teaddict

Got a little sample of this free with my latest Norbu order, and because I want to get to sleep early tonight, I figured a low-caffeine tea was just the ticket for my first taste of the new stuff. I very much enjoy a roasted toasted flavor in my teas, but the first genmaicha I tried was overwhelmingly toasty and not at all to my taste. I think this tea must be what genmaicha wishes it could be: warm toasty but also sweet and surprisingly, fruity!

I started with 2.4 grams of tea in my small gaiwans (about 75mL or 2.5 oz water per infusion), with water at 150 degrees. I used shorter infusion times than Greg recommends just because I’m a tea wimp and like most of my teas a little more dilute than average, and for the same reason I started on the lower end of his suggested temp range.

I started 30 seconds, then 15, 30, 45, 45. All infusions were warmly toasty, but not so toasted as to be bitter (in this very different than that genmaicha that I couldn’t really enjoy at all). They were also sweet, and where I was expecting some vegetal flavors from the green leaf, something alchemical happened with the toasted stems transmuting it into fruitiness. Wonderful, odd, but wonderful. Very very nice. The sweet n’ fruity faded with later infusions, but even at my fifth it was delicious (probably lasting so long because of my short infusion times).

This is a very nice tea.

This tea is just so very very nice. Today I bulk brewed up a thermos of it, starting with cooler water, because I was simultaneously drinking some Bi Lo Chun, and then ramping up the temp for the last few infusions to nearly boiling. As always, this is a lovely tea, but what was a little unusual and different is that somehow the flavor has a very strong sweet/caramel/woody note that was so strongly reminiscent of the 2008 Yi Wu bamboo aged puerh I’ve been drinking that I could have sworn it was the same tea. And since I love that Yi Wu, this was a good surprise.

This is a lovely anise-sweet young sheng that I got as a free sample with a recent order. I did a parallel tasting with another very nice young sheng, and the link below is to a version of this with photos on my tea page.

Long twisted intact-appearing leaves and a fair bit of stem. The dry leaves smell sweet and earthy.

I put 2 grams of my tiniest gaiwan, with 1.5 ounces near boiling water. After a flash rinse, they smell even stronger and more delicious.

First infusion, 205°F/96°C, 10": sweet anise

Second infusion, 205°F/96°C, 15": sweet anise, woody/earthy starting up

Third infusion, 205°F/96°C, 20": sweet anise, woody/earthy

Fourth infusion, 205°F/96°C, 20": sweet anise, woody/earthy, still the anise is very strong, bit of bitter aftertaste

Fifth infusion, 205°F/96°C, 35": sweet anise, earthy has retreated now, bitter/sweet aftertaste

Sixth infusion, 205°F/96°C, 60" (stopped to take a picture of the leaves): sweet anise and earthy, rich and strong

Seventh infusion, 205°F/96°C, 1’: a little dilute, should have let it go longer, more sweet water with hints of anise

Eighth infusion, 205°F/96°C, 3’: oh, this is much better, my earthy flavors are back. Still delicious, yum. Young sheng star.

Losing count—10? 11? still wonderful, both of them. Troubling fact: I want to shoot the spent leaves, lay them out to show the size and pluck, but they’re just not quitting, now 15, 16 infusions in. It will be a long night.

1.5 liter later (the kettle was filled completely when I started), they’re not as rich, but still, a little better than just sweet water.

Wet leaves are are mix of light brown and green, large leaves with some more than two inches long, mostly intact.

Full review with photos:
http://www.well.com/user/debunix/recipes/LaoBanPen&YongDe11.10.html

This is a lovely smoky-earthy young sheng that I got as a free sample with a recent order. I did a parallel tasting with another very nice young sheng, and the link below is to a version of this with photos on my tea page.

This tea has long intact-appearing leaves and a fair bit of stem. The leaves smell sweet and earthy, with a bit of mushroom odor to the Lao Ban Pen.

I put 2 grams into my tiniest gaiwans, with 1.5 ounces near boiling water. After a flash rinse, the leaves smell even stronger and more delicious.

First infusion, 205°F/96°C, 10": smoky, earthy, sweet

Second infusion, 205°F/96°C, 15": sweet and earthy, woody, bit of anise and smokiness lighter already

Third infusion, 205°F/96°C, 20": sweet and earthy, woody, bit of anise, smokiness almost gone

Fourth infusion, 205°F/96°C, 20": earthy, sweet, smoky

Fifth infusion, 205°F/96°C, 35": sweet and earthy, bit of herbaceous flavor

Sixth infusion, 205°F/96°C, 60" (stopped to take a picture of the leaves): sweet and earthy, deep, warm, rich

Seventh infusion, 205°F/96°C, 1’: both a little dilute, should have let them go longer, more sweet water with hints of earthy

Eighth infusion, 205°F/96°C, 3’: oh, this is much better, my anise and earthy flavors are back. Still delicious, yum. Young sheng star.

