Bitterleaf Teas

Morning mug of tea.

This is exactly the kind of black tea that’s perfect to start your morning off with; it’s really rich and full bodied which exactly the sort of profile I want from an early morning cup of black tea. However, even though it’s full bodied it’s not harsh at all: it’s actually very, very smooth and velvety in mouthfeel with some brilliantly sweet and indulgent flavours.

The majority of the flavour notes are milk chocolate; silky and sweet. If you’ve ever done a professional chocolate tasting, you know that you start by holding the chocolate to roof of your mouth to heat up and melt – and that sweet, creamy melted chocolate flavour against the roof of the mouth is exactly what I’m experiencing sipping on this one right now. The rest of the profile are notes like malt, molasses and nougat with just a little hint of fresh baked bread. It’s a very complex and rich profile overall.

Mmmm!

Song Pairing: https://youtu.be/9dmgJ9xfIVs

My morning cuppa.

So, today is my brother’s 19th birthday so late in the evening we’re going out for dinner and drinks to celebrate him being legal drinking age. In the mean time, I’m enjoying having the morning/afternoon off by having some tea and listening to some good music and the rain.

I added some spiced orange honey to this cup as well to add an extra dimension of flavour to the cup and that was just a really smart decision. The spice notes of the honey actually didn’t really come through at all, but the orange became this smooth, sweet consistent flavour throughout the entire sip; since this tea is SO naturally chocolate-y tasting that added orange flavour almost gave this a Terry’s Chocolate Orange kind of vibe. Except, it’s a LOT more natural tasting so maybe more like orange slices dipped into high quality, melted down chocolate. Yummy!

Lazy Gong Fu session…

I think about five steeps in total? I used a bigger gaiwan, so this was quite filling since I was the only one drinking it. Really good though; super chocolate-y with sweet potato, malt, and honey undertones though. It felt like a very indulgent treat.

That’s about it; I didn’t take notes. Just enjoyed it as it was.

Commute to work tea!

God, this is such a fudgey, chocolate-y blend and I love it for that quality so damn much. Added chocolate flavouring in my tea or chocolate chips that become sludge in your cup? Fuck no! But give me a good black tea with natural, rich chocolate notes that fill every crevice of your mouth and I’m in heaven. And yes, that’s the dominant note in this one but it’s also got nice malty and molasses undertones as well that just serve to further suit the richness of the tea.

It was a good rainy day companion. Little did I know it would be the last rainy day tea for me all day; I picked out a whole rainy day line up this morning but low and behold shortly after my bus to work/drinking this tea it started snowing. Bleck.

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FT62Gwv70kM

I swear, not just because of the serendipitous name.

Well, I know I probably shouldn’t be drinking caffeine this late at night but I’ve been craving black tea all day and I only just had the chance to make myself a cup…

Mmm! This is really good! Honestly, I’m a little tipsy and I know my observations wont be the most astute but the creamy, decadent chocolate notes I’m getting from this tea are just divine. Seriously; the whole thing is rich fudgey chocolate from top of the sip all the way until the brief, playful aftertaste. I can’t wait until I get a chance earlier in the day to actually steep this Gong Fu because I imagine watching this lovely chocolate flavour evolve over infusions is going to be a real treat!

Ugh! Technical difficulties!! I was feeling a bit off today and decided I wanted to spend my day playing some Ark, but it seems my electronics have other plans. I turn on my Xbone and my screen didn’t turn on, so I fiddle with the cables and connections and nope, the screen (which is old and has been on its last legs for a while) finally has died. This is so sad, the new Ark update is supposed to come out on the first but I doubt I will have a new screen by then, what a bummer.

