Mandala Phatty Cake II: The Sequel

I’ve been a bit absent from Steepster lately. I have a good excuse. I sprained my wrist and typing is a big ol’ pain. To make it even worse, I steam burned the same hand so now I have second degree burns and a sprained wrist. I’m not whining, I swear. The only thing that has kept me from being a big baby is tea. So, I guess, there’s that. My form of pain management is drinking copious amounts of tea.

Steep 1- 15 seconds
Kind of mellow. Sweet. A little bit smoky yet creamy. Very interesting in a completely non-aggressive kind of way.

Steep 2-30 seconds
It’s asserting itself a bit more. Still smoky and sweet but where the original Phatty Cake asserted itself in a smoky way, the Sequel is all about the creamyness.

Steep 3-45 seconds
It’s getting a bit nutty…literally. It’s reminiscent of Amaretto. Call me a bit insane but I may even prefer this to the original Phatty Cake.

Steep 4-1 minute
It’s a tiny bit woodsy but it’s kind of reminiscent of vanilla extract without the alcohol kick. It’s vanilla in that sort of woodsy way and not totally pastry-like or sweet.

Steep 5-1.30 seconds
Vanilla bean with a touch of figgy fruitiness. Winner! It’s light but it’s very flavorful.

I’ve been craving some iced tea lately so I decided to stop brewing this hot and try an overnight iced tea steep. Oh my dear tea gods. It was amazing. This is going to sound crazy but it’s like I took a Napoleon, mashed it up in a blender and drank it. It’s vanilla and custard and even a bit pastry-like. I wish I had made more than a glass worth of it.

I am not going to go so far as to say that I love this more than the original Phatty Cake but I love it for different reasons. Since hockey season is getting close, I am going to use a hockey comparison. The original Phatty Cake is the flashy forward. The guy who scores all the goals, gets all the credit and is all “Look at me!!! I’m so talented” but the Phatty Cake Sequel is the hard working third liner. The guy who does everything well but stays out of the way. He’s also the guy that scores the goals when the flashy forward is in one of his cold streaks—-or decides to retire to Russia…I’m bitter. I think on most occasions I’d prefer the more mellow Phatty Cake Sequel to be honest but I think the Sequel with gain some strength with age. Hopefully not too much because I like the gentler aspect of it.

sipdown8

I had this in the afternoon since i REALLY need to drink up some of my smaller puerh samples instead of accumulating them all. I still think that while i could live with having most of Mandala’s puerhs in my cupboard, there are a few that i MUST have…and this isnt’ one of them. it’s delicious, but not something that i’ll be wishing for often, now that it’s gone.

The first few steeps were a middle of the road brew that was smooth and delicious, while also not being out of this world. Later steeps brought out hints of woodsy vanilla. I’ll have to see if i can cold brew the rest of this over night just to see how it fares after a number of steeps hot brewed :)

I drank this all evening, on & off.
I was busy, so I don’t really have any notes to share, but I wanted to drink it, since I drank the original Phatty Cake yesterday. I can’t really give a comparison of the two…but I love them both. I think the original is sweeter, but they are both tasty.
What I can say is this was a wonderful bold & rich contrast to the last couple of steepings of the Huang Zhi Xiang Dancong I was drinking all afternoon. The Dancong had me so dopey & mellow, & the Phatty Cake woke me back up a little. I drank several steepings before dinner, & several more after.
Yesterday I put the leftover leaves in a jar of water in the frig. I added tonight’s leaves to the same jar, as I didn’t really feel like the water had absorbed much flavor. I’ll drink their fusion tomorrow.

Birthday “Cake Tea” Tasting 6/8

The only straight tea in our tasting! I’m glad at least one straight tea wound up getting included; I knew I couldn’t include simply every pu’erh cake but this one does ACTUALLY have cake in the name, so it made the cut off.

Of the people I invited to my birthday tasting, half of them were from the Store Operations department at work and the other half were a mix of people from Research & Development and Quality Control. I would call everyone present BIG fans of tea, but without a shadow of a doubt only the R&D/QC people are really big fans of straight and traditional teas – for all of us, that’s what we gravitate to the most outside of work. It definitely came across in the tasting too, because the only people who liked this tea were the R&D/QC staff members – everyone from Store Ops found it too intense.

This was actually my first tasting of this tea, and I will definitely need to try it again to get a real sense of what this is like – I don’t think the cupping style of preparation tends to do most Shou pu’erh any sort of justice; always better to Gong Fu, Grandpa, or even just brew Western. My snap impression was that this was very earthy though, with a bit of a sharper saline top note – and maybe a wee bit oceanic in a sort of “crabby” sort of way over the less pleasant “fishy” descriptor sometimes used for pu’erh.