Losing count—10? 11? still wonderful. Troubling fact: I want to shoot the spent leaves, lay them out to show the size and pluck, but they’re just not quitting, now 15, 16 infusions in. It will be a long night.

1.5 liter later (the kettle was filled completely when I started), not as rich, but still, better than just sweet water. Based on the kettle volume and the gaiwan size, both of the young shengs gave me about 20 infusions. Nice teas.

Wet leaves are are mix of light brown and green, quite intact, and small to medium sized, about an inch to an inch and half long.

Full review with photos:
http://www.well.com/user/debunix/recipes/LaoBanPen&YongDe11.10.html

A very nice oolong, quite pricey, actually, and I’m not sure yet if it’s worth the price. I’m trying to understand the buttery flavor other people have reported in Taiwanese mountain oolongs, like Da Yu Ling. Making this one in a small clay pot, about 5 grams of tea in about 100 mL of water. The water is near boiling—the Pino is keeping it between 198 and 212 degrees throughout.

First infusion was 30 seconds, not too sweet, but rich, floral, warm, a little spicy, and yes, a little buttery….I think that what I have been thinking of as a sun-warmed hay could be interpreted as buttery.

A little longer 2nd infusion is spicier, vegetal, still a little of the ‘buttery’, but the floral/sweet elements are a bit overwhelmed because of the overlong infusion. Third infusion, down again to about 40", better, the buttery is more prominent, but the sweet/floral is not as strong as the first infusion. 4th at 45 seconds is spicy, sweet, floral, but the buttery has receded this time. By the 8th infusion it’s getting pretty much to slightly sweet or spicy water.

In the end, this one presently lacks the very strong sweet and floral notes I expect in the best Alishan oolongs, and I suspect the difference is not the nature of the tea, but the storage conditions with the tea in a large jar instead of tiny vacuum sealed bags.

This lovely tea continues to make friends and influence people. Today Lisa said, “this is the first time I haven’t added anything—no honey or lemon or sugar—to my tea!”

And this was a cup from an admittedly inferior brewing—fit in around some crazy fast-paced work that went right through lunch—a 30 minute first infusion (not a typo, yes, 30 MINUTES!), several more almost as insane infusions, mixed in the thermos, and the end result was not only drinkable, but charmed someone new to my teas. Good job, dear puerh!

Drank this in a gongfu session yesterday. Best yet brewing of this tea—mellow, sweet, a little fruity. Mmm.

Can’t be sure what made it better—didn’t measure the tea quantity beforehand, used cool water per usual, bit longer first infusion, maybe?

First time drinking this tea in a while. Like most bricks, it is challengingly compressed, and one of the teas that inspired me to buy some particularly pointed letter openers. Success! several grams of tea have just soaked up their ‘flash’ rinse quickly in my gaiwan. Earthy, sweet, fruity, plummy scents arise—makes me want to eat it as much as drink it.

Greg warns about overly long steeps at first—suggesting a possibility of off flavors. I find nothing like, but perhaps this is in part due to letting it ‘air out’ loosely wrapped in my puerh drawer. The first two steeps—no more than 30 seconds between the—are combined in my small yunomi, and deep red-brown liquor, and I want to drink fast but am waiting….tap, tap, tapping impatient feet—for it to cool. And the first sip is rewarding—deep, sweet, lovely, all the things promised in the smell of the wet leaf. And nothing whatsoever ‘off’ about it.

The leaves are still swelling and will eventually fill a good part of the gaiwan, so this should have a lot of steeps in it.

10 or so steeps in, the gaiwan is at least 1/3 full with very broken up leaves. It still requires a bit of care to avoid oversteeping—and responds well to a little dilution if I overdo it. Earthy, sweet, fruity, plummy. Rich body. Compared to the Norbu private label Lao Tou Cha nugget brick, this is an earthier tea, but equally delicious in a different way. And like that tea, it is very potent due to the density—a little goes long way. I really thought it was such a thin little sliver when I dropped it in the cup….

