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1st impressions: Not dark, but not green. Middle fermentation. The wet leaves smell autumnal, but with caramel, honey, minty, citrus, berries. Really mild flavor. Kinda thin texture, not a lot of jin hua, some cooling sensations rising in my throat. The Sprite like lemon/lime flavor is interesting.

Drinking it down:
The notes on their webpage mentions “oak moss” and that is a kinda esoteric note to bring up. I have dabbled in perfumery and can pick that out in here, but I just thought it was an odd thing to mention.

The cooling citrus thing is really different from the usual warm dark profile I expect with fu bricks. The texture did thicken up. The berry note seems to be headed to a cherry wood flavor. Really a solid summertime tea. Fruity, sweet, and light.

Unusual. These are really big, burly leaves with some really light colored/green leaves mixed in. Herbal, seaweed, roast, cherry, dark. The seaweed hits first followed by an herbal, woody, autumnal dark flavor. The aftertaste is that cherry candy aftertaste.

Not sure how I feel on this one. I think the seaweed/green flavor will fade as will the gnarly roast. The cherry hints at some future sweetness. Right now it is not a profile I enjoy. It is interesting and complex, but not for me.

Also, some sooty(?) dirty stuff floating around that doesn’t seem to full wash out.

Another Greener Fu brick from Moychay. Some mold, but not as much as many of their other Fu’s.

1st impression: It is very much a green Hunan heicha. Fruity, a bit herbal, decent texture. This is the first time I’ve really understood the “apple skin” note others have referenced. Where most of these bring a raspberry note, it really does come across more like apple in this one.

Drinking it down: More honey, herbal, and woody notes come out with further steeps. The apple skin note did eventually move toward raspberry ketone. Really easy drinking. No astringency of bitterness. Slightly mouth drying and lively texture.

I’ll be really interested to try Moychay’s puers. So far all of their heicha leans on the woody/fruity notes with a distinct bent toward a sore note. This doesn’t have that sour character, but otherwise feels very Moychay. I dig this one. I may pick up a larger amount of this to see how it ages.

On my second box of this. Bought the first one a few years ago and drank straight through it. Really dug it. I remembered it solely as “that tea I dank through really really quickly”, but didn’t remember what about it was so appealing.

This second box I bought about two months ago. After sampling straight from the mail, it went into a mylar bag with 69% bovedas. I don’t know if this tea had sat in YS’s Kunming or Seattle storage, but it was bone dry.

1st impressions: Cherry wood, smoke, peat, vanilla, clove, some green/herbal notes. Really love the aroma of Tian Jians. If I had the money to make it a habit, I’d be buying these by the basket. The taste is pretty minerally to start with a sharp green herbal note in the background. The best thing to compare these to is a roasted oolong. It has that roasted taste with the sweet spice and green profile.

Finishing: The small tippy leaves brew out relatively quickly (relative to other hei cha, they last quite awhile compared to hong cha). The texture is a bit thicker than when I first got it in the mail, but still not remarkable. Being a tippy tea, this can get really astringent and bitter if you aren’t careful. When brewing carefully you get a little astringency and a nice solid cocoa bitterness in the background.

Overall a well balanced, comfortable tea. I’d recommend it of you wanted to explore the world of Tian Jian and can find this box for a decent price. The price on this has been shooting up lately and I’m seeing it less in listings.

First impression: Oh boy. What have I gotten myself into. The aroma coming off every part, the leaves, the liquid, the cup, smell strongly of wet, fungal, dank, basements. The first sips: Wow I didn’t know something could taste exactly like a moldy basement. Exactly.

Toward the end of the session: lots of camphor/cooling sensations at the back of my throat. That pervasive mustiness sticks around the whole time. Not really my kind of thing. I also found some mineral sweetness, dried herbs, wet wood, and forest floor flavors, but that basement profile stays in command. The texture is kinda thin, which I’m finding is the case with many of the Moychay samples I bought. No astringency or bitterness.

First impression: Dry leaves smell rich with cocoa and roast. Wet leaf aroma, sour citrus cocoa, herbal, rubber, grains. Taste: Punchy, Aggressive, Light bitterness, a little sourness. That cocoa & rubber really carry over to the taste.

Further thoughts: I’m not familiar with young liuan. I thought it would have to have some power if it was to age for 20+years. Turns out that that is the case. The dark notes are delightful and will likely become the predominate flavor. I can only assume the sourness and rubber tastes will settle down at some point.

Good texture. A little astringency. Brews fast and strong. Cooling sensation in my throat. Pressure felt at my temples. Not great on my empty stomach. Overall I enjoy it. I only bought a 50g sample, but may pick up an additional one and see how it ages in my home storage.

1st impression: Roasted, caramel, grain, dried fruit. Not very sweet for a fu. Balanced woody, grainy profile. Tastes like tea, so some hong cha/black tea notes. Plenty of fungus, dark leaves. look and taste roasted. This also have the beginnings of an aged aroma/taste.

Final impressions: Some mushroom, deep forest, and mineral flavors developed. This has definitely seen some humidity. If not in storage, in processing. It brews up dark, but thin. Bright minerals take over pretty quickly.

The more I drink Moychay teas, the more I’m getting a feel for their preferred profile. Every tea I’ve had from them leans woody, with a slight sourness on the finish. That may be from their storage. They profess to store their tea in around 50%rh and 20-30C with plenty of air flow. Pretty dry for these “born-wet” teas.

First impression: Caramel, Smoke, Raspberry ketone, Cherry Wood, Peppercorn. This isn’t labeled as a fu brick, but it is loaded with jin hua right to the edge of the brick. The aroma is absolutely wonderful. Good roasted depth. Lots of up front sweetness. Very fruity. Slightly cooling in the mouth/throat. The caramelized sweetness is really nice. Cherry wood in the aftertaste.

I dig it. I thought I would as soon as I smelled the wet leaves. A really solid sweet fruity fu brick. For ~$0.06/g it is a good bet .

First impression: Nutty, Cocoa, Berry, Mineral, Basement aroma. This is very much a cooked/ripe liu bao. It brews up dark from the start. Strong minerals, with a cocoa bitterness in the background. Warming. Comfortable.

Getting into it: Wet leaves smell of earth, melon, berries, & cocoa. Bitterness ramps up with additional steeps as the brew gets darker. I’m left with a wet rock taste lingering after the cup is empty. Little astringency. Really not much to note on texture. There is no indication of this tea’s age, but it seems pretty young. Moychay’s storage is also really dry/cool so I can anticipate this tea will largely stay this way.

Not really complex. Strong mineral taste. Easy going. I won’t be buying more of this, as I have a fair bit of tea in the area already, but if you are looking for a tea that really screams “minerals” grabbing a sample wouldn’t be a mistake.