But, of course, where there is sadness there is always tea to brush away whatever has put me in a foul mood. Today’s tea is from Bitterleaf Teas, their Giant White 2015 Jing Gu Moonlight White Tea, ah Moonlight, one of my favorite types of tea. I have given it the nickname Drow tea, since it is dark leaves with beautiful silver trichomes, much like a Drow…because I am such a dork, but I don’t care, Drow are awesome and so is this tea. After I get done oohing and aahing over the beautiful fluffy leaves I give them a good sniff, and the first thing I notice is the iconic aroma of tomato leaves. I am not sure why Moonlight almost always smells like tomato leaves to me, along with rich honey, freshly cut hay, woodruff, sage, and a bit of distant grapes. It is mellow and sweet, a bit more herbaceous than usual, which I really enjoy.

Into my dedicated to Moonlight teapot the leaves go for a steep. Well hello complex wet leaves! Notes of sugar cane, marshmallow, peaches, lettuce, and dried tomato dance out of the pot with the steam. The leaves smell crisp and sweet, managing to be refreshing while also retaining a dessert like sweetness. The liquid is very light, like a just ripe peach (not cut, just sitting there, taunting you with its sweetness, but it is too pretty to eat yet…this has happened to me too many times) wildflowers, honey, and a touch of butterhead lettuce adding a touch of crispness at the finish.

This tea starts pretty light, with gentle notes of hay and delicate lettuce at the start and a powerful burst of perfectly ripe peach at the middle. The finish is delicate sugar cane and distant note of hazelnuts. It is very sweet and wonderfully light, a good start that had me craving more.

Steep two’s aroma has the wildflowers and honey along with gentle lettuce and peaches, but now it also has a meringue sweetness that really has me wondering what a peach meringue pie would taste like. It starts with a thick sweetness, like warm honey drizzled apricots and peaches with a side of juicy sugarcane. In the middle of the steep it gets a distinct woodruff and sage quality that blends amazingly with the fruity quality and makes the transition into lettuce and celery pretty seamless. The aftertaste is a long lingering sweet and light sugar cane, delicious stuff.

Now what sets this Moonlight apart from many others I have tried? Well it is sweet, it still has that crisp lettuce quality of a fresh Moonlight, oh yeah…it lasts forever! I am not sure I have run into one that lasts as many steeps, and usually this style of tea can get quite a few steeps in before it fades away. As the steeps carry on the notes of peach and apricot increase and the crisp lettuce notes start to take a backseat until they eventually fade, though the herbaceous notes stick around for a bit longer. As the tea starts to fade all that is left is wonderful honey and distant wildflowers.

For blog and photos: http://ramblingbutterflythoughts.blogspot.com/2016/08/bitterleaf-teas-giant-white-2015-jing.html

Got home from work, brewed this up, and instant diarrhea.

This is the definition of a middle aged tea because the taste is mature and the hue is right in the middle, but you have no texture. Completely thin and smooth, but it needs some wet storage to give it GIRTH.

second session with this tea. i like it a great deal. very smooth and creamy-thick mouthfeel, even with 1g:20ml (as recommended, but usually i tend more toward 1:10 for shou), with a clean set of flavours underneath. it’s so lovely and cozy. nice sweet aftertaste, which i love. solidly slicks down your teeth, as well.

MAY have over infused this one a bit
I agree the end sip is that of DATES
LOVING this company!

Thank you to the good tea friend who gave me this sample. This is I think one of the better semi aged teas I have tried. It did start out with notes of leather and tobacco. Early on there was a note of cherry too. This note unfortunately did not last long. It developed into something fairly nice once the notes of leather and tobacco were pretty much gone. Not sure what to call that note. It was what I would call comparatively sweet. Not sweet like the apricots of a young sheng but sweet in comparison to how it had started. Overall I liked this tea and a lot of semi aged teas I do not like. I steeped this twelve times and stopped because I was at my caffeine limit but I think this would have gone a number of more steeps. It was a little weaker in the twelfth steep but not incredibly so. I think I certainly could have gotten another four or five steeps out of it. I could save the leaves but tomorrow I will want to drink something else.

