Wuyi Origin

(2023 harvest) Complex notes with cinnamon, walnut, flowers. Second steep is different and very pretty. Some chocolate, chili pepper and baking spice. Very balanced, deep roast. Palate is very smooth.

This is a 2020 harvest and another tea from Leafhopper, thank you again! Also today 2 teas are finished, though I don’t count those as a sipdowns as both had only one session. But it still counts in total quantity of tea. And in my stock system, the quantity is zero too.

Anyway, I preheated the gaiwan, filled the thermos, added the leaves to the preheated gaiwan and I got somehow nice, tobacco aroma.

Gongfu / 5 grams / 125 ml / 90°C
First steep, 10 seconds
The wet leaves aroma changed towards sweet notes, maybe yams or other sweet potatoes, liquid is sweet, but without much to write about. Was it too short?

Second steep, 15 seconds
Definitely sweeter, but I have been expecting more complexity. There are hints of stonefruits with powder sugar aftertaste. Wet leaves lean towards floral, orchid notes.

Third steep, 20 seconds
Definitely I got the florals more than fruits, very much orchids in aroma and flavor, slighlty woody, sweet and stonefruits in taste.

4th steep, 30 seconds
This one brought into the starlight the fruity notes, stonefruits to be more exact, definitely cherries and plums in flavours, along with honey and slight woody note. Definitely most flavourful and most interesting steep so far. Nice mouthfeel here as well.

5th steep, 40 seconds
Wet leaves smell like crate of fruits, you know, that fruity sweet whiff, with woody notes. The brew stays sweet and stonefruity, smooth and mouthfeel is still nice.

6th steep, 50 seconds (or so) got little distracted
Fruity notes are weaker, woody notes started to be stronger. One… two steeps remaining for this tea. But nevertheless, it’s still okay.

7th steep, 60 seconds
Well, that’s all from this tea apparently.

There was weak start, great body and flavours in the middle steeps, but also fades quite quickly. The flavour profile is interesting, very fruity in the end, but on the other hand I think that longevity of this tea could be better. But honestly, I don’t think this is my favorite flavour profile, I think I prefer a bit other black teas, for instance Indian/Nepalese and definitely Georgian teas are my all time favourites. But you have to try teas which you aren’t that familiar with to broaden your horizons.

(2023 harvest) Wow. So delicate. Almond aroma, orange blossom. Raw nut, walnut skin. Some soothing green leafiness, just a hint of orange zest. Really gentle roast, oatmeal porridge with a hint of brown sugar.

(2023 harvest) Heartbreakingly pretty aromas. As pretty as an orchid. High toned, delicious.

(2023 harvest) Wow, this is so pretty. Has a wonderful scent of earth, lemon, bergamot and roast persimmon. Body is brisk but then leads into an extremely malty, creamy satisfying finish.

(2023 harvest) Fragrant! Cinammon and tamarind and floral garden. Has that unique ya shi aroma. Intoxicating nose; silky, brisk and pretty palate.

My sixth grade boys are like German Shepherd puppies—rowdy but trainable. My sixth grade girls are like Siamese cats on steroids—logic does not work, threats do not work, and they stare straight through you like you’re a glass window. Both camps were at meter-peaking hyperactivity levels today.

Which is why I’m sitting peacefully in a sunbeam watching Minnie nap close to the Christmas tree and reveling in one last cup of derk’s light, slightly buttery green tea. (I hadn’t noticed the buttery part before.) Quiet is good. Quiet is better when you’re holding a cup thoughtfully selected by a friend.

Rain! Two delicious mornings waking up to it. You can just hear the ground going ahhhhhh. We celebrated with a lunch out and a dessert at a little hometown ice cream gem (everything made-in store) that offers you the option of sitting inside a salvaged railroad mail car (the labels are still on the sorting boxes) or outside on the porch in rocking chairs. We rocked.

