Crimson Lotus Tea

After trying a cake of Cloudy Days, it wasn’t long before I re-ordered it as my first tong.

Clean, creamy, smooth, nutty, sweet and earthy. The tea is a well balanced very enjoyable Shou.

Drinking up a sample of this today. The wet leaf has a wonderful sour plum or apricot smell.

The first steep comes out quite light, though the body is already coming forward quite strongly. This is quite a “mid-centered” tea, with a forward body and a hint of maybe spiciness to it. Overall it’s quite low in bitterness and has a long lasting aftertaste of mellow sweetness. Definitely an enjoyable tea for me, though I find it lacks any particular high notes and mostly hangs around in mid to low notes.

It’s been a little while since I drank this. I remember quite enjoying it when I was first getting into puer, for its fruity yet upfront taste.

The wet leaf smells of ripe apricot. Today the sample was all broken up, smallish leaves, so it steeps fast. I accidentally oversteeped the first brew by a few seconds, meaning it came out with a little bit of a bitter uptake but overall, quite mellow and forgiving.

The second steep brings a little bit of creaminess. It might not be the right word, but it’s a sort of mouth-watering smoothness that I’m starting to pick up in a lot of sheng nowadays. Overall it’s pretty body centered, with a forward sweetness in the mid notes and a low bitterness that pops up and resides for a little while.

I drank this one the other day with a friend. I wasn’t paying as close attention as I maybe should have, but I noticed some of the same traits I did from when I first tried it. It has a nice overtone of apricot fruitiness, though it blends in well with the body of the tea. It’s quite smooth and has very little bitterness even when brewed for a long time, lending itself to an easy drink. It can tend toward the light side, though it might have more to do with my technique and sizing than anything else. Definitely one of my favorites so far and looking forward to trying more!

I received this sample from Crimson Lotus Tea, thank you.

Flash steeped in a gaiwan I found the tea clean, sweet and vegetal. Quite mellow and easy on the stomach. I noticed a slight tingling feeling on the front of my tongue.
When pushed a bitterness came to the front but sometimes I enjoy that kind of bitter.

I may order a cake so I can revisit this tea down the road to see how it changes.

After the gaiwan I got out my dragon egg Jian Shui from Crimson Lotus which I hadn’t dedicated. In went the Hidden Song, the tea found its pot.

Beautiful tea, nice leaves, taste starts a bit bitter even with flash steeps, then it turns sweet and stays like that until the last steep. Strong Qi, kind of agressive if pushed too far, long lasting body feels, Qi is on the speedy side, alert and relaxing sensations. I wouldn’t recommend it to beginners. I think this tea is high on caffeine, I feel some jitters after drinking a lot of it.

This was my first Huangpian blended shue which was refreshing, sweet and light .
If I forgot it was steeping there was more of an earthiness, in a good way.
I must have enjoyed it because the jar is empty and needs a refill.

First tasting of today is Crimson Lotus 2013 lucky cloud. This is a very dark medium sized cake, rather tightly compressed. This is one of the first full cakes Ive gotten instead of samples, so the first order of business was breaking into the cake. Since I dont have a puerh pick, I found a small thin cheese knife instead and worked it around the edge. Breaking off a about a 3 1/3 gram piece, then I scraped up a few of the broken pieces that fell off and in the yixing they all go, it was a bit over 4 grams total.

Giving it a quick wash that was all it needed, a single wash. It produced a clear very light brown liquor, giving it a good smell, a tiny sip and then tossing the rest of the wash, I decided it was ready to infuse.

The first infusion produced a very dark brown liquor as the leaves opened up, an aroma of peat, plums and caramel greeted me. And though it had a very slight fermentation aroma it wasnt at all unpleasant, it came out smooth and clean. The broth was sweet, smooth and with a nice pleasant aftertaste.

