Yunnan Sourcing

Sipdown 2/17-2022

Nothing to add, just logging the sipdown.

Mastress Alita’s Monthly Sipdown Challenge: a black tea

This is an easy prompt for me to accomplish. I drink black teas nearly everyday. Working on sipping though this, as it’s not my favorite. (This is also not the 2018 varietal, but I didn’t want to make yet another page for the same tea).

I actually find the rich, chocolate notes less pronounced than in the standard Laoshan black. I’m getting more of the white floral notes, with a hint of chocolate. This also smells sugary sweet- like turbinado sugar.

Definitely humid stored for much of its existence, followed by dry storage. I’d say camphor is the forward note and it’s supported by a good, strong base of dry, earthy forest floor, peat, dark wood, fresh oyster mushrooms, geosmin, caverns and a now-muted dry woodsmoke. Spicy, warming and drying with some tongue-numbing bitterness, though no other remarkable mouth or throat feelings. Smoke becomes strong and ashy in late steeps, where it mixes with floral perfume. Nothing offensive for me; then again, nothing noteworthy. Just a solid aged tea provided by White Antlers <3 Steep this long and hot to awaken the profile.

Sipdown 5/20-2022

Never really connected with this. Found it sharp and slightly bitter.

Mehhhhhh. Not loving this. There’s a a fresh, buttery quality to it- like snap peas, clarified butter, and fresh cut grass. But, that is followed by a sharp, citrus rind that just doesn’t work for me in conjunction with the former qualities.

The smell of warmed leaves in the gaiwan give a raisin aroma while also looking like raisins in appearance (the tight and small dark leaves). The wash and first steeping produced an altumnal orange colored liquor with a peachy taste. The third steeping was fantastic yielding a more complex flavor profile rounding out with a buttery and milky finish while also mai ting the subtle notes of peach. I haven’t finished brewing but it’s an excellent day drinker !!

The original 2015 Green Miracle was one of the first ripes I ever bought, drank and reviewed. I still have maybe half a cake left. While not bad, it has never really impressed me. The strength and longevity are below average and the very mineral, somewhat chocolaty flavor profile is rather bland and forgettable. While things have improved across the board with age, nothing about the tea has ever really changed in any significant way. Now we finally have a follow-up and I was curious to see if this tea would be more of the same or similar in name only.

I finished my sample in two sessions using my Ben Shan Duan Ni Yixing clay teapot both times. Already the aroma of the wet leaves alone sets this tea apart from most ripes. I’d describe it as “greener”, more leafy. In my second session in particular I felt like it reminded me of berries, maybe a berry jam.

The uniqueness is equally apparent in the first sip. The tea is much higher noted than your typical shu. Quite sweet. In my notes for the first session I talk of umami/soy sauce, my second berries with some underlying chocolate bitterness. Interestingly, my notes for the first session continue to describe the tea as savory, later on becoming more mineral and roasted, maybe a bit chocolaty. My notes for the second session continue talking about milk chocolate and mineral sweetness.

Neither paints a picture of a very dynamic tea, it becoming quite bland and quite a typical ripe affair in the last third of the session. I also only got eight brews out of Green Miracle both times, with the last eighth set-it-and-forget-it brew barely qualifying as worthwhile. My notes for the seventh infusion of the first session do speak of licorice/anise, though, which is somewhat interesting at least. My notes don’t really talk about mouthfeel and body that much. I’d say the tea’s probably okay in that department, but not particularly noteworthy.

I feel like I might’ve just painted a picture of a somewhat bland tea, but overall I feel Green Miracle 2020 manages to differentiate itself as a somewhat unique ripe among its myriad peers and it’s likely a tea that most shu fans would enjoy. It did intrigue me with its initial steeps, but quickly devolved into mediocrity. Those seeking deep, dark flavors and thick, oily body might want to seek elsewhere, but for other ripe lovers I would definitely recommend a sample.