I’m so glad I had a little bit of this left to enjoy, derk, on an evening that finally didn’t require AC going full blast. I had no new revelations as I enjoyed it again, but it is a simply enjoyable, not fussy, sweet and gentle little green tea. As you mentioned in one of your reviews, it is a good evening cup—doesn’t mess with your rest. Thank you again.

derk, I could just get lost staring at the dry leaves of this one—a petite little mop of curls. They’re a treat for the eyes. Their final product is highly appealing as well—definitely vegetal, but some sweetness at the end for dessert. There was Cloud Mist in the cup and some outside, too. I drank this listening to welcome rain.

As I drink my way through 100g, I’ve come to appreciate this tea as a simple and versatile drinker. I mostly find myself craving it when I need something tonic — it’s pretty gentle and doesn’t have much caffeine, so I can even drink a bowl in the evening without disturbing my sleep cycle. A good representative of Chinese greens that I think most people could appreciate. At 2 years old, it’s holding up well enough.

This is my first Cloud Mist from Fujian. It’s milder than others I’ve tried from various regions. Did very well as bowl tea while camping. Refreshing sweetness and cleansing mouthfeel. It complemented the environment, as in it wasn’t competing with the scents of surrounding forest. Mostly tender raw green bean with tarragon and some apricot in the back, a little nutty-creamy.

My first ever ‘Duck Shit’ oolong, courtesy of Leafhopper. Sadly I couldn’t get the sample to work for me. Always thin, astringent and bitter. Bangin’ white peach aftertaste, though!

Feeling: abrasive

Another sample from Leafhopper, thank you :)

This is an Wuyi tea I can get behind. It’s too tannic and drying to want it everyday but it has a great expression of heavenly orchid, rainforest, and gingerbread aroma. The actual taste is cedar dominant and can be a little clunky at first as I work my way around the tannins and tartness but it smooths out in later steeps into a gently sweet, rounded character of hay, gooseberry, squash, leather and chamomile. The orchid and spice-rich aftertaste and energy spread throughout my head and upper body, eliciting a mellowed, unfocused mindstate. It’s like the way a high quality incense trails with a weightlessness through undisturbed air, wrapping its resinous tendrils around whatever comes within its path, infusing, permeating. A mood-altering tea with dense meditative energy.

This seems to be right on the edge of needing to be reroasted. The first few steeps have that aging oolong sourness creeping in along with a perfumey air. But it all smooths out as the steeps progress, lightly exhibiting an incense character with an orange tone in the midground. Vaporous notes of chocolate syrup, orange zest, coconut/husk and charcoal are supported by that lowdown and earthy Wuyi wet rock minerality I find so fascinating. In the final steep, spearmint and vanilla are the most apparent. Mild aftertaste. Mouthfeel never comes to mind. I am calm and grounded but also with a stimulation that has me feeling like I’m elevated and being pulled forward while my toes sweep the ground. Interesting experience. I haven’t felt an energy like this from tea for a while.

Thanks for today’s wonderful complement, Leafhopper :)

Song pairing: Prince — Controversy

2020 Bei Dou-from the awesome Leafhopper!

I’ve been working through a lot of the teas in the swamp (swap)and I’m down to about 4 of the samples left, going through 2-3 each week. I picked this one after going through a few Taiwanese ones and needed something with lighter caffeine. Smelling the dry leaf, I was enticed by the chocolate nutty notes singed with smooth roast and campfire smells.

Like most teas in the past two weeks, I brewed this one in my Eclipse press. I let it sit around 35 seconds, and pressed the leaves to try to separate it out. Tasting and smelling it each time in several rounds of small cups from the press, it resembled other good Bei Dou and Big Red Robes I’ve had by leaning hard into nutty and nearly chocolaty profiles. I kept on getting cocoa, hazelnut, and a tinge of orange pele and citrus, then leaning back hard into the woody, incense like roast. I was deeply satisfied and grounded with a calming buzz.

The second brew time in the press-even after 20 sec, it was just woody and roasty. I let it sit more. Alas, more charcoal and roast. I finished it quickly and then dumped the leaves out. They smelled like ash, so I think I hit a good stopping point.

The first session was incredible, and it was more mild and complex-the way I like my yancha. As for the second, the ashy-muddled profile was consistent with why I don’t drink them often, and losing the complexity from earlier. I’m still very happy to it.