Many infusions later—certainly more than 20, maybe closer to 30—it is getting on towards sweet water, that gentle ending, but this with what are still very short infusions. Will give it longer to see if I can coax more out of it before we’re done. …… 1.5 L into it, the kettle is empty, but the tea leaves still have some sweet & spicy scent left.

Finished my sample of this tea, and it was most impressive. I underestimated the quantity of leaf and ended up with my gaiwan jam-packed with leaf, and got 20-30 infusions out of it. By the very end, it was mostly sweet water, but still pleasant.

I hope to be vacationing in Hawaii in the not-too-distant future, and will try to score some of this while I’m there.

Breakfast sencha this morning, a particularly sweet and delicious brewing: 5 grams tea in the 5 oz kyusu, water 150 degrees to start, up to 170 by the 4th infusion, so nice in my blue Hagi.

Entering this note on my phone, can’t seem to use the sliders.

I brewed up a fabulous batch of this tea a few days ago—thick bodied, rich, sweet, earthy, spicy, with that deep caramel undertone that is so silky smooth—and it was so well received by everyone else in the clinic workroom that I didn’t get enough of it. I’d hoped that maybe I had enough life left in the leaves to do a few more brewings when I got back to the quiet of my office that evening, but while I did get a little more tea, it was not the same.

This was a bulk brewed batch, 2 pieces of the tea cylinder, about one and a half inches long, brief flash rinse, infusion water 195-212 degrees (started as the kettle was still heating up, and kept up as it cooled down a little), total infusion volume just over one quart (filled my thermos and I got a bonus cuppa). Wow. This infusion was pretty close to perfect.

Tried this tea for the 2nd time tonight, and it was wonderful. 2.5 grams of tea, 60-75 mL of water in the gaiwans, temps near boiling, and 30" first infusion. Somewhere around the 3rd and 4th infusion there was something a bit bitter, but it started sweet, smoky, spicy, earthy, had that slightly bitter interlude, and carried on for another half dozen plus infusions with the sweetness and bit of earthy and spicy. It is a wonderful tea, one I’d be happy to have more of in my cupboard, but the cupboard is already overflowing with puerh.

Didn’t realize I was missing a first tasting note on this lovely tea. I opened the package a couple of weeks ago and have been enjoying it as a morning tea. It’s very much as I expected from the Shincha—sweet, delicate, vegetal, without overpowering umami, just how I like it. It’s an excellent start to the day.

I do it as I do most of my sencha lately: about 1 gram of tea per ounce of water, net 4-5 grams for my 5 ounce kyusu, preheating the kyusu and infusing water first at 160 degrees F for 30 seconds, then 10 seconds for the next infusion, then back to 30 seconds, 60 seconds, 60 seconds, 2 minutes, and often going to 170 or 180 degrees by the 4th or 5th infusion to get more flavor out of the tea. Good that way or when keeping all to 160 degrees.

1.9 grams of tea (was aiming for 2.0, but got tired of adding & subtracting little bits) in small gaiwans, about 60-75mL water

And I took photos this time, watching the unfurling infusion by infusion: see my flickr set here

http://www.flickr.com/photos/debunix/sets/72157625151330461

The flash rinse barely started to unfurl anything

Started timidly, 30" at 160 degrees: warm, vegetal, sweet but the infusion is a little too short/dilute

1 minutes at same temp: vegetal flavors of peas, grass, lightly floral background, no hint of bitterness, much better match of infusion time and tea. Used the aroma cup set for this, and it was fun, sweet fresh mown grass odors.

90" third infusion, sweet, vegetal, delicate, love it love it, the best yet

2’ a little hotter, 170 degrees, slight astringency but still mostly vegetal

3’ 180 degrees, and better than the previous, sweet, vegetal, such a nice tea

5’ 190 degrees, and the tea is done: barely more flavor than hot water.

Large lovely leaves are now mostly unfurled, but I couldn’t get them to completely flatten long enough to shoot the picture

Next time, 1 min, 90", 2 min, 3 min, 8 min?

I was lucky enough to get some of the spring version of this tea, and quite sad when I went to reorder it and found it was sold out. This is an entirely worthy successor.

Drinking this gongfu cha this evening, with a small gaiwan, and water near boiling. The first few infusions need careful timing to avoid bitterness, but later infusions are toasty sweet without any hint of bitter. Mellow, pleasing, tea-as-comfort-food.

Sharing this tea around my clinic workroom this afternoon, raves all over. My acupuncturist colleague feels a particularly relaxing effect with this tea, more than any of the other green oolongs I’ve shared with him. I just know that drinking it makes me feel happy.