I steeped this twelve times in a 100ml Ruyao Teapot with 7g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, 30 sec, 45 sec, 1 min, 1.5 min, and 2 min.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BJdXDoED9gP/?taken-by=allanckeanepuerhtea

I drank through this in two different session on two different days. The first session was really rough because I’ve never said anything negative about something from the Bang Dong area; I generally promote it and explain it’ll go up in price by 3 to 4 times here shortly as the region is more exposed. So here’s the thing….

SPRING BANG DONG IS LIGHT, VEGETABLE, AND HINTS OF FLORAL NOTES.
This… this… there is no trace of any of that. So maybe I went into it with thoughts of the other four I’ve had from this region during spring, but it was murky and harsh each session with this funky wild taste that doesn’t represent the region I love so much. It was really upsetting to experience this tea because I went into it 100% not knowing what it is/was. Once I found out it was Bang Dong, my world kind of shattered. Not only that, but one that cost more than YS’s…

What a sad day it was for me and that is coming from someone who is putting WMD as one of the top 5 sheng productions of 2016 and it’s from BLT.
Sigh.

Just released today on Bitterleaf Teas’ site. This is an apparent ‘banzhang’ tea. Banzhang (班章) is a growing area in Bulangshan (布朗山) that is known for high quality teas. Great notes of sweetness, bitterness, astringency, stone fruit, wood, and smoke in this tea.

Full review: http://www.aguywithagaiwan.com/2016/08/19/2006-mad-king-banzhang-bitterleaf-teas/

http://sororiteasisters.com/2016/08/15/fox-tail-ancient-tree-black-tea-2015-spring-feng-qing-bitterleaf/

For the full review!!!

I really like this one! Very nice! Will be doing a full review at Sororitea Sisters soon! Stay Tuned!!!

The struggle of a nocturnal person living in a diurnal world is real, especially with Ben’s new work schedule! He gets up right when I am going to bed, and with him being such a light sleeper I have to creep around not making much noise (and keep the cats relaxed, they always get rambunctious when one of us is awake) so not to wake him. I am going to try, ugh, again to switch back to diurnal, but it is so hard. Something I have always struggled with, I say I am nocturnal, but really I have a cycling sleep schedule and always have. I sleep fine when my cycle matches up to when I am supposed to be awake, but if not…well…there was a reason in school I would fall asleep leaning against a wall sometimes. So it is that time to brute force ‘reset’ my sleep schedule so that my nocturnal rustling doesn’t bug my more productive fiance, not fun!

Today I am taking a look at Bitterleaf Teas’ Sabertooth 2015 Feng Qing Ancient Tree Dian Hong Black Tea. A Hong Cha from scenic Yunnan, made from old tree leaves and if age was any indication of leaf size, well, this tea comes from an Ent. When I was sharing this tea with Ben it easily fit in my larger teapot, but for a single session I needed a gaiwan because the leaves didn’t fit in my Petr Novak pot and I didn’t have the heart to break them. They were big ol leaves with a hint of golden fuzz here and there, mostly they are dark and twisty, they look archaic. The aroma is rich, with notes of cocoa, malt, autumn leaves, acorn squash, and caramel sweetness. There is also a woody briskness at the finish of the sniff, giving promises of a zinginess along with the heavier qualities in the aroma.

I decided to use the big audacious golden gaiwan, because she is needy and gets jealous when neglected. The aroma of the wet leaves after their first water dousing blend notes of cocoa, malt, molasses, dried cherries…and…hello…notes of sassafras! Yessss!!! I love when that note pops up, I have only had it show up in Red Jade, but considering it is a hybrid of assamica and wild growing trees, picking up this note in a Yunnan tea I am assuming is an assamica is not too surprising. Now if I am wrong and it isn’t then I will admit to being surprised, because I have never seen sinensis with leaves this big. The liquid is sweet and rich, with notes of acorn squash, creamy sweet molasses candy, malt, and a finish of cocoa and a touch of cherries.

