Huang Shan Mao Feng Green Tea

Sipdown! Thanks again to Teavivre for passing these samples down. I gave my last little packet to a friend who is a fan of green tea so I hope she’ll enjoy it! This personally wasn’t my favourite kind of green since I’m not into vegetal or mineral notes, but I know there are peeps out there who love that.

Every tea goes through what I call a break in period. This is where you experiment with water, temperature, steep time, and leaf quantity to find the optimal brewing parameters for the tea. In my experience, green teas are more finicky than other kinds of tea. Finally hitting that elusive sweet spot is one of the greatest thrills of green tea for me. The downside though is by the time you’ve figured out how to steep it, your stash is almost gone.

This one took me quite a few tries, but I was rewarded with a marvelous cup of tea. It’s sweet and crisp without the typical grassiness found in most green teas. It has a light body with a flavor resembling white tea. The wiry dry leaves smell of seaweed, although that doesn’t come through in the liquor. The wet leaf smells floral and has a rich aroma of fresh spring vegetables.

I tried brewing it many different ways (grandpa style, test tube, cold steeped, etc.) and found it tasted best in a plain old gaiwan, steeped at the standard 175 F with the lid closed.

First infusion is smooth, crisp, and refreshing. Tastes like a bouquet of spring vegetables.
Second infusion is sweet and clean tasting. Some of the nuances of the 1st infusion are lost but still very delicious.
Third steeping was for 90s. The needle like leaves opened fully and the tea broth became lighter and had a flavor reminiscent of sweet mountain spring water.
Fourth steeping. Upped both the time and temperature to 2minutes at 180 F. Much lighter, maybe I should have steeped longer? Still, it had a lot of flavor and evoked crisp salad greens and snow peas.
Fifth steep was for a long 3 minutes. At this point the tea was done, enjoyable but flat.

I was pretty impressed by the quality of this tea. After Dragonwell this is my favorite of all the green teas I’ve had from Teavivre so far. It resembled Verdant’s Laoshan Pine Needle tea a lot, both in its physical appearance and taste. A great tea for when you want something fresh tasting but that’s not too grassy or vegetal.

I originally was going to drink a tea purchased from Teavana tonight but I noticed that it is a green tea/green rooibos blend. I am beginning to believe that I am allergic to green rooibos so I picked this one. The last two times I drank green rooibos I was up all night with insomnia and I didn’t want to take a chance.

This tea is somewhat sweet and quite vegetal in nature. The note of green beans is described in the Steepster writeup and is fairly accurate.

I brewed this tea once in an 18oz teapot with 5 tsp leaf and 175 degree water for 3 min.

LooseTman’s review made me realize it was time to open my batch of this Mao Feng.

Most of the time, I’ll have my green tea in a tall glass tumbler, a method I’ve learned from David Duckler at Verdant.

But today, I felt like using my little 5oz glass gaiwan, I love watching fluffy green tea through a small glass vessel, something whimsical about it.

I love green teas and have neglected them lately. I usually drink tons at this time of the year cause they are so fresh.

This tea tastes like sweet greens, spinach, asparagus. It’s very fragrant, its aroma is tantalizing.

I used 5g of tea, so I get lots of flavour here, with a certain level of astringency due to the amount of leaves maybe. It’s bright but not bitter.

This little tea has a lot to offer, strong body and character.

A nice floral mouthfeel develops with the later steeps.

The sweetness also intensifies as I’m sipping on steep #5.

This tea gave me an increasing amount of energy, I can see myself drinking lots of it in the morning.

Very good, not as enjoyable as Long Jing to me, I miss the buttery notes they provide, but it’s something I will definitely have again.

This morning, I’m very pleased to review Premium Huang Shan Mao Feng Green Tea from TeaVivre, Western style: 17 oz. / 8 g / 185*F / 3 – 5 min. without sweeteners, milk, or cream. I brewed this tea twice: 1.) w/o a brew basket – placed leaves directly in the teapot, 2.) using a 2” wide x 3.25” deep SS brew basket with the same teapot.

Leaf: Buds with 1 or 2 leaves, up to 5 cm long
Fragrance: Sweet hay / straw / grass
Liquor: Clear straw-colored – easily appreciated in the double-wall glass tea cup.
Aroma: Very Sweet and pleasing
Flavor: Honey with a hint of green beans

6/2/14:
Sample size – 6.6 g / 14 oz.
3-min*: Smooth and rich with a mild honey-like sweetness, a hint of green beans, and a mild almost savory essence. There was no astringency or bitterness. This 2-cup pot of green tea was very warm, relaxing, and enjoyable.

Re-Steep:
4.5-min: Light to medium bodied
6-min: Light to medium bodied

6/5/14:
Sample size – 6.3 g / 13.4 oz. (395 ml)
3-min: Light and smooth with a mild honey-like sweetness. There was no astringency or bitterness.

4-min.: Light and smooth with a developing richness and a mild honey-like sweetness. There was no astringency or bitterness.

