Huang Shan Mao Feng Green Tea

(Free sample provided by Teavivre. Thank you!)

Yesterday I found some scattered tea notes and one of them was Teavivre’s Huang Shan Mao Feng.

Dry leaf is very long with partially twisted first leaf. Apart from its usual green texture I noticed a few leaves with somewhat yellow and brown hue to them. With a deep sniff dryness with hint of sweetness to it is revealed, and when dropped in pre-heated teapot you get some starchiness rising to nostrils. When it comes to visual appearance his tea has hardly any broken leaf and seems to take a bit more volume than my other Mao Fengs I have in cupboard.

I steeped this tea in glass 250 ml teapot three times (and I could have gone for more if I wasn’t full) with 80 Celsius water, and 60 – 60 – 90 seconds steep.

1st

First infusion came out clear and really pale jade. During steeping barely any leaves sunk since I added them on top. Light bodied and sweet with lingering

fruity note (apricot, peach… not quite sure) that completes at tongue root after wallowing (peach). Every sip seems so thirst quenching, refreshing and amazingly good. As I empty pitcher I don’t see any kind of residue.

2nd

Second infusion is still clear like first but with more of jade tone to it. With slightly augmented peach notes comes a faint Tie Guan Yin-like note in background with just a hint of astringency. Few seeps in and I start to notice how my throat is getting a bit dry, almost sore-like, starchy…

3rd

The appearance of third infusion is identical to that of second. As I’m not intending to steep it further I removed wet leaves that filled my room with light Tie Guan Yin-like aroma. When it comes to tasting this infusion reminds me of 4th steep of Teavivre’s Tie Guan Yin (look it up in my previous notes) with grassy-vegetal body. At this point I thought that I might squeezed a bit too much out of the leaves and that I should’ve steep it just over a minute.

Although I can’t recall much of the experience with this particular tea I can, however, tell that this is the best Mao Feng I’ve had so far. I guess I should write more in-detail impression just after finishing my cup in future.

Tea of the late morning……

I have my last round of samples from TeaVivre. This time I requested things I am considering buying, and they were very accommodating. I am very grateful for this tasting opportunity, and I am so looking forward to purchasing the next season of teas, as I am sure I have a backlog of greens from them at home to drink before they expire. This was my chance to really explore some Chinese green teas, and I am finding that all of my preconceived notions about green tea were so wrong. I don’t know why I assumed it would be otherwise, as my thoughts on tea in general have been completely rewritten, and lean nearly in the complete opposite direction as they did before I tried loose leaf. I think the green teas I had tried in the past were low quality and poorly prepared. Now, I am surrounded by high quality green tea, and I have learned a thing or two about preparation. These things have made a huge difference!

This tea is very nice. The leaves are very long and thin. They are a deeper green than the Premium Dragonwell, but still in the green range rather than leaning brown. It is hard to measure the right amount of tea, because the leaves are so long! My first mug was a little light on the leaf, but still enjoyable. For the second infusion, I added a little more leaf, and now I have something very good. The liquor is a light yellow-green. There are very light floral notes as well as light notes of asparagus (kind of like the long jing), but there is not the buttery-ness from the long jing. I guess you could call this an addition of floral notes, but minus the buttery notes in comparison to long jing. It is still not as floral as a Tie Gwan Yin, but lovely and light. Not even a hint of bitterness, and oh so smooth. I can see why it is one of China’s top teas. Definitely on the shopping list.

Mug method at 180, roughly two tsp of leaf (I may need the scale next time!). No additions.

Thanks go out to Angel and Teavivre for providing many samples of their tea for sampling. This came with my first order, at my request, as I wanted to order Dragon Well in my 2nd order (2012 version), along with one or two other greens. This won out as my 2nd favorite green.

Huang Shan Mao Feng is a mild, slightly vegetal, slightly floral green. I can see how some have compared it to a TGY in that respect, but this is not as bold and much milder. It has no bitterness as all, but perhaps a bit of astringency while hot (goes away when cooler). While cooling, it does move into a slight grassy phase, but goes down so smooth.

