Broken leaves

[steanze]

I just got some samples from teafromtaiwan (the two sample packs with 5 different teas each), and so far I tried the Shi Zuo, the Tsui Luan, the Four Seasons and the Shan Ling Xi.
I quite liked the Shi Zuo and the Shan Ling Xi but I found the Tsui Luan and the Four Seasons a bit bland. Though, one thing that I noticed immediately is that most of the leaves in the samples are broken. Furthermore, in many cases they are single leaves rather than groups of 2 or 3 intact leaves with a stem. This was true for all four samples.
Is that because they are samples? Is that because I was unlucky? Is it because I should get more expensive teas to have intact leaves? Is that because of teafromtaiwan?
I have no experience on this since these are the first taiwanese gaoshan oolongs that I buy... Thanks in advance for your feedback!

By the way, I was thinking about getting some samples from theformosa.com, it seems to have interesting teas at reasonable prices and free shipping... has anyone tried it?

[brandon]

Do you mean the balls were crushed before brewing, or that the unfurled leaves are not whole bud and stem? Pictures please. Machine picked tea is not going to be a whole stem-plus-two-to-three-buds system, it will be torn.

[Tead Off]

I just got some samples from teafromtaiwan (the two sample packs with 5 different teas each), and so far I tried the Shi Zuo, the Tsui Luan, the Four Seasons and the Shan Ling Xi.
I quite liked the Shi Zuo and the Shan Ling Xi but I found the Tsui Luan and the Four Seasons a bit bland. Though, one thing that I noticed immediately is that most of the leaves in the samples are broken. Furthermore, in many cases they are single leaves rather than groups of 2 or 3 intact leaves with a stem. This was true for all four samples.
Is that because they are samples? Is that because I was unlucky? Is it because I should get more expensive teas to have intact leaves? Is that because of teafromtaiwan?
I have no experience on this since these are the first taiwanese gaoshan oolongs that I buy... Thanks in advance for your feedback!

By the way, I was thinking about getting some samples from theformosa.com, it seems to have interesting teas at reasonable prices and free shipping... has anyone tried it?

It's been a long time since I've oredered samples from tft but I can't remember if they were broken or not. I do know that many of their teas are organic and hand processed like their DYL and Long Feng Xia which seem to have their leaves and stem intact. I also didn't care for their 4 Seasons but like their SLX very much.

[steanze]

Thanks for the replies! I also tried the Dong Ding and the leaves in it seem definitely better. I liked it, pretty different from the greener oolongs. I might still prefer the Shan Ling Xi and the Shi Zuo. I took pictures of the leaves of the Shan Ling Xi and I will post them as soon as I have time + i figure out how to do it (I never posted pictures before...)

Now I have samples of the Ali Shan and the Yu Shan from theformosa.com on the way

[britt]

I just got some samples from teafromtaiwan ....
I quite liked the Shi Zuo and the Shan Ling Xi but I found the Tsui Luan and the Four Seasons a bit bland. Though, one thing that I noticed immediately is that most of the leaves in the samples are broken. Furthermore, in many cases they are single leaves rather than groups of 2 or 3 intact leaves with a stem. This was true for all four samples.
Is that because they are samples? Is that because I was unlucky? Is it because I should get more expensive teas to have intact leaves? Is that because of teafromtaiwan?

I placed my first order with Tea from Taiwan in January 2008 and had the same complaints; the leaves were very uniform in one way only; they were all severely broken. The taste was bland and the durability was zero. Two teas at 150 grams each for $66 isn't terribly expensive, but I expected better than this. I sent the following e-mail to TFT but they never responded, although their spam e-mails had no trouble finding my inbox.

Hi,

I did receive the tea but I am definitely not enjoying it. I actually considered throwing them away but I'll give them to someone instead. They are the worst Taiwanese oolongs I have yet tried. Zero durability and no taste after the first infusion even when done gong fu style. The Dong Ding is the worst but the Pear Mountain isn't a whole lot better. If these are from Winter 2007 then I'm glad I didn't buy any from the spring. The leaves don't open well and they look terrible if and when they finally do open.

FYI I buy Taiwanese oolongs and a limited amount of mainland China tea from Hou De Asian and they have all been great. They open quickly and the open leaves look to be of very high quality. Their spring 2007 oolongs still taste fresh. I am very happy with Hou De but wanted to try shipping tea direct from Taiwan for a comparison. Hou De wins easily. No offense is intended by these comments; this is sincere feedback.

Thanks for the follow-up,
Dave B.