Well, this first steep is complex! It is really a coin flip with Hong Cha as to whether the first steep will be a gentle introduction or a complex flavor burst, and I have found it almost always is not indicative of how complex later steeps will be. It is why I love this tea so, it always keeps me guessing and interested. It starts with notes of cocoa and dried cherries, then moves to cranberries and sassafras, on it then goes to finish out with acorn squash and myrrh. It starts smooth and finished a bit mineral and dry, really waking up the palate…hello morning tea!

Guess how long I waited til the next steep…yeah not long at all. The aroma of this steep is straight up chocolate covered cherries and molasses, super rich and sweet. This taste starts out rich and sweet, with notes of caramelized sugar, cherries and a bit of cranberries. The middle is mellow squash and a bit of peanuts. For the finish is a resinous myrrh and pine wood with a lingering rich molasses that lasts for aged. This steep is nothing but smoothness as well, not a single note of dryness or briskness.

The aroma for steep three is rich and super sweet, again it is a chocolate covered cherry and molasses bomb with an extra explosion of yams and squash in the finish. My goodness that first sip is sweet, like a mouthful of brown sugar and cocoa with a rich dark cherry (not dried, juicy fresh this time) note as well. In the middle the familiar notes of squash and yams are joined by a touch of pumpkin and distant sassafras. This tea has great longevity, it just goes and goes, and if it wasn’t totally obvious, its taste is quite enjoyable while being very soothing. In my opinion this is a perfect morning tea, since I do not use caffeine to wake up, I use intense sensory input, and this tea takes the cake!

For blog and photos: http://ramblingbutterflythoughts.blogspot.com/2016/08/bitterleaf-teas-sabertooth-2015-feng.html

This tea took me by surprise. Its flavors are light, but not weak. I think that’s important to distinguish. This tea is all about the aroma, huigan, cooling, aftertaste.

Aromas of fresh apricot on the dry leaves. Flavors of tea are honeydew/melon, apricot, sweet-ish but not sugary, honey aromas fill the cup as you sip but the floral honey flavor is delayed and appears in the aftertaste.

After about 5-6 steeps a slight drying/astringency appears that is pleasant and urges you on to take another sip.

This tea is light, but unexpectantly delicious. I’m not a fan of light puerh, but this one is all aftertaste and its wonderful. wow! wish I could have tried this when it was fresh off the production line a year ago.

FYI this is a spring tea

For a key to my rating scale, check out my bio.

Excellent value, nice balance of flavors and impressive complexity for price. Lots of tannins but balanced by rich flavor and caramel-thick mouthfeel. 回甘 (sweet finish) is very persistent. $0.10 USD / g.

(Reviewed in the 10g “coin” format)

First off, this tea is just the cutest. I want to hug him, and pet him, and squeeze him, and call him George. But probably not squeeze him TOO hard, his compression isn’t all that tight.

The dry leaf aroma is enchanting. I double checked after steeping, and I did in fact use artesinal spring water, which I was wondering if I hadn’t accidentally swapped with water from the river Lethe. I drank several steeps without having any particular memory of this tea.

I think the biggest flaw here, to my tastes, is that this production is the epitome of “all right”. The very definition of “okay”. If there was a Best Choice or Great Value brand for sheng, I’d expect it to taste pretty exactly like this, only less cute and without the great dry leaf aroma.

The wet leaf actually looked to be in very good condition, and leads me to wonder if perhaps the smaller quantity pressing here has led to faster aging, causing a tea that should still be relatively young to mimic the “awkward phase” of sheng where it’s neither young nor aged but just sort of… there.

Or it could just be I had an off day.

Either way, though, if I’m buying something youngish from Bitterleaf, Secret Garden, 24K, and Winter Wings were all stellar choices. This however… unless you’re planning a sheng tasting for 500 newbies and need something to be inoffensive to as many of them as possible, I’d stick to their other options.

Stinks to give a review like this to a company I’m very fond of, but if I don’t “call ’em as I see ’em”, these notes are useless to everyone.

Fortunately, I still have many other of their teas on my radar to order. Release your new teas Bitterleaf… pretty please? <3

From the Dark matter group buy, steeped during a google hang out with other steepsters.