Gongfu Sipdown (1709)!

Thank you Togo for this sample!

The aroma coming off the leaves after the initial couple steeps was heavy charcoal and roast with a herbaceous pungency that really reminded me of dill. However, the steeped tea itself has a lot more of a mouthwatering juicy floral quality that really stands out among the other tasting notes. Very, very lychee forward. Of course, it’s still pretty roasted with a lot of those charcoal, woody, and heavily roasted chicory root type notes – but it’s just much more dynamic and nuanced overall, and with no dill! Though I love a nice, roasty oolong I have to admit that notes of chicory are not something I usually enjoy because they’re usually coupled with a sharp top note sourness, but I only got that in one or two steeps of this tea session and the lovely sweetness of the lychee more than made up for it!

Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/CfEeJoTOMXQ/

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWmJbtJsx_w

Thank you leafhopper!

Quickie note. I was more into this one than I expected. It’s very woody and heavy on the sweet potato / yam side, but super pleasant in smell and taste. It’s on the cedar, incense, sandalwood spectrum with a little bit of cooling effect in the aftertaste bordering on rosy. The smell is deeply floral like Geranium and Roses. Super comforting. It didn’t change much steep to steep gong fu, but I have some left over to play with. I very much enjoyed it, and actually liked it more than some other Wuyi teas that are more overpowering.

Wuyi Origin released this “benefit tea” to provide a lower-cost option during the pandemic, and I applaud them for their thoughtfulness. What’s more, it’s actually a tea people would want to drink! I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 195F for 10, 12, 15, 18, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.

I’ve had this tea several times and still have trouble pinning down the tastes and aromas. The dry leaf smells like squash, sweet potato, cherry, malt, and wood. The first steep has notes of carrot, pumpkin, tart cherry, grass, malt, maple syrup, tannins, and wood, and has a silky texture. The second steep adds gooseberry, cream, sugarcane, and hints of sweet potato. The next couple steeps have more wood and malt, though they still have very vegetal notes of carrot, pumpkin, and sweet potato. The next couple steeps are more tannic and have notes of lettuce along with the orange veggies. The final steeps have notes of malt, tannins, wood, minerals, and roasted veggies.

This tea reminded me in a good way of the most affordable grade of Wuyi Origin’s 2020 Lapsang Souchong. Unlike the Sweet Potato Zhen Shan Xiao Zhong that I had recently, its sweetness was balanced and it had more complex flavours. I’d say it punches well above its price tag of $10 for 50 g.

I waited to drink this one because I could not remember if I really liked it, or was meh. Doing it again, I really liked it. Describing it is going to be hard. Butter, sweet potato, starch, regular potato, malt, wheat, florals, caramel hints, rose hints, etc. is in it. Unlike the other teas, the first steep was nutty after about 30 seconds approaching almond. There are prominent florals, and while I have seen some reviews on the Wuyi website describe rose, I keep on getting hit with geranium instead in every cup. There are times where it approaches chamomile or buckwheat (I know, those were descriptions for other teas I’m using for this one), and then it goes back into the geranium ending in a sweet dry bread-sy finish.

The later brews are just as floral. Not loud or obvious while layering it. Oddly enough, I found the other teas more floral than this one. This tea actually had more dimension. I’m not sure I’d reach for this one again, though I do think it’s good quality and recommend it for people wanting something different.

I liked this one more than the Meizhan, but it was also pretty similar in profile in its subtlety. The leaves are gorgeous and uniform, yet not as fruity as I’d think. It’s got nice malt, texture, aroma, and great viscosity, though the flavor slowly develops. I’m writing the adjective ’honeysuckle" again, though the fruitiness is a lot more like a subtle apple and feels more floral than actually fruity for my palette. It gets more fruity after steep three and starts to taste a little bit like appleskin, maybe apple juice.

My parameters were gong fu twice and I used between 3-4 oz of water per 5 grams, starting maybe around 30 seconds and went by that in increments. After a while, the tea just got generally malty and savory. I likely am underappreciating this one, so here it goes: I think it’s good, but I prefer the Honey Style because this one was a little subtle for me.

