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I finally got around to finishing the last of a 25 gram pouch of this tea last night. My work day was extremely stressful and I did have some trouble sleeping, so I ended up deciding to calm myself with a gongfu session. That did the trick and I managed to go to sleep almost immediately afterwards.

Obviously, I gongfued this one. After a quick rinse, I steeped 7 grams of loose tea leaves in 5 ounces of 205 F water for 8 seconds. This infusion was chased by 11 additional infusions. Steep times for these infusions were as follows: 13 seconds, 20 seconds, 30 seconds, 40 seconds, 50 seconds, 1 minute 5 seconds, 1 minute 30 seconds, 2 minutes, 3 minutes, 5 minutes, and 7 minutes. There was no real rhyme or reason for this particular methodology. It was late, I was tired, and I just kind of goofed off with it to see how it would work.

Prior to the rinse, the dry tea leaves emitted aromas of chocolate, honey, orange, marzipan, and pine. After the rinse, I detected emerging scents of toast and malt. The first infusion produced a maltier bouquet with a hint of spice. In the mouth, I detected mild notes of toast, honey, chocolate, orange, marzipan, and pine underscored by a hint of spice. Subsequent infusions brought out more robust malt, chocolate, marzipan, orange, and pine impressions, while the previously rather generic toast note began to morph into a definite wheat toast flavor. I also began to detect cinnamon, nutmeg, juniper, cedar, vanilla bean, roasted nuts, minerals, brown sugar, cream, and lemon zest. The later infusions were mild, offering gentle mineral, malt, toast, pine, cedar, nut, and citrus notes.

This was a very nice, mellow Yunnan black tea. It even responded to my wonky brewing method well. I would definitely recommend this one to fans of traditional Yunnan black teas.