What I really liked is that I only have to (yes, I know I don’t “have” to) add a minimal amount of honey to make it enjoyable (under a tsp, therefore under 20 calories, lol.) It is good without any sweetness (but much better with a little). My whole point of trying to switch to tea is to reduce calories (and a healthier alternative) :)

2012 version
Quick rinse, 2 tsp., 2 minutes at 175.
Thanks again Angel !!!!

This is another I specifically asked to try. The brew is nearly clear as expected. I let it cool a bit then sip. Onions. What???? We fixed a pot of chili this morning and it looks like my wife (who I love dearly) picked up my cup while chopping onions. Grrrr. So I guess that means I will have to wait to see what this tastes like.

WE’RE HOME! I love being on vacation, but I also love coming back! I just barely made it to the post office before they closed so I could pick up my new tea. It was so hard to pick which one to try first, but since I am hungry I chose the one that I thought would go best with food.

I can not remember what made me want to order this one. I just looked at reviews and none of them stand out as being the reason. I know a tea shop owner mentioned recently that a Chinese Mao Feng green was his favorite right now, so maybe that had something to do with it.

The dry leaves are long, thin, and light. The aroma is what I would consider to be medium high notes…a little toward fruity/vegetal and not leaning toward darker roasty tones.

The liquor is so so pale! I have used a middle of the road amount of leaf and steeping time. But once it cools enough to sip….oh my. This is going to go nicely with my meal. Soft and milky! The more you drink the creamier it seems to get. I am not getting lots of fruitiness or peach like others did. Maybe my parameters were different. I will enjoy this one just as it is! I agree that if you are a fan of DragonWell, this one is probably right up your alley.

This was a free sample provided for me by TeaVivre – thank you so much for your generosity!

Preparation notes: Around 3 tsp. of tea leaves in 500 ml. water at the below parameters, with no additives.

Dry Leaf: Dark green and very thin, like pine needles. There were leaves and bud pairs interspersed throughout and it smelled very clean and floral.

Steeped Leaf: The floral characteristics were still evident after steeping, but with a nutty overtone – and there’s a brownish tint to the pale green liquor that reminds me even more of nuts. It’s not a roasted nutty note like with genmaicha, however – maybe more of raw walnuts or pecans?

The texture is buttery and smooth, and there is no bitterness at all in the taste. This makes me think that it could probably be quite forgiving if the tea were oversteeped. There is some grassy flavor in the tea itself, but it is a sweet grassy flavor, not overpoweringly vegetal.

Overall: This and the Dragonwell are probably my favorite greens from TeaVivre so far – and this would be the one I recommend to anyone who prefers a green tea on the less vegetal side, or someone who is just starting out with greens and needs a wide margin of error as far as preparation goes, and a gentler introduction to the flavor profile. It is definitely going on my shopping list!

First of all I have to say thank you so much to Angel Chen and Teavivre for providing me with so many samples for tasting. Along with a few samples of teas I know I like—Tie Guan Yin and jasmine pearls—I requested a few of the green teas I’m not familiar with but was intrigued by their descriptions. Up to this point I have generally only drank flavored green teas. So I guess this review comes with a helping of ignorance about green teas, but you have to start somewhere, right?

The dry leaves smell a bit grassy, like I tend to associate with green teas. The leaves are very long and spindly, which means I was unsure about my portioning, but I forged ahead since the directions actually used a teaspoon measurement. The steeped tea is very light, a hint of mint green color. The aroma is surprising to me: buttery, a bit floral, almost like a green oolong, but lighter and fresher. It really doesn’t smell much like the dried leaf. The flavor is a bit vegetal and grassy (green tea-ish, really), but it’s also buttery, floral and a hint sweet. I do think I didn’t use enough leaf for this cup, but I’ll remedy that next time. I’m really enjoying this one even slightly weak, so I’m really interested to see how it brews up with more leaf. I could definitely see myself exploring more of this type of green tea.

Finally getting to my Teavivre order.. the flavor is nice. It’s crisp, floral, and I can even catch some fruity notes in there. It’s very light but it makes a nice green.

Thank you TeaVivre for the sample!

Now that I’m finished this semester I get a month to sit down and enjoy myself for about a month before starting summer classes. So, in a month if I disappear again for a little or show up sporadically you’ll know why.