First steeps were quite weak, but mineral and wet pile. I went crazy and did an aggressive long steep and got one excellent cup of rich, thick, earthy, and smooth. The next infusion however was horrific as it was so bitter it was rising up my nose. It is really impressive to get bitter out of a shou, hahhaa! So yeah, maybe take a more moderate approach to this tea and insane like I did.

Overall not bad, if I had some more I’d experiment again.

I’ve had so much Jade oolongs lately. They are all starting to taste pretty similar. Some salts starting building up in my boiler, so I had to get water from somewhere else. It ruined the last of my Alishan too.

Since my stomach was cramping and I had a craving for a chocolaty black tea, I perused my darker tea selections. I almost picked a flavored Pu-Erh, but then again, the flavorings would upset my stomach too. Then there were twinofmunin’s bags waiting for me. I’ve been fascinated by this tea to say the least. I’ve had purple before, and they normally have a weird earthy quality that is hard to describe for me. Some pu-erh’s have aided stomach cramps before-despite them CAUSING them on a usual basis, but I knew I could handle this tea. Smelling the dry leaf, it was distinctly smokey and earthy. It made me think of fresh soil growing a batch of young grass under the remains of a burned tree.

Imagery aside, the first sip made me think of the dragon blood incense. Earth remained fixated in my head after five seconds of steeping. The temperature was closer to 170 F, and I have no idea what I did for the grams. Nevertheless, the ideas of incense and earth continued in steep two at ten seconds. I grabbed my little batch of Dragon’s Blood incense for comparison, and they were pretty close. They had the same smoked and earthy qualities I pick up, but the incense was sweeter and closer to sandalwood.

Three yield the same kind of dirt profile with a little bit more grassiness than before at fifteen seconds. I actually found this tea to not be as bitter, fishy, astringent, musty, or sour as other Pu-Erh’s I’ve had. Again, I’ve had purple teas before, but this one did not have the overwhelming potency that I’m used to with Pu-Erhs. Then again, I’m not drinking any more since I have to wake up early tomorrow ( why did I even drink this in the first place?).

I am pleasantly surprised that this tea did not affect me too much. The earthiness was welcomed, but I would not have it in large quantities any time soon. Not sure who I’d recommend it to.

My first review from the Puer TTB! This tea’s name is well deserved. I almost injured myself trying to break off a sample from what was in the box, and ended up having to snap what I did take in half, as going at the little chunk with a pick anymore would have been too dangerous. I ended up getting a 7.5g chunk, perfect for my 120mL gaiwan.

I honestly wasn’t too excited to drink this after seeing how compressed it was…I figured I’d have a frustrating session of trying to fight this tea to come apart, and that was slightly the case. Really though, once this tea got going, it was amazing. Absolutely my favorite example of aged puerh so far, though do note I have only tried a few of them.

The dry leaf had little to no smell, maybe a bit of hay, but once rinsed (I did two rinses to help open it up), it had a nice woody flavor with light camphor accents and a fruity seeming sweetness.

The first five steeps were decently light, both in color and flavor. I wasn’t surprised by this, as I could still see that most of the tea was compressed into a little square, with just bits and pieces coming off, despite my proddings with my gaiwan lid. These steeps had a slightly damp woody flavor, like mossy wood, but nowhere near as wet tasting as any ripe puerh or even some of the wet-stored teas I’ve tasted. There were also very slight apricot notes on the aftertaste. The tea had a decently creamy texture as well. These first steeps were interesting, because at this point I had no idea what this tea was going to become. Would the wet taste increase to the point where it was off-putting? Would that apricot taste get more prominent and feature heavily later in the session?

On steeps 6 and 7, I could tell this tea was starting to find its legs. I could see the chunk opening up more, and I started getting nice notes of mineral and honey sweetness with that same creamy texture.

