2002 CNNP "Wild Tree Ye Sheng Purple" Raw Pu-erh Tea Cake

I’ve got about a ton of sheng from YS to go through. Not sure what I was thinking when I ordered these all back in December but… Oh well, I guess I wanted to try a lot of different shengs back in December. :)

This was interesting like the one review here mentioned. It starts off semi-thick and ends moderately thick so it has a very nice comforting mouth and throat feel. It kindasorta tastes like a young sheng but then again it doesn’t. It doesn’t have a hint of the usual bitterness that sheng has, but there was some astringency as I progressed through the infusions. In the early infusions, the liquor was amber and that progressed to be orange in color. It began fruity with stonefruit, cherry notes… And It has a long almost too sweet finish (for me). Not too shabby. Daily drinker type but it is on the expensive side for that purpose.

Porcelain gaiwan, 6g, 205°F, 130ml, rinse, 12 steeps: 5s, 10s, 15s, 20s, 25s, 35s, 45s, 55s, 1m5s, 1m15s, 1m30s, 2m.

This fellow is quite a strange one not in a bad way but different as expected! The actual bouquet is really nice and thick and just because of this first impression you immediately assume “This must be a long lasting and full thick bodied aged fellow!”

Nah!!! Not really in fact. The taste is very nice but a bit light for this kind of age.

Don’t get me wrong this isn’t a bad aged Sheng otherwise I would have given it a much lower rating than four BUT I am more into the really thick and full bodied ones this one really got a nice structure especially of mushrooms with a fine sourly astringent note to it and a certain touch of a cardboard taste with a final long fruity echo of very young pears and cheery blossom! The strongest infusions were 1-3 (after one rinse = not counted) the others really turned out very light very quick. I also tried to infuse the 7th one over 4 minutes. It was a bit stronger but not as much as some others tend to be. Good thing = there is really no bitterness at all within this fellow! The main attractions are definitely the entry of the wonderful thick aged medicinal aroma followed by those mushrooms nuances as its main act and the final encore of fruity lightly floral notes!

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