The second infusion was much darker producing a nearly black liquor that was dark,creamy, smooth and sweet. The flavor was a little more intense and actually made my tongue tingle a little. This is a very nice tea with a good mouth feel and a smooth sweetness. Dont let the dark color fool you, this is a wonderful afternoon sipping tea.

The third infusion was about the same darkness, showing this tea was going to have alot of staying power, the taste and aroma might be even a bit stronger. The slight tingle got a bit more pronounced. I really like this tea alot.. it would go well with strong foods, ones that you might think would overpower the tea.

The fourth was the same as the third, again showing the staying power of a good shou puerh. The flavors and aromas are staying pretty consistent at this point, the umami might be getting a bit more pronounced though, as well as the mouthfeel getting a bit more intense as well.

Im going to go finish up this tea, but I have a feeling Ill be steeping this for a while.

I highly recomend this to anyone who likes shou puerh! This is going up there with my favorite tea!

I received this Dragon Ball as a sample with an order.
Using a 170ml gaiwan and water off the boil the loosely compressed ‘planet’ opened quickly.
Because it was very clean I gave this tea one quick rinse instead of my usual two for shou. Smooth and sweet with nice earth, enjoyable on a snow day.

Hmm I guess no one has made a review for this yet. Drinking this tonight since I got a sample with latest Crimson Lotus Tea order. I knew not to use boiling water, so I started with 190 and yikes that was still bitter (even with flash steeps). So I brought it down to 175 and that’s a lot smoother. Tea isn’t bad, but is still a little astrigent even with the lower temperature. Definitely drinkable though. Feeling a little tea high from this tea tonight too – nothing fancy but a little light-headedness. Maybe because I drank so much so quickly?

For the price and the artwork I don’t think this is a bad tea. The sample I had tonight was a lot of dust and broken pieces. I’ll have to try the more “intact” piece next time to see if helps cut down on the bitterness and astringency.

Second sampling of the day is 2007 huang zhi shou. I was in the mood for another strong tea today and picked this one. I started with giving the tea a wash to clear the dust and a bit of the ripe puerh dank from it. After looking at the leaves, and they were still packed pretty darn tightly, I decided to give it a second wash. I did sip the second wash and was surprised to find it was actually decent, though a bit watery since I flash washed.

The first proper infusion gave me a dark chocolate looking liquor that had scents of earth, peat, oak, and caramel. I also got a hint of cacao in it and a slightly lingering aftertaste that was quite pleasant. This was done with like a 1, 2, 3, start pouring and using the about 5-6 second pour of the yixing as most of the steep.

The second infusion gave a darker liquor and a tiny bit of cloudiness, probably as the leaves really opened now and started giving their all. This infusion was wonderful, sweet, dark, oak, earth, maybe berries or something as well. Basically everything you want in a dark ripe.

The third infusion is always the most fun when it comes to a shou puerh. Basically I poured the water in, and then right out again as fast as possible and I still got a liquor that was nearly black. This is the most intense infusion and it was quite dark, and earthy and sweet. The third usually isnt my favorite, it something gets to be a bit too much and this was similar. It was still good but its a bit much.

The fourth infusion is almost always my favorite, the leaves have poured their heart out in the third and now you get that beautiful slow slide. All the flavors are coming out, the notes are high and you get a chance to give it a moment to steep. Yup this was my favorite, dark sweet and delightful and not overpowering at all. This is what I wait for when I break open a shou!

The fifth and on infusions I slowly increase the time to maintain as much as the delight as I had in that fourth. I got about 3-4 more good steeps out of this before it started to wear down, but its got quite a bit of power and got nearly 10 steeps from it. Very nice tea, plenty of staying power.

I only got a slight bit of dankness in the first wash, and by the first infusion all hints of it are gone. I probably could have skipped the second wash, but it all worked out good.

Highly recommended if you like dark shou tea. I got this as part of my what is puerh from crimson lotus.

First tasting of the day is 2003 Changtai sheng. I got this as part of the “what is pu’erh” set. I started by getting my little yixing pot and giving it a quick rinse. The rinse came back fairly clear with little dust. I decided to skip the second rinse and go right to the tasting.

