white2tea

I recently received a small white2tea order with some of the latest smoked teas, something that I’ve come to deeply look forward to each year! Though I’m sure it won’t be long until I’ve tried each of them, but couldn’t resist brewing one up immediately. I’m starting with 2025 Northern Grown, the smoked sheng pu’erh. It’s bitey and abrasive with a lot of upfront pine smoke, tobacco and peat moss notes. However, it’s what follows after the initial wave of smoke that really makes it feel so compelling to me. Still smoky, but cushioned with the bitter sweetness of burnt sugar and a slightly tropical fruitiness like a greener, slightly underripe mango. So unique, even among the other different smoked raw pu’erh from W2T that I’ve gotten to try!

Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/DIwat9QpgWb/?img_index=1

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMtKc9eyMN0&ab_channel=PaulSpring-Topic

Strong lapsang-like smoke well-balanced with fruity sheng flavor. Compared to most smoky raws, this feels very “clean”, I guess because it’s a clean modern production that has been smoked, rather than a rustic factory production with smoky processing.

Quite nice.

Grandpa Style!

I only did half of a coin snapped, along with quite a lot of fresh basil leaves muddled up and steeped together in the liquor grandpa style, just to do something a little more fun and experimental. The result is still pretty delicious with a very, very bitter dark cocoa note swiftly followed up by a whole lot of fresh, savory herbaceousness. Even though this isn’t even close to being a sweet brew, there is something sorta indulgent about it. If you’ve never had dark chocolate dipped or coated basil before, I’d highly recommend. It’s a unique juxtaposition of flavours, but it works shockingly well and this is basil just the tea version of that!

Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/DIHpb49yGcA/?img_index=1

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7szEV16-wI&ab_channel=TheBrook%26TheBluff

I topped this off in the office on Monday, which means that the following notes were half- assed. Haha.

Aroma: Green peppers, honeydew rind, watermelon rind, rinds, rinds, rinds!
Tasting Notes: Peppery honeydew

It was a chaotic week at work, so I didn’t get much time to work on the sip down pile as much as I would’ve liked (here’s looking at you, coffee). Unfortunately, the W2T club – sometime last August – only had 15g of this red. As I’m both grateful to have had the opportunity to try this, I’m a touch sad that there was only so little. That’s life – never enough, but enough to be happy. Lol

Aroma: Black pepper, toast (not burnt but almost), & cocoa powder.

Tasting Notes: Citrus, grapefruit, zest

Gongfu!

All my steeps have been long and drawn out, really stretching out the most I get get from these beautiful little nuggets of ripe pu’erh. It’s deeply smooth with both a creamy mouthfeel and flavour that reminds me a lot of oat milk, though with a bit of a more brothy and savory undertone and earthiness. There’s also a few sweeter notes like vanilla and date sugar. Very nice and easy going! Probably going to try and squeeze out another steep or two, and then I’m very much looking forward to simmering the “spent” leaf on the stovetop for a while to make some milk tea to enjoy later. Gotta love a tea with utility!

Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/DHzCwYsSfUZ/?img_index=1

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BW0fGH-Ueu8&ab_channel=DavidDeanBurkhart

I’m trying to get back into adding logs again…Life has been wild. Not the bad type of wild, but the type that catches up to you all at once (work, friends, etc.). I feel like not writing or reading reviews is like not calling or texting friends. Sure, I’m active on IG, however, Steepster is the foundation for my tea journey. It is where my thrill for tea took the further plunge into this endless abyss called “CommuniTea.” With that said, thank you to those who’ve stuck around and those who keep on with their posting – it’s giving me plenty to catch up on – and just being here to drink and share tea! :)

Tea Review Time:

My experience with aged tea is limited. I’d love to have the money to afford to drink the “older” stuff; unfortunately, my funds and taste are relevant to most of the newer/fresher teas on the market. Buy it now and save it for later, I suppose. I’m getting better at drinking every little sample sitting in my hoarded pile (hoarded might be too strong of a word, as I’m sure, most tea heads are holding onto their goodies for a long time). Ha-Ha.

Yes, yes, I’m getting into the review now.

Aroma: Leather, moss, earthy, damp paper, old books, beets, & wet earth.

Tasting Notes: The tea was quite nice. There were notes of woodiness, beets, gasoline (whatever that means), paper, a little bitterness, and eventually astringency.

Feeling: Qi so heavy I floated my way toward the end of the workday.

PS. I’m afraid to rate this too highly on the account I enjoyed it, yet, it’ll be the last of it, forever. Thank you W2T for giving me this moment.

Grandpa Style!

The more experimental charcoal roasted offerings from W2T have been really hit or miss for me, but in this case I really felt like I tasted each and every tasting note described by W2T: spiced plum, cinnamon, mulling spices. Especially the stonefruit and cinnamon notes, which were perfectly rich and cozy. I’d also add molasses, figs, dark exotic woods, and baker’s chocolate to the list of flavours. Teas with the combination of plum and cocoa notes have a special place in my heart, so this especially resonated. I also really appreciated how full bodied and thick the brew was, with an appropriately balanced tannic briskness. Just a really lovely tea that seemed to offer a little bit of everything in a really nice way.

Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/DHuBZxxyWh4/?img_index=1

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9A3OO3lsoio&ab_channel=maryinthejunkyard

Thermos

To-Go Cup

White Gaiwan

Teapot

This is one of the most flavorful black teas I have ever had, and my FIRST white2tea tea. It came in the monthly tea club box for March. Deliciously milky and malty, and would make a great morning beverage brewed western style, but is still a treat gong fu as well (like I did).

This is a great shou! It has a thick, silky, smooth texture. I am getting background notes of cherry and vanilla. It’s uplifting on this gray, cloudy morning!

Gongfu!

From a taste perspective, I’m not entirely sure how I feel about this tea. It comes off more like a rather thin tasting and lightly bodied ripe pu’erh with to me, and as someone who typically enjoys their ripe sessions very heavy-handed and intensely brewed, it’s hard not to immediately perceive this as somewhat watered down. The notes of the sheng is rather lost to me, as well. With that said, I came to two different conclusions the longer I sat with this session and continued brewing. The first was that there was a very strong and grounding body-feeling to this session. Taste typically trumps all for me, but I just started feeling really GOOD as I drank this despite the milder tasting notes.

The second thing I landed on was this sense that this tea would actually probably be quite accessible to a new pu’erh drinker less familiar with shou or who had been turned off in the past by really intense earthy or woody tasting notes and “funky fermentation”, as weird as that might sound for such an experimental blend. The tasting notes I did get were really, really smooth and inoffensive with a bit of a sweet brown notes I’d characterize as carob or date-like. Probably a pretty safe way to dip your toes into the pu’erh world from a flavour standpoint!

Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/DHZbpXMSLun/?img_index=2

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y993yWQUOfc&ab_channel=UnderTheRug

I had a gongfu session with this tea for the first time. I was pleasantly surprised by the texture. It felt thick and silky smooth. There were woody notes with a dark chocolate-like bitterness and a bit of sweetness on later steeps.

I took another Mini, probably my last one to steep.
At first I did a long rinse, I believe it was about 30 seconds long; and steeps were starting on 30 seconds too. I tossed the rinse out and let it absorb the humidity for about 10 minutes.

After first steep, the dragonball was already broken up. And taste wise it was mellow sheng, with stonefruits taste, a little astringent, like unripe stonefruits are. There were hints of bitterness.

Next steeps were equally tasty, with similar flavour profile; but somehow there wasn’t much to focus on this tea. It was just a good, basic sheng. When steeping long, astringency was a little lingering; but that’s pretty much expected I guess.

Grandpa style, smells malty and faintly reminiscent of golden needle Yunnan, but tastes brighter, fruitier and less chocolatey than those teas. Really does remind me a bit of jam. May have to order more of this, seems like a steal.

Grandpa Style!

This tea is thick and oily with a slick mouthfeel and bold aroma that’s both buttery and a little more savory and brothy. The heaviness of liquor is really satisfying with a subtle, more medicinal undertone and slight salinity to the more woody finish. However, there’s also a creeping sweetness that seeks to build sip over sip. Quite bread-like but more of a brioche or sweet bread, in the way a hot cross bun or Hawaiian roll would be with notes of honey tightly weaved in. It’s still buttery as well and combined with the aforementioned notes of brioche, it’s sort of giving laminated pastry!? Like, as if this ripe pu’erh was some type of savory leaning croissant. It’s unique, and tasty, and very well suited for a day spent cozied up indoors!!

Tea Photo: https://www.instagram.com/p/DGq_K8SS-Yh/

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhP2-qYmfjg&ab_channel=DavidDeanBurkhart

This tea has notes of chocolate with some fruitiness. It has a bit of dark chocolate-like bitterness to it.

The time has come for this Man, Gingerbread Man. Tomorrow he would celebrate his third birthday (pressing date).

I used a whole mini in my gaiwan and steeped with various steeping time. Mostly around 30 seconds, with rather small increments. I wasn’t totally focused to the tea this time, but this tea is rather forgiving.

There is a thick mouthfeel; strong dark shu flavours, and while it is not gingerbread in any way, it is rich and a kind of sticky. I can’t point out any particular flavours, but it made me feel cozy and it was warming me up.

Enjoyable and easydrinking shou and off any funky and off flavours. Definitely it was worth 80 cents I paid for it. Would I get more of this? Maybe… it’s not so expensive and it’s drinkable.

Maybe my expectations for this Mini were too high, maybe I was preparing it wrong…

This is fine tea, and I was steeping it with several 30 seconds steeps (including rinse), and many longer ones. The dragon ball never fell apart; but keeps releasing nice and slightly astringent flavours typical somehow for sheng. And here comes the twist; yes, it’s definitely astringent and there are unripe stone fruit notes; I would describe them as unripe apricots… but there is, in my opinion, slight smokiness (or it’s roastiness — ?). That switches the flavour a little into oolong territory. Later steeps were definitely more oolong like.

I used whole litre in my thermos and honestly, I have to say, this is unique tea but somehow I feel it should be even a bit better. Or it’s again Yancha like and it seems I am not so big fan of those.

I would like to hear other tea enthusiasts thoughts. But this tea doesn’t seems to be for me.
That’s me problem, not tea problem.