pu-erh of the day. Sheng or Shou

After a nice session of aged shu this morning, I decided to break out the October White2Tea club 2013 Lincang Orb for the late afternoon. I’m brewing the whole thing in my 100ml gaiwan @195F. I have to say, that little orb is compressed as heck; now that it’s opened, the leaves are spilling out of my gaiwan! This brew is thick, sweet, slightly smoky, and quite enjoyable.

2004 Chang Yu Hao Yiwu Ancient Tree Sheng
Few things beat a high quality Yiwu made with material from old trees. Yesterday I spent time throughout the day enjoying a 2004 Yiwu. A few months ago, Essence of Tea offered a “sale” on a few very special somewhat aged teas they had introduced on a very limited basis. I picked up a few different 25g sample packs and this ChangYuHao Yiwu was one of them. Whole leaves from old trees nicely darkened by 11 years of aging – genuine non-plantation leaves; careful storage in Malaysia; and all the characteristic aromas of true quality YiWu material. The aroma from the wet leaves is sweet and rather pungent. Very clean tea liquor with sweet and spicy umami. Definite throatiness and a lingering aftertaste in the mouth. A smooth, heavy, sweet tea with feel good cha qi – I am happy to have an opportunity to session this 2004 YiWu. This is a good tea!

Today I drank a ripe tea purchased from Aliexpress King Tea, the 2015 BanZhang LaoMan’E (SanYangKaiTai) Organic Ripe Tea. It should be noted that this is not from Lao Ban Zhang village but is a brand of tea called BanZhang LaoMan’E. Some sellers do try to tell you that this brand is Ban Zhang tea but King Tea didn’t falsify it as such. They also didn’t have anything on there site saying it in fact was not BanZhang tea. In any case this tea had a lot a fermentation flavor. It also had a very strong taste of camphor. This taste persisted through all twelve steeps although it got somewhat muted. There were also notes of spice and bamboo. It is not to say there were no sweet notes, it’s just they weren’t dominant. There was no taste of chocolate in this tea. Anyone fond of camphor in their tea would probably like this tea.

This is an organic plantation tea from pu-erh.sk. I found it to be very good. The first steep was like liquid beef jerky, smoky and sweet. As I got further into it, some fruitiness came through. The smoke lasted several steps, but it was well integrated into the flavor. It is a durable eye-opening drink, and I get the feeling it will age well. Kind of like a premium Dayi sheng, only organic.

Just had a sweet little session with the 2012 Huron Gold Needle shou – there is a tasting note with a song. I could drink this every single day. It’s my sweetheart shou.

Drank YS’s 2013 Autumn Bing Dao today. I liked this more last year, but I’m not sure if I’d attribute that to the tea or to my own tastes… It started a little thin, but got nice and thick with longer steeps. Creamy notes of stone-fruits, slightly grassy, very energizing.

2013 Qing Mei Shan, YS. Fluffy leaves, gentle cake, laughing children, jasmine memories. The pretty girl with bubble brain. Why complain? Thanks to fellow steepstarian for sharing this v. fine sample.

Today I finally got to the first ripe tea from my last Chawangshop order, the 2008 Yezhuang Shuangli TF Zhong Pin Ripe Cake 357g. This was a very enjoyable tea. It had a fair amount of fermentation flavor left, but not too much. It had partially cleared. During the course of twelve steeps I found notes of earth, chocolate, spice, fruit to name a few. This is a bargain at only $24. To me this was a find. Not as good as something like the Huron Gold Needle by Whispering Pines but close enough for enjoying a good cup of tea. I gave it twelve steeps. It would have gone a few more but as always I stop because of the caffeine factor. I think this tea would have gone fifteen steeps, don’t know if it would have gone twenty.

Just finished a session that began early this morning of TanLong Tea’s 2014 Hu’s Valley Raw from Mandala (they’re carrying the 100g and 200g versions of this cake). A medium bodied sheng with a spicy-tart profile and slight underlying sweetness. I pushed it pretty hard in terms of timing, so I want to try it again with shorter steeps to see if more complex notes come out. No smokey notes, which is a good thing for my tastes. Overall quite enjoyable even though it’s young.

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Tried the October white2tea club orb. I didn’t much care for it, it fell kind of flat and gave me an instant stomach ache. I guess every month can’t be Poundcake and Mushrooms!