The first infusion was about 10 seconds at just under 212, and I got a clear brown liquor with mild smokey and earthy flavors. I found this interesting as it felt about halfway between a raw and ripe.

The second infusion was a little darker and more intense. And that was a flash steep in and out of the yixing, basically using he pouring time as the steep. The flavor was very nice and smooth at this point. Taking on a slightly stronger earth and smoke flavor and giving up a little of the vegetal. It tasted more like a ripe at this point.

Third infusion I was a little surprised, the color, flavor and aroma stayed very similar to the second infusion instead of bursting into darker color like ripes do at this stage. It was again very pleasant smooth and easy to drink.

Fourth infusion was very similar to the third although I did a 15 second infusion this time to keep up those lovely flavors and aroma’s of the previous infusions. I was not disappointed.

I started adding 10 seconds to each infusion at this point and steeped the rest of this wonderful tea out till the end. And I got about 4 or so more infusions out of it. I was very impressed with how evenly this held up.

I highly recommend this tea, unfortunately as of this time, this tea and the sampler pack I ordered are sold out.

My first tasting of today is hidden song by crimson lotus. I started by doing a single wash, there was almost no sediment and the leaves opened up enough that I decided a second wash wasnt needed.

The first infusion produced a very clear pale yellow liquor with a mild sweet and vegetal taste. I was very impressed with it was this flavorful on the first infusion after a single wash. The second infusion however was much better, a slightly darker liquor and a more intense sensations of the flavors and aroma as well as a slight wood and smoke aroma. Not too intense.. just pleasantly mild.

Third and fourth infusions were very slightly more intense, with the vegetal flavor coming out more strongly. I know Im missing some of the subtler flavors here, I can smell and taste them but cant quite identify what they are.

Overall the tea is nice , easy to drink, and refreshing. I highly recommend this for anyone looking for young sheng to drink now. I buy teas with the intention of drinking them now, not how they will age in a few years. And this one is sweet, mellow and vegetal and is very pleasant to drink.

Midas Touch

Sheng Olympiad 2017

A few of these notes will intermesh with notes taken from my friends who had sampled this with me.

I had shared this tea with a couple of friends yesterday. I was planning on drinking an oolong for our second “party”, but they insisted on trying more sheng instead (and who am I to deny them the chance to taste good puerh?) while playing a game of Settlers of Catan.

I gave this tea two rinses prior to starting the session mainly due to the reason that there wasn’t much of an aroma from the leaf. However, on the third rinse/steep, there were subtle notes of “fruit or flowers of some type, with a touch of sweetness.” The flavor was subtle and unnoted for myself, but my friend had pointed out that there was a “sweetness, maybe honey,” subtly lingering on the tongue.

After a few steeps through, there were stronger notes of hay (?) and honeysuckle (?). However, these are the last notes taken as we continued with the tea, Catan, and fellowship. I thought that this had been a pretty good weekend with friends—who actually wanted tea! :)

First to review!

I really enjoy rolled puerh, for they are perfect for when I am traveling. I can fit them in my teaware pouch and just pop them into the pot. This rolled ball is very very dark leaf and gives off scent of sharp greens like bok choy, kale, and some sweet wood. I warmed my pot up and rolled the planet inside. The scents opens into some off metallic (iron) scent with the same greens. bitters, and roasted asparagus. I washed the ball twice and prepared for brewing. The taste begins sweet and green with green bean notes. I can note some huigan that is delayed, but it sits nicely and lightly in the back of the throat. The grassy tones give a warming feeling on my forehead, and I can note a faint amount of smoke in the background of my brew. The brew continues in the fashion. The later steeps give a slight lemongrass bite. This tea does lack complexity, thickness, yada yada yada, but its inexpensive and rolled, so you can’t complain too much. The qi is nice and gives me a good spatial feeling.

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