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Pu-erh Tea by The Mandarin's Tea Room
An expertly blended puer composed of 70% raw(sheng) and 30% cooked(shu) leaf, carefully aged for almost two decades.
Dry Leaf Aroma: Aged leather and dried chinese red dates
Wet Leaf Aroma: Pungent wild herbs
Body: AThe surface of the first few infusions glistens with a delicate sheen of naturally aged tea oils. The deep russet hue is bright and unclouded. Smoothly textured with a rich flavor that shares the sweetness of a lotus seed pastry and piquant notes reminiscent of chinese apothecary herbs. Multiple steeps bring out dormant florals and and soft musk. An ideal tea for enhancing the appetite or aiding in digestion after a rich meal. An excellent example of puerh from this era and factory.
Finish: Intensely cooling with camphor and mint
Qi: Strong with a pleasant warmth that develops in the chest
Oh. OH. oh.
I understand now. . . THIS is puerh. (Oh.) There is a balance of dank earth and cooling menthol overtone that delivers a full, very palatable complexity. Not every tea has to be mystifying to be very, very good.
And I know this is weird but I actually left the wet leaves out overnight (I couldn’t bring myself to throw them away) and had something like the fifth steepage the next day. Weird, yes, I know, but still so good. One of my absolute favorites.
This is the first “production-blended”, aged puerh I have tasted, and the result is exactly what I would have hoped for: well-balanced. The dominance of sheng leaves in the mixture provides a foundation consisting of leather, and dried cranberries on the nose, a smooth, full flavor/texture in mouth, and a desirable cooling on the finish. The shu leaves provide additional weight and just enough strength to the final result without overpowering the development of the sheng. As cultureflip hinted at in his review, the tea is not overly complex, but it doesn’t have to be. It all comes together as an absolute top notch tea, with a pleasant, full, yet meditative “qi”. Sure, there are teas that are more challenging, but drinking this simply puts me in a better place, engendering fond memories of times past, and providing a calming refuge from the day-to-day. I can’t ask for much more than that from a tea.