Really enjoying a series of infusions tonight….even as the leaves are losing potency—somewhere around the 8th or 10th infusion, that is—the ‘leftover’ taste is still warm, earthy, fruity, delicious. I am liking this tea better the more I drink it.

Had a nice brewing session with this tea this morning—4 or 5 infusions in a small glass teapot, the better to see the beautiful leaves unfolding. It was so delicate and floral and sweet and perfect that I fell in love all over again. I started out with about 12 ‘poles’ in a 6 oz teapot, water 160 degrees, infused 30-90 seconds in the first few infusions, then upped the temp a littele to 170 for another infusion or two (writing this in the evening, can’t be too precise). But I did count out the little poles as I dropped them into the pot. I will definitely be ordering this one again.

Another lovely thermos full of this tea today. I shared it with a coworker who said it was just ‘creamy’ and so nice, and I agree. Sweet, caramel, just a hint of earthy and enough sense of something herbaceous and bitter lurking nearby to add an interesting depth and roundness to the flavor, but never enough to be in any way unpleasant.

So very very good.

This is a very expensive tea, so I wanted to be well prepared. I finished lunch 30 minutes before tasting, brushed teeth without toothpaste, rinsed mouth with plain water—didn’t want anything to interfere with the taste of the tea.

1.4 grams of tea in tiny gaiwan
30mL water per infusion (used a very small measuring cup)

Water boiling or near boiling (205-212 per the thermometer when poured from the kettle)

Flash rinse

Wet leaves smell like forest floor—sweet clean compost scent

first infusion 15 seconds
earthy like the scent promised, but surprisingly strong sweet and spicy notes right up there with it

2nd infusion 20 seconds
earthy, caramel, sweet, spicy, very very very nice

3rd infusion 25 seconds
About the same as the 2nd infusion, a bit stronger is only difference

4th infusion 30 seconds
earthy, sweet, spicy, caramel

5th infusion, 40 seconds
Still strong and lovely

I have to admit to an ulterior motive here: I was hoping I might find that I actually prefer my young sheng puerhs to the ‘real deal’ of very aged sheng, since I have come to prefer them to most of the ripe shu—ripe shu designed to mimic the aged sheng. So I was hoping to find this would be a rather bland experience like eating dirt. And it wasn’t. It is lovely. It is very, very lovely.

Is it lovely enough to want to invest $$$ in drinking it regularly and in larger volume? Maybe not. I think stuff like this will remain an occasional tea, because even as it is sitting net to me in the cup, and the water has just boiled again, visions of Lao Ban Zhang loose mao cha are dancing in my head.

But do I understand why some stuff like this is praised and prized so highly? Yes. I get it now. It is subtly but dramatically different than the best of the shus I have had, because it manages a wonderful balance of the elements of spicy, sweet, earthy, fruity, more complex than I’ve had yet from a shu.

I’ll report back later when I see how many infusions I can get. Now up to 7, no surprises, still going strong.

Edit: got up to 12 with signficant tea flavor; by 16, it was slightly sweet water, still nice, but not a lot of oomph left.

Tried to brew some of this up tonight, and am so frustrated. It smells so good, and tastes so good, but I burnt my tongue on some pizza today, and I can’t take the heat tonight. Bummer.

I wish I know what I did that was so distinctive, but recently I brewed up the best infusion of this tea ever. I did it a little carelessly, in bulk, for my thermos, so can’t be sure of the exact parameters. But it was floral, vegetal, and sweet, so delicately perfect that people were asking for seconds and it didn’t sit in the thermos long enough to lose that fresh-brewed perfection.

Wow.

I have not brewed up this tea for a formal tasting, but it has continued to work beautifully as a bulk-brewed tea for the thermos. After a few hours it does lose some of its charm, but it is still tasty 4 hours after brewing.

Still need to do that gongfu cha….

Tried this last night in my new Chao Zhou teapot from Tea Habitat, and compared it to a porcelain gaiwan. I’d recently tried one of my other Dan Congs in the Chao Zhou, and that particular infusion seemed to lack a lot of the high notes from the tea, so I was a little worried about that. This is a young pot, having been used only perhaps a dozen times since first seasoning, so I suspected it of taking more than giving to the teas.

As it turned out, I could not tell any difference. Both were fruity, sweet, spicy. I will continue to use the pot and work on its seasoning without worries. But I am almost out of the Po Tou, so there will not be very many more infusions to come.