I’ve been wanting to try out TeaVivre’s teas for a while seeing how well rated they are here but had been reluctant since they didn’t sell sample sizes yet. Then someone posted the link for free samples, so here we are! This is the second one I tried, my notes for the first one need to be found, and this reminds quite a bit of Long Jing, but as others have said without the butteriness.

The dry leaf is long and straight but not flattened like longjing with notes of fruit, floral, black pepper, and vegetal. The infusion was light in color and had a salty aroma to it. Taste, the taste was indeed very interesting and complex. At first I was getting a very salty note, but it was more in mouthfeel than in taste. There was a nice steamed asparagus note, but it seemed to take a second or two after taking a sip for it to come out which I found interesting.

There was a nice delicate floral note and fruit note that seemed to go together very well. The fruit note came in later in the cup and come in stronger in the later steepings. It reminded me of plums, but it was the taste of the skin of the fruit, not the juicy flesh. A nice plum taste with a hint of astringency. Overall a very good tea that I’’m glad I got to try. Thank you TeaVivre!

I must admit that I botched this yesterday by not using enough leaf, which resulted in an almost flavorless brew. So this time I used 2 tsp for 8oz and steeped for an outrageously long time to account for its mildness. The liquor was still a very pale yellow so I was worried it would be weak once again. But no, this time it packed a lot of flavor! It tasted rich and every sip a bit different; some more vegetal, others indulgently buttery, others slightly nutty. And no bitterness, even after my errantly long steep. A few minutes later I realized I had gulped it all down in record time, which caused me to sadly gaze at my empty cup hoping it would magically refill. So definitely a winner.

Thank you Teavivre for this sample

Very good green tea that was smooth on the palate, with very subtle peach-like flavors ;)

Sample sipdown! I’m slowly getting through all my samples/swaps…there are way more than I thought I had. I’ll get there eventually!

The leaves of this one are so pretty. Long, twisted, and deep green. Once the steep, the green becomes more vibrant and the leaves unfurl a bit – so pretty to watch.

The smells I’m getting from this are delicious. Dry, the scent is slightly vegetal, slightly floral, with a crisp/fresh aspect. There are also slight butter notes present. Once brewed, these scents morph a bit. I’m getting a much stronger buttery vegetal note – smooth vegetal, though, not grass (more like a sweet spinach smell). The floral notes are also still present, though not as prominent. It’s a sweet, fresh smelling cuppa and I can’t wait to sip it!

Taste-time: So, I may let this one cool down a bit more, but as of right now I’m getting a creamy mouthfeel, stronger floral notes, and some light vegetal notes at both the front and back of the sip. The sweetness is still there, but not as evident as it was in the smell – not bad, just a fact. There is also something cooling about this tea, almost like spearmint. It’s very slight, and most of the time unnoticeable… but the cooling effect is present with each sip. It’s interesting, in a good way!

As it cools more, I’m also getting a bit of an earthy, rock-ish (I don’t know if that makes sense to anyone, but its the only way I can describe it) taste – it blends nicely with the other flavors. The sweet taste has emerged a little more at this cooler temp, which is what I was hoping for. The floral taste is still the strongest, which is fine. It isn’t a perfumy floral taste, but a natural one; makes it easier to tolerate, and in fact it may even be enjoyable. =)
It is also less creamy. The thickness of the mouthfeel has diminished some. Interesting, as usually I find it the opposite.

Crisp, fresh, floral, and smooth. That’s how I would describe this one. Very tasty. Can’t wait to compare this to my Butiki Huang Shan Mao Feng… a few more samples down and I might be able to swing opening the package!
Green Tea WIN!

Tea was okay but very too light for me. Those with a palette for extremely light flavors may enjoy this far more. It was decent though and I enjoyed it.

Uh oh…I think I already messed up the preparation of this tea. I’m not sure I used enough leaf. The liquor is almost clear! Clear!!

The aroma of the dry leaves was great: soft, clean, not overly grassy. The dry leaves themselves were a long, thin, crispy, mixture of green and yellow leaves and stems. The brewed tea aroma is very very soft, a little too soft. Again, probably because I didn’t measure the leaf correctly. I hate when I mess up brewing a new tea. It makes me not even want to write a note about it.