This order was so bad I decided not to give it away for two reasons;

1. I questioned whether this was really genuine Taiwanese tea or a fake, and wondered if it was even safe to consume.

2. I didn't want to give this order to someone and have them judge all Taiwanese tea to be this bad.

The answer with what to do with this inferior tea was obvious; down the garbage disposal it went.

[steanze]

Mmm I see. To follow up, I tried a bunch of their samples by now, and the integrity of the leaves is variable, but on average they are quite broken. On the other hand, I ordered samples from theformosa.com and I definitely like them, the leaves are in much better shape and the tea is more tasty.

[Tead Off]

After reading some of the comments here, I went directly to the Long Feng Xia that I got from TFT and brewed up some. I am down to very bottom of my supply where the smallest and broken bits usually sink down to. In the tea scoop, most of the balls were intact. Very little particles.

After 6 infusions, which had both myself and my wife exclaiming how good this tea is, maybe my favorite Taiwan Gaoshan, I took out the leaves to inspect them. Most were intact, large, and, had their systems intact. This is handpicked, hand processed, organic tea, I believe.

From my memory, the tea I've gotten from TFT has been intact. I don't like all of them, but, who does? But, I will issue a challenge to anyone who can come up with a better high mountain tea than their LFX, DYL, SLX. These teas are exceptional and need to be brewed on the light side. You don't need a lot of leaf in the pot and the first few brews need only 10-20sec tops.

[iannon]

I would have to agree with Tead Off just in my personal experience with them. I had the DYL and the LFX and the SLX as well in the sampler sizes first (among some others) and then ordered some more LFX after. I didnt care for the aged sample at all..way to smoky roasted for my personal tastes. I have ordered from Floating leaves as well as DTH and Ishoppo to name a few and found TFT to be on par or better. Leaves were all mostly nicely intact and opened up nicely thru many infusions.

[miginaustria]

I only ordered once 2 sample packs from TFT about 9 months ago. Leaves were in good shape, no real problems. I thought a few of the teas from TFT were fairly good and good value even in relation to Floating Leaves and Houde, from which I have also ordered.
I was actually thinking in placing an order from TFT again soon, but if several people are experiencing problems I might reconsider.
Maybe we should call the TFT owner's attention to this thread, so he's aware of it?

[Chip]

I only ordered once 2 sample packs from TFT about 9 months ago. Leaves were in good shape, no real problems. I thought a few of the teas from TFT were fairly good and good value even in relation to Floating Leaves and Houde, from which I have also ordered.
I was actually thinking in placing an order from TFT again soon, but if several people are experiencing problems I might reconsider.
Maybe we should call the TFT owner's attention to this thread, so he's aware of it?

By all means ... if he wants to reply to this topic, he should contact me in advance so it is done properly!!!

Thanks,
Chip
Immoderate TeaDrinker who happens to Moderate

[Alucard]

I also ordered 2 of their sample packages a month or two ago. The leaves seemed fine to me...there was a few particles in the pouch but nothing i was concerned about. All samples were good except the aged oolong...the sticker said 1991 i think....was smooth but did have a taste that i did not enjoy, bleh!

Edit: I have not tried FTL or Houde.

[steanze]

Here are some pictures of a TFT sample (Shi Zuo as far as I remember)... I do not have a huge experience on tea samples but the samples I got elsewhere had leaves that looked better.
This said, I do not have anything personal against TFT and I liked some of the teas I tried so far even if often the leaves were not in good shape. It is possible that I got some unlucky samples from the bottom of a big container or something so I wanted to check with you guys who have more experience with TFT whether what I got is their standard or whether it is unusual.
It is interesting to learn that other people had similar issues with TFT. To be fair, it is also true that people who were unsatisfied might be more motivated to post in this thread and therefore might end up being overrepresented. Thank you all for your posts!

[teaisme]

I think the general consensus is that tft has good quality tea. If you had gotten the bottom of the bag/canister your other teas would not be like that also. What are the chances of them being at the very end of more then a couple teas?
Seems more likely to me it was a packing/shipping/handling issue.

Also, there seems to be a lot of emphasis on wet leaf appearance, and quality being judged on how well the tea leaves opens up. I wouldn't put too much weight on that. Right now I am drinking some shanlinxi 2nd place and after a full gongfu session they are still not completely open. After soaking for a day they still do not completely open flat. I would be more concerned with the taste/texture/aroma then whether or not the leaves fully open up, sometimes they are just made not to.

[steanze]

Dear churng,

thanks for the reply. My issue was not so much with whether the leaves fully open up but with whether they are broken into pieces or not. To my knowledge, intact leaves are a sign of hand picking and/or more careful processing which is often applied to higher quality teas.
Anyway, I did like some of the samples. It might be that they got smashed during shipping.