The original Green Miracle DNA is certainly there in the 2020 iteration. I don’t know if these are actually the same tea just different harvest, but I can certainly see some resemblance, even if only in very broad terms. I would classify this tea as quite good, just not quite to my taste in terms of its profile. I’m generally not a fan of mineral notes and that is the case here as well. While I do enjoy dark chocolate notes in ripes, the milk chocolate here is again somewhat of a miss.

The wet leaves are an atypically light shade of brown for a modern ripe, hopefully hinting at more room for this tea to develop over the years than your typical shu. Despite this, I didn’t find Green Miracle to be too “green” for my stomach, which has often been the case with Yunnan Sourcing’s other lighter fermentation ripes when young.

This was the first loose (well, cake) tea I drank after a week of teabags and it was like night and day. And the bagged tea wasn’t bad! But this puerh was just such a multisensory experience, nothing from a supermarket can compare. The flavor is rich and deep, the texture is thick, it’s got a cooling aftertaste like menthol but a generally warming vibe – reminded me why the shipping time from China is worth it. I like to leaf this hard, but that’s my MO with ripe puerh in general.

Blind bought this cake a few months ago and was unimpressed with my first sampling even after a brief rest. This is my only black tea cake and I didn’t think it was worth getting a storage box for just one cake, not yet at least, so I threw it into my white tea cake box. I thought the aromas matched up really well.

Looks like the longer rest and storage improved it a bunch! I enjoyed it a lot more this time. Sweet honey, deep chocolate, and blueberries.

Happy one year gongfu-nniversary to me! It’s been about a year since I started brewing gongfu style. Looking forward to many more years of tea drinking.

Most really young raws don’t tend to offer me a lot in terms of aromatics, but when they do, it seems to often be a sign I’m in for a treat. This Hong Ni Tang was one such occasion. After the rinse, the leaves have a complex, deep aroma. Foresty, campfire embers, perhaps even a touch of vinegar. This is reflected in the taste, and it’s great.

I love this tea. I state that twice in my notes. It has a lot of character. Scott’s description says the character of this tea is between Jinggu and nearby Mengku and I agree. It has the complex yet deep foresty character of certain Mengku teas together with the sweetness and added extra character of Jinggu. The aforementioned campfire embers are there in the most enjoyable form I’ve come across in tea. After the first couple steeps it also develops a pleasing tanginess. Somewhere in the middle I started picking up on some grape leaves. Towards the late infusions the tea gets more fruity and floral. There’s a touch of astringency but no bitterness to speak of.

The Hong Ni Tang is such a complex and unusual tea I immediately fell in love with it. And not only is it complex but has great depth as well. The mouthfeel is also good and cha qi noticeable but not too potent for my liking. While not one of Scott’s strongest teas, the strength is also very good and longevity excellent. This is a tea I would warmly recommend to any sheng lover, especially given its rather affordable price of $0.20/g. I’m definitely picking up a cake in my next Yunnan Sourcing order. While it’s too early to say, based on first impressions at least this might just be one of my personal favorite young raws.

Sipdown 3/18-2022

Logging the sipdown

Mastress Alita’s Monthly Sipdown Challenge: a tea you could happily drink every day

While I prefer the Verdant Laoshan Black, I still love this and could easily drink it daily. Working on sipping through this one though, and will continue to keep the Verdant version on hand.

This is tasty- dark chocolate and leather. I still prefer Verdant’s Laoshan Black.

Sipdown 72

My previous rating still stands. It was fine, but a little bit of a weird mouthfeel and a lingering sweetness that wasn’t quite right.

I love black teas with sweet potato notes, so I was particularly excited to try this.

It is so sweet, and has a stevia like coolness that lingers in the throat…which I don’t love. It is starchy and sweet potatoey, but the intense sweetness overwhelms it. I’ll have to try this again with different steeping parameters.

This isn’t my favorite- it’s a bit boring. A little bit of a sweet, honey flavor but it’s mostly pretty bland.