Glad I got to share this one, though!

Quick note… This tea is not the type of tea that you can take lightly. I’ve screwed up one or two early steep times due to being busy. I have to redo this on a quiet day. I work from home a lot so my Sundays are sometimes my busiest day.

It’s complex. It’s above my ability. It’s making me want to paint landscapes again. lol I’m thinking colors like umber, mahogany, burnt sienna… Earth colors. It starts off bold, like “Hey, pay attention!”, almost combative but then becomes more subdued, calming, mellow, sweeter.

Interesting experience.

212˚F, 110ml, 12 steeps: 5s rinse, 10s, 15s,???s, 25s, 30s, 35s, 40s, 45s, 50s, 55s, 60s, 1m15s

Update: I didn’t get any fig or fruit as some of the others.

Following up my Thai eggplant and ground pork takeout with a strong, clean shou to cut the grease.

I’ve brewed this consistently throughout the 1-oz bag. Easy to break off a 5-gram chunk and go western in a ball jar. Couple of 10-second rinses, though after tasting the second rinse, I think only one could be had. Already dark and clear. Fill ’er up with 8oz of boiling water. 30/60/90/120/180/asyouplease.

The brewed liquor smells like the ancient, leaky trailer my friend used to live in on the edge of damp riparian habitat. His mother, the prior occupant, was an indoor chainsmoker. Sounds gross, right? Tastes amazing.

If that offends you, I can say it also reminds me of slogging through a forested swamp in northeastern Ohio on a cloudy and cold November day. It’s about 36F and nearing sundown. Clay and muck and leaf decay stick to my wader’s boots and weigh me down. Somebody within a mile has a fire burning. The smoky particulates stick to my own misty exhalations which I breathe back in, open-mouthed. I’m a sweaty stick of human-landjaeger in these chest waders, forever trudging forward. Sounds gross, right? Tastes amazing!

Ash, earthy fungal loam, humus, smoke, leather, old books, followed by a tingling tongue, decaying dark wood, gray clay (very specific mineral taste for me), tobacco, lighter wood and finally a sweetness like vanilla. Mouthfeel stays light and clean. Cha qi is near instant and unbeatable. Perk up, calm down, both gaze and lights soften. I’m immobilized yet focused within this rusty orange hue. If I were still much of a writer, this would be my choice of beverage for late nights of visualizing and penning.

I’m pretty sure you could manage less leaf, more steeps, lower temperature and still end up with a decent cup.

Sad to see this ounce go. I will order several cakes of this to have as my go-to evening shou.

I thoroughly enjoyed this tea. I steeped it western style with 5g of tea and about 8 ounces of water. After an initial rinse I steeped each infusion for about a minute. The aroma was very reminiscent of warm compost and dirt. The taste is of sweet dirt. The second infusion brought the slightest astringency and bite in the mouth.

Really interesting tea. Received as a sample from Garret with my noble mark purchase. Different flavors arise with each steep. A little bitter here and there, but very enjoyable. Fits perfectly into a nice evening tea for me. Tobacco, leather, earth, and campfire are prominent in almost all of the steeps and picked up a bit of maple syrup(ish) flavor at the 7+ steep mark. Really enjoyed it and picked up a cake!

Phatty cake, phatty cake how I love saying phatty cake.

I had a sample of this from the time when Mandala was having its shou sampler set (In 2014 IIRC). Unfortunately for me this one was forgotten and neglected in its plastic baggie at the back of my tea box. After surviving through two moves and an equal number of years in a ziplock bag the flavors were slightly muted. I still get whisps of the wonderful flavours other reviewers have described but I definitely should have tried reviving it first by reintroducing some humidity. Still a good tea, but I wish I had enjoyed it sooner.

After dusting off my gaiwan I spent a good part of the morning enjoying this tea and ignoring the mile long to-do list I have sitting on my counter. I gave the leaves a quick 15 second rinse, discarded the water, and began with a 30 second steeping. The flavor was light, with hints of leather and molasses. Each time I steeped this tea the flavor deepened and the notes changed. What started out as leather and molasses moved into dark chocolate and slowly became sweeter. The later steepings reminded me of the Mexican vanilla beans I bought last year, they tasted of wood and vanilla.

You can read the rest of the review on my blog:
http://www.notstarvingyet.com/index/2015/8/25/tuesday-tea-phatty-cake-ii