5-min.: Similar flavor profile with a just tinge of grassy bitterness. I’d suggest < a 5-min. steep.

Impression: Of the two methods, this tea was much more enjoyable when brewed w/o a brew basket. Apparently, the extra space in the teapot for these large leaves allowed the flavor to more fully develop. The sip was clearly much richer. An excellent afternoon tea.

Thanks to Angel and Teavivre for graciously providing this excellent green tea tasting opportunity.

Method:
RO water re-mineralized with an Aptera filter http://steepster.com/teas/teaware/39532-puregen-aptera-alkamag-water-filter
http://steepster.com/teaware/teavana/39311-perfect-tea-spoon
http://steepster.com/teas/teaware/37731-my-weigh-durascale-d2-660-digital-scale
Brewed western-style conveniently in a Staffordshire 2-cup fine bone china teapot with a SS brew basket and served in double-wall glass tea cups
http://steepster.com/teaware/davidstea/36677-thermometer-and-timer
http://steepster.com/teaware/teavivre/39708-double-wall-glass-tea-cups

Spring 2016, 175F, 60 sec, light leaf

Vivid green leaf with vegetal scent that brews a pale straw color tea.
Tastes sweet with mineral and very light fresh greens. Very soft and mild with no bitterness or astringency.

Thank you for the sample Teavivre!

This tea is wonderful! It’s very green and vegetal tasting, yet very light, with an almost clear liquor. It is also incredibly sweet for a green tea, and has a creamy, velvety mouthfeel. There’s a very light aftertaste of orange if you smack your tongue.

By the second steeping there is a more distinct vegetal flavor, taking on the flavor of green beans. The sweetness is still very rich. There is absolutely no astringency or dryness to this tea. It is ever so slightly nutty. The third steeping is similar to the second, but with less sweetness and more nutty and vegetal flavor.

Cool stuff, definitely on par for one of China’s 10 famous teas.

A light but beautifully balanced green, the flavor is equal parts vegetal and floral – the sort of honeysuckle floral you typically find in oolong teas. There’s no strong aroma, but the steeped leaves smell ever so slightly of peas. A very fresh-feeling tea, good anytime.

Guys, I finally think I need to break down and buy a scale. See, I have a project coming up that will require very exact tea measurements, and I do not think my vintage kitchen scale will cut it. I am a very ‘free flow’ in my tea preparation with eyeballing tea amounts and water amounts, count time out in my head (unless it is more than a minute) the only thing I am strict to is water temperature. So, this is going to be different for me, though not unpleasant, though it will interrupt the flow of my tea ritual, but not in a huge way. Maybe my vintage scale will work, clearly I will need to calibrate it and find out!

Today on the Green Tea Week from Teavivre, we take a look at one of my favorite spring greens (I am going to keep saying that everyday I think) Huang Shan Mao Feng Green Tea! Good old Yellow Mountain Fur Peak, as it translates of course referencing where it is grown and the appearance of the leaves, this particular harvesting was…harvested…on April 6th, putting it the day after Qing Ming. The aroma of these very pretty leaves is very fresh, very fresh and green indeed, and nutty. So, it starts out with a blend of chestnuts, water chestnuts, and edamame. After that the aroma fades to sweet peas, fresh spinach, and a tiny bit of smoke, like just a very very tiny whiff of smoke.

I decided to bowl steep this tea, it is one of those green teas that take to bowl steeping really well, it like never gets bitter! The aroma of the leaves floating around happily in the water is a nutty blend of sweet peas, edamame, and chestnuts. Subtle with a gentle edge of sweetness. The taste is pretty fantastic, it starts with a nectar sweetness of distant spring flowers (do I detect a hint of tulip?) and moves right along into green with notes of sweet pea, edamame, lima bean, and lettuce. Finishing up with a smooth chestnut and sesame and a lingering honey aftertaste. My bowl was refilled a few times before the flavor faded away to delicate sweetness and no more, not the most lasting of teas, but certainly very delicious.

For blog and photos: http://ramblingbutterflythoughts.blogspot.com/2015/04/teavivre-huang-shan-mao-feng-green-tea.html

Wow. This one smelled amazing when I opened the sample packet. Green and fresh (although it’s actually almost a year old now) and oh so delicious. And so bright green, too. Lovely to look at.

I approximated the western brewing directions, using 5g and 14oz of water.

Once the water hit the leaves, the aroma was even more veggie. Mmmmm.

It tastes very green, vegetable, fresh, slightly floral. It’s almost creamy in texture in my mouth. (I guess that’s buttery. Seems a weird way to describe it.) Someone said green beans in an earlier review, and I could buy that, although I thought more spinach. I really like this.

The second infusion was not so spinachy, but it seemed creamier. It was quite satisfying both first and second infusion. I tried a third and it was alright, but not spectacular. It just tasted like average green tea by that point.

I will try the other sample pack of this gong fu style.