2021 Spring Harvest Backlog from early January, when I was stuffed up

The milk flavouring in this is intense! Like a literal fresh glass of cow’s milk, as opposed to the tangy buttercream or mineral “milk-like” notes I sometimes get from a lot of Jin Xuan teas (both flavoured and unflavoured). Are my other favourite milk oolong teas this disconcertingly milky? I don’t think so. The cup is sweet to finish in a way that’s quintessential lactose sugar. It’s delicious but also so much milk. One of the downsides is that the milk sometimes lingers (if you’ve smelled the dairy section in the back of a grocery store you understand the physical presence of this faint sour sweet aftertaste; the same thing that makes this tea distinct also makes it finicky to my taste buds).

After some time (around 4th steep), floral and fruit notes (strawberry, mango, pineapple) begin to emerge. I actually really love when my “jin xuan” and “high mountain” oolong carries these fruity sweet notes; that they’re initially buried under the milk scent is somewhat of a drawback for me here. The 4th steep is where a more buttery aspect emerges too. Hurrah for an excellent fourth (and fifth) steep.

PS – I appreciate Yunnan Sourcing clarifying that this particular tea is (edit- allegedly) steamed in milk, making it unfriendly to vegans and those sensitive or allergic to lactose. Many vendors I’ve seen carrying this tea style aren’t particularly transparent about flavouring or lack thereof (one must err on the side of caution if this is a factor). Luckily, there are vegan Jin Xuan styles, including unflavoured ones, too!

Steep Count: 5 @ 20-45 seconds.

Sipdown 6/21-2022

Artichoke water. Like an artichoke was boiled for an hour and I drank the residuals. But, somehow not terrible? Just much more vegetal than I was expecting.

Still not a trace of bitter melon (thankfully). Not sure how much the bitter melon is contributing in terms of flavor, but this tea is extremely rich. Like a dark chocolate cake covered in roasted nuts.

Bittermelon is my nemesis. I love food, I will try pretty much anything, and there are only a couple things I will no longer eat- bittermelon is one. But, here I am…trying a bittermelon stuffed with tea.

Luckily, this tastes nothing like bittermelon. It’s sweet and tastes like a chocolate filled with caramel. Really glad I fought my anti-bittermelon instincts and gave this a try.

I don’t care who you are, Cucumber Village is obviously the best name for a village, can we just agree? Of my recent big Yunnan Sourcing 2021 sample haul, this tea was the second one to stand out to me. Just the aroma of the dry leaf in my pre-heated gaiwan was so lovely I knew I was in for a treat. The fragrance is that of most pleasing vegetal sweetness. If I could bottle it, it would make a wonderful perfume.

The scent is reflected in the cup. Being a Jinggu tea, this tea is very sweet. Perhaps I’m being influenced by the name of the village, but I do taste cucumber in this tea, its juicy, vegetal taste upfront and earthier skin in the aftertaste. Either way, vegetal sweetness is the predominant character here. In my second session with the tea, I also picked up plenty of honeydew melon.

While the character of the tea is very sweet and friendly, once the leaves open up it displays a surprising amount of strength. The longevity is also excellent and I was able to enjoy pleasing steeps through the session all the way to the final three and five minute brews. There’s probably some amount of bitterness and astringency present, but honestly both sessions they remained so negligible they never entered my radar.

Of the teas I’ve tasted, Yunnan Sourcing’s Da Qing Gu Shu comes the closest to this one. Both are Jinggu teas and have a dominantly sweet, vegetal flavor to them when young, albeit both have a character that’s unique to them. The price point is also pretty much identical. I own a cake of both the 2014 autumn and 2015 spring Da Qing and can report that they’ve been aging really nicely, at least in my own storage. Between the two, I’d likely recommend the Da Qing over Cucumber, but I enjoy both highly.

Fans of Jinggu teas as well as sweeter Yiwus would likely find Cucumber Village worth a sample at least. Personally I’m likely to cake it.