Est. 1956 · The Order The independent guide to oolong: the partly oxidized teas, and how to brew them. Oolong.biz
THE ORDER OF THE SEVENTH STEEP SEMPER PARTIM OXIDATUM The Order of the Seventh Steep
The Order of the Seventh Steep
OOLONG
Semper Partim Oxidatum Always partly oxidized

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The 'Taiwan-Style' Oolong That Was Never From Taiwan Zhangping, a Fujian county, grows oolong under a national standard written for a style that never crossed the strait. Land, not origin, is what the standard actually measures. Chaozhou Names Seven Tea Kings Across Its Phoenix Dancong Classes Two days of final blind judging on 355 spring samples closed July 9, with a single Tea King crowned in each of seven classes, from honey orchid to Lingtou dancong. Oolong's Astringency Peaks Lower Than Green Tea's, a Study Finds Researchers at Hunan Agricultural University tracked astringency second by second in six teas and reported oolong's builds slower than green tea's, alternating between "rough" and "dry. Chaozhou Closes Entries for Its Eighth Phoenix Dancong Contest, Judging Set for July 8 The Guangdong championship stopped taking spring-tea samples July 1 and will judge ten single-bush classes over three days, from honey orchid to duck shit aroma. Alishan Drought Cuts Tea Output 30 to 40 Percent as 2026 Competition Crowns Winners A dry spring delayed Alishan's high-mountain tea harvest and cut output 30 to 40 percent, Taiwanese officials said as the region announced its 2026 tea-competition winners. China Sets a New National Standard for Wuyi Rock Tea, Effective April 2027 The revised GB/T 18745-2026 standard builds a quantified sensory system for judging the prized "rock rhyme" of Wuyi oolong and, for the first time, defines aged rock tea. It takes effect on 1 April 2027. A 35-Year-Old Oolong, Down to Its Last Dozen Catties, Poured for the Public At a drought-thinned Nantou competition, a 35-year-old aged oolong valued near NT$100,000 a catty was set out for anyone who came to taste it. Wuyishan Judges Its Old-Bush Shui Xian Before the Roast At Yangzhuang's first walked-water competition on June 27, judges graded old-bush Shui Xian in its lightly finished state, before the finishing roast that usually defines Wuyi rock tea, to read the raw craft and the mountain plot without the fire. Muzha's Top Tieguanyin Goes to a Father-and-Daughter First Zhang Ya-han won the special award at Taipei's 2026 spring Muzha Tieguanyin competition, a year after her father took the same prize, the first back-to-back father-daughter win. Her winning tea priced at NT$30,000 a catty and sold out the day results posted. The Tea-and-Aging Study Everyone Shared This Month Barely Looked at Oolong A 2025 tea-and-aging review found tea may guard against several diseases of age, and a ScienceDaily write-up sent it around again this June. Almost all of it rests on green tea, and the authors say plainly that oolong is little studied. Taiwan Turns Its Only Wild Tea Into a High-GABA Oolong The Tea and Beverage Research Station has processed a GABA oolong from Tai Cha No. 24, the island's only domesticated native wild tea, at 249 milligrams of GABA per 100 grams. Lugu Names a 50th Dong Ding Champion From a Shrunken Field Drought had already cut entries to Lugu's 50th Dong Ding Oolong competition by 16 percent. The county's own agriculture chief says judging stayed just as tough anyway, and the numbers back him up. Drought Collapses Phoenix Dan Cong's Staggered Spring Into One Rush Drought and heat overlapped the early, mid and late cultivars that Phoenix Dan Cong growers normally pick in turn, shortened the season to a 40-day scramble, and cut core-area output by as much as 30%, two reports said. Zheng Yongshun Takes Top Prize at New Taipei's 2026 Spring Wenshan Baozhong Competition Pinglin tea grower Zheng Yongshun won the special award in New Taipei City's 2026 spring Wenshan Baozhong tea competition, judged over six days against a record 1,825 entries. Wuyi's Da Hong Pao Mother Trees Named a National Biodiversity Case for 2026 China's environment ministry named the germplasm protection of the six Da Hong Pao mother stems one of ten national conservation cases for 2026, citing 3,299 preserved tea specimens and five new cultivars bred from the program. Drones Now Carry Wuyi's Rock Tea Off the Cliffs It Grows On More than 70 drones are flying over 600 trips a day out of Wuyi Mountain's steepest gardens this spring, lifting freshly picked leaf out of the cliff-and-gorge terrain where the region's prized zhengyan tea grows. Drought Cuts Entries to Lugu's 50th Dong Ding Competition by 16 Percent A dry January left some Lugu tea gardens near total loss, and entries to the township's landmark 50th-anniversary Dong Ding Oolong competition fell from 4,401 to 3,714. Emei Held Taiwan's First Festival for the Insect That Bites Its Tea The Hsinchu township staged a rite for the small green leafhopper, the pest whose bite gives Oriental Beauty oolong its honey aroma and the reason the crop is never sprayed. Anxi Opens Its 2026 Tieguanyin Season, With a Robot Working the Crowd Anxi county opened its 2026 spring Tieguanyin season on April 14 with the traditional mountain-shout rite, more than 5,800 tonnes of spring tea already under contract, and a kung-fu robot greeting guests at the gate. A Lab Test Now Reads Tieguanyin's Season and Roast From Its Chemistry A new study reports a machine-learning method that tells spring Tieguanyin from autumn, and light roast from dark, at 90.9 percent accuracy from the tea's chemical fingerprint. Wuyi Growers Hold Mountain-Calling Rite at Da Hong Pao Tea farmers and heritage transmitters chanted for a good harvest at Wuyi Mountain's Jiulongke gorge on the spring equinox, opening a season for a rock tea industry the city now puts at 17 billion yuan a year. Vietnamese Tea Sold as Dong Ding Reached a TWG Counter in Taipei 101 A 60-year-old Taipei tea house blended Vietnamese leaf into tea sold as Taiwan Dong Ding oolong, some of it reaching a TWG counter in Taipei 101, prosecutors said.