But here we go anyway. I apologize for my incompetence in advance. I’ll add a little more leaf to the second steeping and let you know how that turns out. This first cup is surprisingly good, even though it’s a little watery. I can tell that this is fantastic tea if brewed correctly.

Okay, second cup! I steeped this one for 2 minutes 45 seconds at 176 degrees. The liquor is still basically clear, but the flavor is stronger now. For some reason, this tea reminds me of the way cotton candy melts in your mouth. It’s sweet, but not too much so. This must be what people call umami. I’m not sure I’ve ever experienced a texture like this in a drink. Simply exquisite.

This is my favorite green tea from Teavivre so far, although the Silver Jasmine Green Tea (Mo Li Yin Hao) is a pretty close second.

Thanks to Teavivre for this sample!

I’m not the biggest green tea drinker, but this is a new favorite of mine. It’s sweet, fresh, light, and crisp. All the things one usually seeks out in a green tea with the addition of some nice oolong-y characteristics and a basic flavor framework that reminds me of a dragonwell. The leaves are an awesome shade of vivid green and smell very dragonwell-like: oats and nuts and potent veggies. I haven’t decided whether I prefer gong fu or Western style with this one yet, but each has it’s pros.

Gong fu style
This allows for a huge change in flavors from steep to steep, but getting more than three solid steeps is rare. But let me tell you, those three steeps are pretty awesome. It’s like a fifteen-steep session condensed to one fifth! With about 1/4 to 1/3 of my gaiwan full of dried leaf, 175 F water, and a seven second first steep (no rinse) it comes out wonderfully. I receive notes of fresh hay, a malty sweetness, thick and “chewy” vegetal qualities, and faint tones of nuts. Maybe almonds? The liquor’s color has great clarity and is so light and vivid it’s almost neon.

The second steep at about 14 seconds brings a lively mouthfeel with a sort of sparkling texture. A new nuance that reminds me of whole wheat toast becomes most apparent and the nutty qualities become more pronounced. The third steep seems to do well somewhere between 30 seconds and one minute. Twenty seconds is a bit too short and it comes out really weak, and one minute introduces some bitterness and astringency (two things that usually aren’t present with this tea except for extra long steep times). The nutty and toasty qualities subside a great deal at this point and are replaced with a strong herbal quality. It’s far more “green.”

With the aforementioned leaf to water ratio, a fourth steep is possible, but it’s flavor faded and it has a heavy mouthfeel. It comes out like a mixture of steep 2 and 3.

Western style
While the flavor doesn’t change dramatically between steeps, each steep is lovely in its own way. Western style produces a light-bodied cup with great character. The “darker” flavors like toast and nuts and such aren’t as apparent this way, but instead blend in with the other nuances so that all the flavors kind of meet in the middle. Yet, a lively, sparkly/fizzy mouthfeel helps add another dimension to keep things interesting.

The main drawbacks to this method, for me at least, is I have to use a ton of leaf. I did 3 heaping teaspoons in my 16 oz cast iron with 175 F water. I performed the recommended one minute steeping time, took the leaves out, and poured some off. Still really weak. So I plopped the leaves back in and went for another minute. This worked much better.

Ultimately, I’ll be using Western brewing when I want a sipping tea and gong fu when I want a short, but power-packed session. I also prefer gong fu to pull out the best flavors this tea offers, like that whole wheat toast note that I look forward to every time I drink this one. I think the textural intrigues of this tea are pulled out much more easily with Western style, though.

There’s a good chance that I’ll be stocking this one as my one green tea on hand at some point. :)

I finally got to trying my sample of this tea this morning. I had a really hard time getting out of bed and wanted something gentle to wake up with. I’ve found Huang Shan Mao Fengs to be pretty great for that type of craving in the past, and this one didn’t let me down. There’s something very round and fluffy and comforting about it.

The dry leaves smelled wonderfully green, buttery, and sweet. They were also fascinatingly rich green and fresh-looking. I steeped it in the Breville for 3 minutes, which yielded a nice mellow cup. I was worried about bitterness at 3 minutes, but there was none in sight. Less buttery and more floral than I was expecting from the scent. A very nice stand-by. I do wish this had different packaging rather than coming in an not-reseable bag. I’ll have to drink this quickly since I have no spare tins at the moment, but that shouldn’t be a problem.

