed to why I was unable to find it!

Do you have any recomendations on where/who to purchase it from? I know adagio carries it but I didn't know if it was a good variety of it.

[silverneedles]

the fruityness is not strong like drinking fruit juice, its a low flavor but pleasant when it appears.

i got one from a local store in LA - winghopfung (asiachi-but i wouldnt recommend their online store) which i compare to,
and i tried the one from Adagio ... maybe one from Adagio was some left overs (bottom of a container) but the leaf was pretty poor quality, taste was not as good with some "tartness"

i'd get it from tea spring, or upton

[inspectoring]

i tried it once from an average online retailer...but I guess I could not make it taste good. I am certain this is due to my technique more than anything else..

[925er]

Pi Lo Chun is nice, and it is some time pan fried with flowers to give it an extra flowery flavor. i haven't try a Pi Lo Chun without flower flavor, but please tell me about it if you do.

my personal favorite is the Taiwanese wu long tea. It has a initially bitter and sweet afterward taste from its low heat baking method. You can give it a try.

[chrl42]

Are you sure that bilouchun pan-fried with flowers?
By the way bilouchun farmers in Jiangsu grows fruit trees evenly with tea trees. Fruity scents would be captured when sipping bilouchun however, I doubt it is because of effects of growing fruit trees around.

[925er]

i did some research and found out that tea farmers add flowers or the needed flavors while drying the tea leaves, and they say that flavors were add in during the drying steps. there could be different method of adding flavor, and growing tea tree with fruit tree can be one too. i need to do more research for this one, and sorry if i posted the wrong info