1113 Tasting Notes
Finally, the passage of time has allowed me to out aside the drama that MP had going on earlier this year. While it is hard to drink this without a bais now due to the damage done in social media, I’m always fair in my assesment of tea reviews.
The dry leaf, just like many others, was very faint in scent to which I didn’t care about because I’ve had tea with no scent become the most aromatic offering. Upon brewing it the sixth time I was excited to open some of the lead to see it’s conditioning. These are very similar looking to that of a dancong. The viens are healthy and the lead is mostly intact, both clear signs of a nice picked harvest that was handled gently. As for taste, I’m kind of in between as the first few steeps prior to the lead opening has a semi sweet note to it but once the flavor came out I began tasting some tart notes. The liquid isn’t as clear or light as I like my sheng, however the first few steeps were quite enjoyable. The slight bitterness coming through with a tart note after the 5th steep may be something that will disapaite as this tea rest for a little. Apparence alone: This is a beautiful product worth showing off and sharing. Taste wise: I really think this tea can become something fantastic if treated right over a year to help reduce that slight tartness that I personally don’t like.
I can see why others enjoy this as it is easy to brew, not much regarding broken leaf, and the taste is in the mediocre level to which almost anyone can taste and not need much of a background in drinking sheng to critique it.
So… https://www.instagram.com/p/BCq0Fo4xYH3/ happened just recently and this morning I am going in for a drug test which means I will fill up on tea prior to driving to the ‘lab’.
Picked out some of W2T Finest DHP; which I was unable to find on Steepster. The dry leaf has a nice soft cocoa smell, but that vanishes when it is brewed. Thankfully this is not one of those DHP that have a harsh throat feeling that I call ‘rough tea’. The taste is of a mildish roasting, to which I prefer. The key aspect about this tea that I most enjoy is how smooth and soft it is making it easy to drink in the morning in my case. Not much of a body or lingering taste, but that’s okay because it does leave residual heat in the mouth that is pleasant. Not to be confused with delicate, this tea is smooth and easy to enjoy resteeps of.
Be careful you don’t drink so much that your test comes back with diluted urine. Then it looks like you are trying to flush your system, which looks suspicious.
All I drank was a pot of Da Hong Pao before the test… was that a bad idea?
Unless it was a gigantic pot you should be ok.
You should be fine. An all day tea session might raise some eyebrows with the urine testing, but one pot? Nah! Best of luck, by the way. I hope this job proves to be a good move for you.
Congratulations on the job, sir!
Thank you AllanK for sending me a sample of this prior to Dark Matter 2016.
I went ahead an rinsed this tea and then threw out the first steep just to be safe so I wouldn’t have the same experience as Allan. About four steeps in I am noticing one aspect that I dislike in general which is the dryness around the sides of my mouth. While that isn’t pleasant, the taste is rather interesting in a way that I enjoy. There is a touch of mossy grass hiding behind a light ‘ripe’ like taste. Lots going on with this tea is you take time to taste it all; hints of salt, scent of minor smoke that doesn’t carry over to the taste, and an odd taste of ‘old tea’.
I am already pretty certain that most people won’t enjoy this tea when they try it, but there really is a lot going on with tea all while keeping me interested in pinning down the mixture of these taste. Wishing that the dryness would not be an aspect, I still feel like this will be a tea for others to experience and be thankful that they did get to try a roasted hei cha regardless if it leaves positive or negative thoughts after.
In the end: I shall call this the roasted moss dashed with sugar and salt. :)
Holy Shit.
That should be two words though if when it comes to this tea. Absolutely amazing. Brewing this at work with no expectations and it brews at 7, 30, or even 60 seconds producing a wonderfully light and great tasting liquid. Aromoa might not be there, but when a tea taste this good and doesn’t give up after 15 steeps… you have a winner. This is a bit darker than how I classify CLT sheng being light but has the same integrity with zero bitterness; even at a minute and yes I tried it.
Why oh why do I keep trying TU stuff? It keeps making me look past others and looking for more TU. Stuff is just really really good.
First, let me just say I was handed a free 5 Guys burger today… Really random.
