First off I huge thanks to David for sending such an extraordinarily generous “sample” of this. There was a rush of orders when I requested this as my free sample and after it got shipped David realized he might have forgotten in it, surely enough when it arrived there was a sample of Yabao, which I will never turn down and he said he would send extra with my next order, which came sooner than I had planned. There was actually more of this than the teas I paid for! It had actually sold out during that time and I’m guessing he included the last of it, wonderful customer service that and the amazing quality tea offerings keep me coming back to Verdant time and again.
Unfortunately sheng and I are still at odds with one another. Don’t get me wrong, this is a great sheng and there many notes in here that I appreciate, the cedar and rosemary especially are wonderful! I generally get a those tastes either a few seconds in or in the aftertaste which lingers and keeps me coming back for steep after steep. It’s just the astringency as it first hits my tongue and the dryness in the finish. I’ve never had sake, a sad fact I need to remedy, but I get the dry white wine reference. I started this last night and have continued it this morning in a quest for the buttery notes and cinnamon at the end.
I wonder what I could do besides lowering the water temp to lessen my perceived astringency. I keep my steeps short at the beginning but tend to want to draw them out if I lower the temp. Perhaps less leaf? Cold brewing a sheng seems a bit odd to me. Aging takes awhile and the right kind of storage though I’m not opposed to it, I would actually like to try some older shengs perhaps from the nineties to see if I like them any better. I can always find something to appreciate in Verdant’s shengs as they are wonderfully complex, it’s just getting over that dryness.
