John Grebe

If you like strong puerh than it is important to break up these mini blocks into thinner layers before brewing otherwise one will get weaker infusions. This puerh is on the lighter end of ripe puerh and has a nice smooth taste that is worthy of Puerh Shop’s American Hao label as it good quality that is truly premium tea.

I brewed and drank this tea out of my large gaiwan Chinese “glass brewing style”. Overall a fairly typical silver needle white tea with a very light and sweet flavor that to some can be summed up as being “sweet water”. Rishi Silver Needle Premium stands out with a slightly fruity taste to the sweet water which is likely from it being a blend of silver needle from different parts of China.

I brewed and drank this tea out of my large gaiwan Chinese “glass brewing style”. The first sip of this tea surprised me at how smooth, mellow and sweet, with a very strong sense of freshness. The leaves floating around the gaiwan stand out as being an unusually bright green as if they were freshly plucked from the plant even though I know that they are not. This is not a tea to really go deep into and try to find flavor notes as it is just a fresh and mellow summer tea.

I brewed and drank this tea out of my large gaiwan Chinese “glass brewing style”. This new style Pi Lo Chun is a lot more interesting in my opinion as it has a enjoyable sweet fruity taste to it which is neither too floral nor too grassy. While the tea does have some subtle smoke under notes to it, the smoke is light enough that it should not be a problem for anybody that likes fruity but not smoky greens.

I brewed and drank this tea out of my large gaiwan Chinese “glass brewing style”. In my opinion this tea can be summed up with the word balance. If one likes strong grassy or floral green teas this is not a tea for you but if you would like something in the middle between the two. On the surface level you have a naturally sweet tasting green tea with a nice middle between grassy and floral but if one gets extra critical they can likely pick up flavor notes from both sides of the spectrum and a little hint of bamboo.

I brewed and drank this tea out of my large gaiwan Chinese “glass brewing style”. A fairly good green tea overall with a slight floral grassy taste to it but somewhat flat at the same time. I’d say this tea falls into the good enough to finish what I have but not good enough to buy more when I do category, but then again I tend to enjoy more flavorful and fruity tasting green teas.

A good tasting chocolate raspberry flavored tea which with a spoonful of sugar makes a good desert alternative. Just like most flavored teas the flavor does not seem right without adding enough sugar to give it a fairly sweet taste.

Like the other reviews I doubt that this tea deserves its premium name. It is better than most of the black teas out there but it falls way short of the really premium ones that I have encountered. Still worth drinking what I have but this is not a tea that I would use to show off a really good black tea to somebody.

A lighter fermentation ripe puerh with a clean smooth taste. While I have had better this is a good cheap everyday tea that would be ideal for a beginner to puerh.

Fujiam Rain is one of the best Shui Xian Wuyi oolongs that I have had the pleasure of drinking. If one is poetic in their tasting notes fujian rain would be the perfect description of how it tastes assuming that rain would have a light and sweet taste to it. Just be careful about getting this tea too strong as it quickly goes downhill but brewed right it is a very nice light and sweet wuyi oolong with amazing reinfusability. When gaiwan brewed I have literally brewed easily 10 cups or more from a single set of leaves.

I gaiwan brewed this tea like I normally do with greens. To me this is a somewhat light and sweet green tea with some depth that is not grassy but unlike the description I would not call it smoky, maybe slightly smoky but light enough that one can miss it. While it was compared to Gunpowder in the description quite honestly I think it is more like a Pi Lo Chun type green tea.

After enjoying the Nor Sun puerh a lot a friend recommended that I try Adagio’s Pu Erh Dante thinking I would like it which is coming full circle for me as Dante was the first puerh that I had years ago. Brewing it I can tell that this one is more like a traditionally stored puerh, although it falls a bit short of the Nor Sun in my opinion. It has deep earthy taste to it but it lacks the bit of mellow sweetness edge to it that comes along with a good earthy puerh in the earlier infusions. Although to its credit it does pick up some sweetness or at least the earthiness fades enough to balance it out by the 3rd infusion.

In many ways it is a shame that Menghai Golden Needle White Lotus ripe puerh has been hyped up so much online. It is a very good ripe puerh but not the best that I have encountered although to its credit it is better than most. I think the best thing about this puerh is its overall balance and lack of rough edges and an enjoyable but complex taste that can be hard to nail down into words although I’d say more of soft wood and not dirt. It has a medium level fermentation which has more body than many of the lighter ones but stops short of the strong malty taste that some of the heavier fermentation brings. Also as others have mentioned before this tea has really good staying power for a ripe puerh but as always the number of infusions you can get from the leaves depends upon how strong you like your tea but you will get more than normal for this one.

