1993 Menghai 7542

This tea is coursing through my veins at the moment which frankly may become an issue as I need to cycle to work in a bit. The coating in my mouth is generous, and appears to not have any immediate plans to dissipate. My temperature is elevated, my palms are sweaty, my head is… well, it’s really rather blissed out at the moment. I want to stay with this tea all day right now. My furry drinking companion is looking at me in the oddest fashion. She may be wondering why I look so oddly contented. :) Happy.

This is my first infusion of this tea. It smells like forest loam, earthy, a deep rich compost of decay. I made the first infusions timidly, not a lot of leaf (I only have a few grams) and short, 20 seconds apiece, and they were…..light, thin, clean flavors of compost, but not so interesting. I decided to push to see what I could get and did 3+ minutes with a smaller volume of water at 212°F/100°C, just enough to cover the leaves, and got some sharpness that was a little unpleasant, more intense earthy flavors, but other than the added sharpness, still very similar.
A little while later, the next pair of infusions were done with very hot water, not so long, and the flavor is still very like damp forest earth, but a nicer balance than the first three. I am not getting the fruitiness I like in my favorite young she puerhs or the long sweetness of my favorite young shengs. Quite interesting.

Unfortunately, this was another session where I stopped keeping track as my other activities took over, so I can’t say when the leaves ran out of gas. I am sure I went at least a dozen infusions, but can’t say more than that.

This is an excellent example of an aged pu-erh tea. The taste is very true to the description: complex, very smooth, and without a hint of astringency. The notes I find in the flavor are decaying leaves, wood, earth, dates and leather. Quite earthy in fact. The tea has a wonderfully rich amber-brown color even on the first steeping. The whole experience of drinking this tea is like walking through a deciduous forest after a heavy rainfall.

There is a lot of energy in this tea as my head seems to be in the clouds now after a couple of infusions.

Overall this is an excellent tea and a good place to start exploring aged pu-erhs.