(This sample was generously provide to me by Teavivre. Thank you Angel and the whole Teavivre Team.)
Dry Leaf: I get a sweet vegetal aroma. I can even see someone say grassy.
Wet Leaf: I get a vegetal aroma almost like a boiled green bean or something close to that.
Liquor: Clear and pale.
Taste: I get a light refreshing sweet vegetal flavor. The broth gives your tongue a slight dryness on your tongue that is nice.
Overall Opinion: I give this tea a 90. It is crisp, light refreshing and totally reminds me of drinking a Long Jing. If you are a Long Jing tea drinker I think you will enjoy this tea also.

The dry leaf smells very fresh and grassy, and they’re also very long leaves! I used my bamboo spoon, since it is rather wide and flat by contrast to a regular teaspoon.

I brought the water to a boil and let it cool a few minutes before using with about 2 spoons of the dry leaf. I think I may have let the water cool too much, as my brew is very very mild, and I am not getting really much flavour at all. I did notice that some of the leaves hadn’t been fully submerged in the water, so I am having a second steeping to see what happens. So far, I like the Taimu green tea better, but it might’ve been my technique and brewing.

Thanks to teavivre for sending this one to me. I still have one more green to try, the Bi Lou Chun.

TeaVivre sent me some samples of their greens from last year.
When I received the package, I was quite impressed with labels. They have marked down production dates and manufacturers! Bag also had some storage and brewing instructions, and it was nice to note that wulongs, greens, white and blacks had distinctive shelf lives. Aluminium bags with TeaVivre’s labels contained smaller, sealed bags used by manufacturers.

This is fairly cheap, and judging be the leaves pricing seems fair. These aren’t strictly Mao Feng, bud and leaf. There are some lower leaves, some leaves have a bit of oxidation, some twigs etc. Leaves are generally whole. Leaves are fairly long, making production date (5/20/2011) seem realistic.

There seems to be two major tastes whirling around here. Weird, little ill-balanced round, almost milky taste, which changes into a light vegetality. I didn’t like the initial milky taste, and the vegetality should have been little stronger to balance that out, methinks. Aftertaste is fairly pleasant, round and soft, if slighly uninteresting.

Overall, I think this is fairly priced, quite decent tea. I have had a couple of casual glasses of this, and those I enjoyed a lot. Now that I sit down and drink this properly with focus, tea feels lacking in many ways. Then again, which green from 2011 isn’t now? This isn’t top tea, but TeaVivre isn’t asking a price of such from this. I would be happy to recommend this for a casual drinking, and I have very positive image of TeaVivre now.

_{Backlogging (so, based almost entirely on my notes)}

Experience buying from Teavivre http://steepster.com/places/2857-teavivre-online—

Age of leaf: advertised as spring 2011. Received fall 2011, brewed up days later.

Appearance and aroma of dry leaf: Beautiful looking leaves which look similar to Jing Tea Shop’s HSMF; smells fresh and possibly not as smoky an aroma as other HSMF teas.

Brewing guidelines: Based on information from their website, I went a little hotter of the later steepings. 10 grams tea, 5 cups water. Loose in glass Bodum pot. Stevia added.
……….1st: 170; 1’
……….2nd: 182; 1.5’
……….3rd: 186; 2.5’
……….4th: 192; 3’

Color tea liquor: pale yellow.

Flavor of tea liquor: Good, mild. Second steeping had a little more flavor, with a hint of something like cinnamon. The forth steeping had little flavor.

Appearance and aroma of wet leaf: They have a fresh, deep-green look to them, with a possible hint of cinnamon.

Value: Reasonable for a HSMF at less than $3/oz.

Overall: I was not very impressed with this tea. Nothing really stood out about it accept the appearance of the leaves. Looking at the wet leaves revealed a quality pluck: mostly bud sets with a number of whole leaves and buds. And in general I like the way HSMF leaves look (I can’t think of what it is about them at the moment, though). We tried China Cha Dao’s grade 3 HSMF the same day, and we liked the flavor of China Cha Dao’s better than Teavivre’s (although the quality of China Cha Dao’s leaf was clearly not as good). If you like HSMF, then this is an OK tea for the price.