Then on steep 8, I increased the time a little bit and BOOM! Diamondcutter woke up. Nice orangey liquid, camphor woody sweetness. It was cooling, moreso in the lower throat and chest than in my mouth, and it made my tongue feel all tingly. I suddenly got pretty sweaty, and realized I was in it for the long haul with this tea. Since I started the session at about 10 at night, this became a late night tea session. Good times.

Steeps 9-13 were awesome, though didn’t boast quite as much qi and body feeling as steep 8 did. Extremely drinkable, with no discernible off-flavors, even the slight dampness from earlier is gone now. Camphor/woody and mineral sweetness that transformed around steep 11 into a sugary front of the sip with a deep honey finish. Thick and creamy texture in the mouth.

Steeps 14-18 were slightly diminished. On steep 14, I noticed the first signs of this tea’s demise – when many teas are already long dead! Still very drinkable and smooth, just the flavors are a tad weaker.

Steeps 19-24 were also quite tasty. These were the “courtesy steeps” I often do when teas have basically given all they can. Steep times of multiple minutes, usually with pretty meh results. Not the case for Diamond Cutter. There was still a lot more goodness to get out of it with these longer steeps, maybe even better than the previous few. The thickness of the tea, slightly diminished before, returned in these long steeps, with smooth woody notes and a honey sweetness. I probably could have gotten a few more long steeps, but it was nearing 1am, so I didn’t want to wait around for 15-30m steeps.

I got 24 steeps out of this, and even counting the first 5 or more steeps as basically rinses, that is an impressive number. I have been mostly unimpressed with other aged sheng I’ve tried, though i haven’t delved deep into that world of tea yet. Most other aged teas I’ve tried have made me say something like “this is good/interesting, BUT…” and that “but” may be it tastes like leather for half the session, or it tastes like a damp basement throughout, or any other number of weird things like that. I think the difference is that Diamond Cutter has had very clean, probably dry storage. It is very tightly compacted, but has aged enough that there is absolutely no bitterness left, even from a region known to have a bit of that bitter bite to it.

Having tried this tea, I am very excited to try the rest of Bitterleaf’s sheng offerings, both from the TTB and from my first order with them which is on its way as well. I may have to pick up some more of this Diamond Cutter for my collection. Maybe I’ll split a brick with somebody, as even one session with this tea seems to become an all-day affair, but I’d likely have to take a hack-saw to it to break the brick in half. Then again, it would also be one that would be nice to have a whole lot of. Don’t let Diamond Cutter’s rough exterior steer you away – it’s a wonderful aged puer, extremely drinkable with soft, clean, smooth flavors.

I’m going to use the rest of my sample to experiment with breaking the tea up more in the gaiwan as I steep. This time, I just used my gaiwan lid to help it along a bit. Next time, I’ll employ my puer pick or a fork to see if I can make it open up faster and get to the good stuff sooner. I’m not sure if that will make for a less interesting session or not.

“Do you ever think of what they’ve gone through?” he asked, as I stared upward, mouth agape in amazement.

I hadn’t really considered it. After all, it’s been a dream of mankind to fly for so, so long. Naturally, I was jealous of the figures soaring and looping above my head. Who wouldn’t be?

But I was still thinking about it, later that night as I lie in bed on my back. Even this would be impossible to do. Clearly, there was a cost to be borne. But the joy, the exhilaration- it would be worth it, I was certain.

I won’t go into detail what it felt like, having objects growing out of what you’d grown used to as your body. Thank goodness it was winter – they tell me the cold keeps it from being worse. I cannot imagine how it could be worse.

But in the end. everyone who has seen me appears just as amazed as I was, back on that day. Eyes and hearts full of life and hope as they tell me how wonderful it must be. It is truly inspiring to be an uplifting influence on so many people.

When you grow tired of the humdrum, the everyday, the monotonous grind of feeling like you’ve seen it all, you can come and watch me fly. I never tire of it, and just maybe you’ll be invigorated like I am, way above the tumult and commotion below.

Wonder and amazement is never far, when you’ve got wings.