Anyways, drinking this tea at work and wow. The bruising is quite well showing that someone skillfully worked in this tea. Brew is medium just as the lead; dark olive with bruising around the putter lead. Taste wise this is strong and quite smooth. Texture is toward a the middle level but I did use a bit of leaf. Ovwrall, I am impressed with this. That makes three out of the 6 Verdant oolongs as something I would and will rebuy. So 50% success on getting me to come back, I’d say that’s pretty good for the amount of stuff I drink
Taking a closer look. This lead is around 78% intact which is nice because most oolong I drink is around 50% with all the breakage. Nice veins, but the leaf is very thin so I would suggest not reroaeting this especially with the taste it is producing now.
Oh the joys of brewing up a misslabled sample from a friend. With no idea what it is I’m drinking, know it’s not a ripe tea as it says it is. This is a raw with a woodsy taste to it which I’m not a fan of. I like sheng that taste of fruit, fresh earth, and dirty grass beenghole
Anyways, it was fun to try and figure out what is is. I failed. At best I can say it’s a sheng that’s roughly 5 years of age.
Two years ago a half dressed tea blogger drank this and then sent it off to TeaDB which might qualify it to be a tea slut pu’erh.
I ended up drinking 16 steeps of this and now it’s almost midnight… I can admit that this does have some power behind it which at first isn’t noticeable because the taste is alluring which calms me down.
Very. Very. Very deep steeps for a raw pu’erh. https://www.instagram.com/p/BCthYShRYKg/
This is my fourth pu’erh that is at least 20 years old which means two things: I have had multiple mature raw pu’erh and I am rather fortunate when it comes to my pu’erh journey a it started less than a year ago. This, and all of those others, were provided by fellow Steepsters and I am very thankful to have such opportunities.
The first few steeps have a bit of the aging to get through, but eventually it equals out and a deep flavor pops more which I can describe at best as old fermented wet grass… however odd that sounds, the taste is pure and very smooth. A nice upfront taste followed by a lingering top of the mouth and back of the lips feeling all while giving a nice feeling around the head due to the complex notes being provided (and maybe some lingering warmth).
I ended up getting rather tea drunk drinking this alone because I drank around 30 ounces of this with hopes that tomorrow morning it will start right back up. One thing that I really enjoy about this is how consistent it is once it hits steep six. After that I was able to provide cup after cup of the same thing which was unique and oddly great tasting as the words I could describe it as would be items people would want in the trash; it would sound worse if I said this was a preserved wet mixture of spring and autumn grass clippings from years ago with a dash of magic.
Check out what made me finally enjoy this sample:
https://www.reddit.com/r/tea/comments/49l5x3/tea_and_dragon_ball_puar/
I believe this is what I’m drinking at work right now. Somewhat dark with a strong taste upfront. The steeps continue darker with more depth, but the depth is in strong taste profile and not that of a flavor. Therefore I have no real remarks on what this tea has for notes of any flavors coming from the tea. Its a nice dark brew with a strong taste, ideal for sipping to keep alert I suppose which is what I’m doing.
Brewed this up this morning after a bowl of matcha expecting a nice roasted tea to open the day. I was rather surprised to find that this was much alike the 1989 oolong from Tea Urchin. Hints of cocoa in the background with a sweetness that mixes in the overall taste to be like a caramel taste. With a minor roast profile, this is an ideal tea for drinking now and in the future. Absolutely wonderful. For roughly $10 an ounce at bulk buy, this is a wonderful price. Easily getting 10+ steeps out this and I can easily say that this tea evolves. It slowly opens up into a earthy, woodsy, type of oolong after the sweetness fades away. Wonderful buy. Now I need to drink the other aged oolong from CS and find out which ones I will be buying a lot of.
Took this to work with thoughts of drinking an aged sheng all day.
Rather surprised by the dark brew of this was while walking back to my desk. What I like about this tea is how long you can brew it to provide a stronger taste of old earth; in the sense of grassy earth and not dirt like earth, if you know what I mean.
A mild lingering taste in the mouth with an upfront sensation on the lips which is somewhat similar to mint. This is not the kind of sheng that I prefer, but I can appreciate how enjoyable this is for what it is. Ideally this would be an enjoyable sheng during the colder months because it does have a bit of warmth to it and I like that.
This is probably a great candidate to wet store because I can tell the earthy notes from this after time would become better and better.
Did you ever try the one from Spring 2013?