The Melting Teapot

It's a beautiful, spring-like afternoon here in my neck of the woods.  We've had a very warm and dry winter in the Pacific Northwest, and there is nothing but sun in the forecast for the next several days.

To celebrate the sunshine, I pulled out my cheerful yellow tea set and gathered together a few oolongs to sip throughout the day.  The first pots will be a comparison of a couple of light and fragrant baozhong oolongs.  I'll move on from there to some Tie Guan Yin. . . and then wherever my tea fancy takes me.

I've been enjoying these small cups with a nice bowl of early season strawberries from California:

My oolong collection has been sadly neglected for the past few months, and it is starting to show its age.  Some of these teas have lost their sparkle, and  I'm really having to coax out their flavors.   Today's sipping will be a good opportunity to go through my older oolongs, setting aside those that have perhaps stepped down in quality and freshness.  I save these for brewing iced tea in the summer.

Hmmmmm, perhaps I can use this an excuse to spend a bit of time on the web sites of my favorite vendors, ordering more recently harvested oolongs.