Hu-Kwa

I thought this was a Lapsang “blend”, but after having a few cups, it’s really “just” lapsang souchong. It’s a good one, I still think Upton’s Lapsang is slightly better.

Has a very distinct tobacco smell very much like a cheroot cigar. But do not think that this will be a harsh or overactive flavor, the tea is a smooth one with an appealing sweetness as well as a wood aroma.

The tea has a gorgeous deep coppery orange color that you could spend a great deal of time admiring in its own right. Along with a beautiful color comes a truly sweet smell loaded with pine smoke. The taste is light and elegant, sweet and with balanced smoky nuances that linger delicately. I found the cup to be really surprising, and quite unlike other Lapsangs I’ve been able to try. Of several I’ve tried, this one is remarkable to me in that the smoky scent and flavor is pervasive, to be sure, but is wonderfully balanced and tasteful. The taste of smokiness doesn’t linger in the mouth as a cloudy, campfire sort of residue but rather as a bright and piney, fresh crispness. The cup has a fine, surprising elegance and lightness to it that is most enjoyable and eyebrow raising considering the power that a smoke flavor can sometimes have to make a cup heavy. This cup is truly light. That a Lapsang could come across as both full of its hallmark flavor as well as delicate and elegant seemed a marvelous achievement to me.

In my experimentations with leaf proportions, I found that a scant to precise teaspoon yielded the best results for my tastes. A slightly higher amount of leaf, roughly 1.5 teaspoons per 8 ounces, definitely brought to light a sturdier cup. While still excellent in taste, the lesser amount of leaf allows a just perfect natural sweetness to shine through along with the smoky flavors. The sturdier cup exhibited interesting sour notes rather than notably sweet ones. I thought the lesser leaf steeping would pair well with savory items and the stronger cup seemed to request a sweeter pairing.

A second infusion is well worth the time. I found the tea quite forgiving and never prone to bitterness in terms of either the first or the second infusion.

I don’t usually comment on a tea unless I am completely responsible for the brewing process. That is, I personally break the seal on a new package, scoop out a precise measurement of leaves, activate the exact time and temperature settings, and witness the entire steeping process myself. However, my wife and I had such a nice experience today at the French Market Cafe Tea Room in Cornelius, North Carolina, that I am compelled to break my rule and talk about this Mark T. Wendell Tea Company Hu-Kwa Lapsong Souchong tea that I tried. Besides, the very generous and personable proprietor, Kathy Montbleau, allowed me to observe most of the preparation by bringing the infuser pot to my table immediately after boiling.

Kathy permitted me to smell the unbrewed leaves in their package before the setup began. The dark brown leaves had a strong, but pleasant, smoky aroma. There also was a light sweetness to the smell that I hadn’t experienced before in smoky teas.

I watched the steeping brew become a dark liquor for five minutes. The odor was pleasingly smoky and sweet. The color was similar to dark molasses with a golden aura around the sides of my cup, like a dark sunrise.

The flavor was nothing short of splendid. It was marvelously smoky, sweet, and smooth. Kathy brought my wife and I an ample pot to share. Fortunately, my wife does not care for smoky teas so I was able to enjoy it all to the last drop. Even the aftertaste was stunningly mild and gentle. Astringency was completly nonexistent.

This just might be the BEST smoky tea I’ve ever had. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND the tea, I GREATLY RECOMMEND Kathy who is a wonderful tearoom owner with a FANTASTIC personality and ENORMOUS generosity (she very kindly let me sample the tea without charge and gave me a large portion of unbrewed leaves to take home with me), and I PROFOUNDLY RECOMMEND the French Market Cafe Tea Room as an extremely friendly and elegant little shop to sip fine teas, munch on tasty biscuits, and let the stress of your work week blissfully slip away.

While this is obviously a high quality tea, I’m not sure it’s my cup of tea, so to speak. The aroma of the leaves is smokey, but not overpowering. I brewed 5 minutes. It came out very clear, slightly dark red. It was smokey, but underneath you could tell there was high quality tea. I’ve never tasted anything like this before, it’s my first lapsang suochong.

Interesting.

This tea is a famous staple at events hosted at my work, often served with lemon. I prefer my tea without sugar or lemon, generally, though the citrus is nice with this tea. It is definitely smokey, but less of the bacon-like smoke some brands of lapsang souchong seem to have, this is gentler and more woody. The smoke flavor is not as noticeable in the scent of the leaves or the tea, but comes through the most when drinking. There is a traditional black tea feel and taste to this, not bitter but full-feeling and with a sort of rich tanin flavor and texture. Some kind of spicy, almost cinnamon-like, secondary note comes in the aftertaste which really adds a coziness to the forward smoke flavors. I thought I had heard somewhere that this might be close to the kind of tea drank in Boston historically, but I could be making that up. Overall a bold cup with just the right amount of smoke. It’s famous around here for a reason!

The smokiness is something you learn to love or hate, but this tea is smoother with more balanced briskness than other lapsang souchongs. Join an online tasting of this tea: http://walkerteareview.com/?p=2373