From how Darjeeling teabags go this one is actually pretty good compared to most even though it is not that good of a tea overall. I was given this box of teabags as a gift and I will be passing it on to somebody else who will hopefully enjoy it a lot more than I did.

This is the first cake of aged sheng that I picked up for myself after long since being afraid of aged sheng out of fear that it would lead me to enjoy shu less. Although as it turns out aged sheng is different enough that it is nothing to worry about. My initial impression is that wet storage aged sheng reminds me more about Liu An tea than puerh, in how it has a lighter and slightly earthy taste to it. The other great thing about this tea is its insane level of reinfusability in that one can literally drink it all day and the tea leaves will out last the heavy tea drinker.

To me the 2002 Keyixing Ripen puerh cake is a fine example of the silky ripe puerh. A light mellow taste with rich smoothness that lasts for multiple infusions.

This is an example of a rare gem of puerh as Chinese grocery store style tins of tea are very rarely that high quality. This is a traditional stored ripe puerh that also has some green puerh mixed in with it. While it has an earthy/traditional stored taste to it, unlike other cheap and low quality puerhs I would call this a good earthy puerh with a sweet taste that is not musty. Quite honestly this one is good enough that if I could buy it in person at a local store I might not actually bother ordering that much puerh online as this is a really good one.

I must say that this one is a lot better than I expected it to be. Overall I consider Twining China Oolong to be a passable oolong tea just like the oolong at Chinese buffets is passable enough to be performed to ordering a soda instead. This is a light oolong which is good and perfectly fine in my opinion although I’d recommend it as a travel or work tea when one does not have the access to or the time brew a better quality oolong in a gaiwan.

I’m not sure if this tea is the freshest or not and quite honestly I only have it because it was thrown in for free with an order from an online Chinese grocery store I placed. Not sure if this tea is the freshest as it has a light floral taste that is not overwhelming like most floral oolongs that I’ve had before. If anything this tea even when brewed gongfu in a gaiwan has a bit of a washed out taste (for a green oolong) to it and even longer brews just make it bitter. So while it is not really bad to say I definitively will not be picking it up again unless it is given to me for free again as it is not worth the $7.50 they were charging for me. Like most cheap and not so good oolongs this one will follow suit in being sent through my ice tea maker as a semi-don’t care ice tea oolong, although unlike others this is not a cheap oolong that I would buy for the sake of sending through my ice tea maker.

Wow the description of this tea having a unique peppery taste was right on. The first time I had this brewed with a mug infuser I wondered if I had forgot to wash my infuser basket after having the Thai Chai I last used it for. So I brewed it again with a gaiwan to ensure a clean brew and the taste was still there. I’ve never encountered a black tea that is naturally spicy like this one before which was a nice change for something different although quite honestly while it is a good tea I am glad that I only bought a sample as I don’t think I will be ordering any more of it.

Overall a well balanced ripe puerh with a slight earthy edge to it. It makes me think of the good cheap bricks of ripe puerh that while it is clearly not the highest quality is still good tasting and a satisfying tea to drink. While I really enjoyed the free sample of this cake, the cake itself especially now 9 years old is not worth the price that it is being sold for in my opinion.

Given that it was an oolong I treated it like a Chinese/Taiwan Oolong and gaiwan brewed it. Contains the familiar grape and dried fruit floral notes that one would expect to find in a first flush Darjeeling black tea of quality. While I really enjoy it, it has gotten me thinking about how much different brewing a Darjeeling black tea in a gaiwan would be from what I am brewing now from the many observations of others about first flush Darjeeling black teas being a more oolong like black tea. Regardless it stands out as a nice tea that is a very enjoyable change from what I normally drink although I highly doubt it will become a staple tea for me.

The first words that come to mind for this one are light, sweet and mellow. Pretty much a light easy drinking ripe puerh with a nice clean taste.

This sample comes off to me as a very good young sheng puerh to be drinking now and coming from a person who generally avoids sheng. Overall the taste is smooth and sweet without any traces of harshness or smoke. While the tea has a floral taste to it, the floral taste is not overwhelming nor is the other strong “puerh” taste overwhelming either so the description of it having both strength and depth is a pretty good way of putting it. The tea holds out very well and consistently for more infusions than I could drink and did not result in any stomach issues for me which says a lot to one that is more sensitive to too much young sheng puerh.