pu-erh of the day. Sheng or Shou

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looseTman said

I’ve recently reviewed 6 shou:
1 Boyou
2 Haiwan
3 Menghai Tea Factory
https://steepster.com/looseTman

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2013 pu-erh.sk Manzhuan. Lots of qi on this one. Envelops the body, both in feels and sweat. Pretty direct for yiwu gushu; I was expecting something sneaky, but this tea leaves nothing to the imagination. Same with the flavor, I was getting plenty of “young puer” edge. Holds it own nicely against Yesterday’s Wistaria.

?! said

Thanks for the reminder BP – gotta hurry up with my pu-erh.sk order – I already missed the 2003 Haiwan (sold out).

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Ken said

Show girls by BTTC , this is really nice.. very mellow, dark and earthy, not much wet aroma or flavor, or at least not as much as I expected.

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Yang-chu said

2006 Mengku Rongshi Daxue Shan Gushu. There are at least three Daxue Mt productions from this year and is listed here on steepster without any notes. I’ll confess to not being as sedulous about terrior as I could be. The thing is, even the experts offer conflicting reports. Anyway, this is something I picked up in KM and this is the first time drinking here. It is a very punchy tea, with a lingering floral anesthetic effect, very Lincang. It’s a very sharp quality that I can’t say I love. On the front end and at the top are vanilla notes. Is that Ba-qi? Very cheeky and it lingers for a good spell. This production must be drunk slowly. It has much to say.

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looseTman said

Sheng compared to shou:

For many years, we used to drink black tea every morning instead of coffee. Now we greatly enjoy shou each morning.

We’ve had limited experience with sheng. However, we did enjoy two cakes of W2T Repave. The flavor profile is similar to green tea.

Frequently, I see “bitter” listed as a flavor in Steepster tastng notes for sheng. If sheng is typically bitter, why is it popular?

Luke said

i recon for its complexity and how suprising it can act in mouth, its not always bitter, there are less or more bitter ones, there are somes that are much more sweet than bitter, and having two sides coin as a tasting profile makes tea exciting and not boring :) – u never know what will hit your mouth with next infusion :)

mrmopar said

A lot of times the bitter is early on in the note and changes to sweet. I think it is a progression of the taste of the tea as it crosses your tongue.

looseTman said

Thanks for both of your explanations. :-)
More complex / exciting / not boring certanily sounds very appealing.

If a person’s who’s not familiar with sheng, quickly scans the bottom of steepster tasting notes, and frequently see “bitter”, they might get the wrong impression. Is “bitter changing to sweet” or “bitter to sweet” a “FLAVOR” option?

Dr Jim said

I used to ask the same question, then thought: “coffee.” Sometimes bitter can be good. The thing that keeps me hooked on puerh is the complexity of flavors from cup to cup, and sometimes even in the same sip as the tea goes from the front of your mouth to the back.

Luke said

Thats why i always read description instead or scanning :)

looseTman said

Agreed, always a good idea, if one has / makes the time.

Psyck said

If the sheng is bitter, put it back in storage and try it again after a decade or two by when it would have mellowed and lost its bitterness.

AllanK said

I find in most cases older sheng develops an unpleasant taste of what are called leather and tobacco.

I think that bitterness has become known as a negative quality because it’s a strong characteristic of low quality tea. I used to despise all things bitter, but over time I’ve come to enjoy bitterness the same way I enjoy sweetness. A balanced bitterness in a sheng is a great quality, IMO. It’s a lively sort of taste :-)

Ku wei +1

looseTman said

Very good explanation Brenden and congrats on WPTC’s 5-yr anniversary! That’s a big milestone.

Yang-chu said

In higher quality productions, and consistent with what is expressed above, bitter is a stage, either in terms of the sip or in terms of infusion. Some productions go through a bitter stage before progressing to a sweet one, either in the mouth or terms of the infusion. Lower quality productions will progress to a stage where they’re just bitter. Better quality productions can be brewed out for a long duration and not express a bitterness beyond its place within the overall taste profile. It can often fade.

I’m reserved in my view that bitter can age out entirely. Bitter seems to be closely associated with the level of florality in the production. Tips are often the most fragrant and bitter. Some of the bitterness might settle out along with the fragrance, as the transformative process will turn good quality material to sugar. Poor-quality tea doesn’t have any good stuff to turn to sugar. Perhaps the glossiness is an indication of which type of bitter it is, though the two lie on a paralleling continuum.

Among many, there is a questionable ability to discern between the taste bitter and the effect astringent. The Chinese refer to this as “ku se,” but it is usually used in a negative sense. That said, the “saliva-producing” effects of some puerh’s most assuredly arises from astringency. Furthermore, there are good quality productions that are simultaneously bitter and sweet with little astringency.

The element I’d emphasize is the concurrence of florality and bitterness. It seems that the attack with unmistakable bitterness seems to the essential fragrances settling on the tongue. These dissipate at varying rates but with the good stuff it is very easily more than 10 minutes and some would push the start of their good classification with at least 15m.

I’m sure many fellow Steepstarians could recommend productions that will help you fine tune your raw appreciation. The best thing is to drink early and drink often. I also might add that taste preferences of people vary greatly. In Kunming there is a general preference for the very macho bitter kick-your-ass stuff that people here or in Hong Kong or Shanghai would consider “bad.” I guess it’s a matter of whether you hang with the hounds or piss with the pups. To some extent, though I don’t know how much, certain attributes are crafted into the production, so it becomes less a matter of how bitter such and such is than what the producer and tea itself have to say.

> I’m reserved in my view that bitter can age out entirely.

Given that bitter is the characteristic taste of alkaloids, and that caffeine is an alkaloid, you’d expect not.

> Among many, there is a questionable ability to discern between the taste bitter and the effect astringent

I’m pretty well convinced that when people complain about “bitterness” in tea they almost always mean “astringency.”

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Two puers of the day today; finishing off two teas I started yesterday. First off 2012 Mannuo from pu-erh.sk. This is a lovely tea, with a long aftertaste that is active pretty deep into the throat. Next off was the young puer maocha from last moths W2T teaclub. I brewed this with a heavy hand, and was actually expecting a little bit of stomach distress, but no. Can’t match the Mannuo, but this tea does sneak into the throat a little bit.

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Having some of that 2005 Changtai Yiwu from LP’s pubertea buy last year.

Mine was never moldy, and had only a faint musty old books note when I got it. That’s now gone, and a nice sweet old wood character is emerging. Too bad I’ve already consumed most of it.

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Weasser said

Old Warrior from Crimson Lotus. If you havent had it, you have to get some before it’s gone. Something this good can’t be available forever.

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JC said
2016 Chawangpu Manzhuan Gushu Puerh by Chawangshop

I have to take proper notes of this one, I brought it to work today because the last time that I had it at home with a friend it was harsh enough that we both agreed to stop drinking and move on. It had a strong tobacco and smoke dankness that was anything but pleasant.

Today the wet leaves and liquor offer dark fruit notes that transition grain/malt notes with richness to it. The initial taste is nothing special, mostly gentle, but the huigan again is rich sort of malty and even a faded maple. I guess the first try must have had a burnt leaf in it or something of the like.

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TyShelly said

Right now I am steeping the EOT Peacock and it is beautiful

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