Backlog:

I tried this twice-once as tumbler fuel, and the next time in a quick gong fu session from my Jin Jun Mei sampler.

I was honestly not as impressed with the sampler overall. All of the teas were pretty subtle, and the Honey Style was my favorite. This one was surprisingly the least straight forward, and heavily resembled the Wild Jin Jun Mei from What-Cha. Extremely buttery, light, and floral headed by honeysuckle, textured by savory sweet potato, with some caramel/brown sugar hints here and there. There wasn’t more than that otherwise. No astringency or bitterness, and while it was complex, it lacked malt and some qualities that I hope for in a Jin Jun Mei. Combining all the fancy pretentious notes together, I could also describe this tasting like summer squash, and that’s it.

I do think this was a quality tea, and it’s exceptional if you are looking for something that doesn’t get bitter-I was just hoping for more considering the price tag and varietal. Since it was Meizhan, I hoped there would be some redder fruit notes like plum or cherry. Alas, honeysuckle it is.

Whenever a vendor offers a black Dancong, it ends up in my cart. This one is from spring 2019. I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 195F for 10, 12, 15, 18, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.

The dry aroma is of honey, malt, hay, orchids, apricot, plum, and other flowers. Togo noticed olives, which I can also detect now. The leaves were so long and spindly that I had trouble getting some of them into the pot. The first steep is very soft, with milder than expected notes of honey, malt, cereal, orchid, apricot, hay, sugarcane, wood, and zucchini. Raisins, plums, and cherries make an appearance in steep two, and the tea is a little more floral, though still very vegetal and woody for a black Dancong. The florality increases in the next couple steeps, though the tea is still more sweet and vegetal than fruity, with a drying sensation in the mouth and an aftertaste similar to sugarcane. There are hints of apricot and caramel in steeps four to six, along with lots of honey and tannins. Letting the tea cool, as I did accidentally on the sixth steep, brings out the apricot more strongly. Apricot, cream, honey, and malt are even more present in the next couple long steeps. The session ends with honey, malt, tannins, wood, and lingering stonefruit sweetness.

Unlike most teas, which flatten out after the first few steeps, this one became more fruity and pleasant as the session progressed. It is unassuming for a black Dancong and it was hard to pin down some of the flavours, probably due to it being stored for so long in my tea museum. In the three sessions I’ve had with this tea, using more leaf brought out the fruity notes, while using less leaf highlighted the florals. I tend to prefer more fruit-forward black Dancongs, but I’ll have no trouble finishing this tea.

I’m drinking this old bush Yashixiang from 2020 in my first gongfu session of 2022! I’m not sure if it’s a newer harvest of the 2019 tea reviewed by Togo or a different tea altogether, particularly because our tasting notes diverge quite a bit. (Then again, I don’t have a lot of experience with Dancongs so I could be missing some things.) I steeped 6 g of leaf in a 120 ml teapot at 200F for 7, 10, 12, 15, 18, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 90, 120, and 240 seconds.

The dry aroma is of roasted almonds, cantaloupe, orchids, and char. The first steep has a fruitiness I can’t describe, kind of like kiwi, cantaloupe, and hints of cooked pineapple. The roast is noticeable but not overwhelming, and I get roasted almonds, orchids, and a metallic aftertaste. The second steep has mandarin oranges in the aroma and taste, along with char, wood, florals, minerals, brown sugar, and that melon/pineapple fruitiness. The third steep is more milky and floral, with cannabis, honeysuckle, orchid, and some vegetal undertones along with the fruit. The bottom of the cup smells deliciously like cantaloupe and pineapple. The next few steeps have notes of butter, caramel, roast, florals, and pineapple, and the roast is getting more pronounced. The end of the session is more savoury, with veggies, minerals, roasted almonds, butter, florals, wood, astringency, and honey.

While Ya Shi Xiang is still not my favourite Dancong varietal, I like this one much more than the others I’ve tried, mainly because the roast doesn’t overpower the fruity and floral components. It has a huge number of flavours, probably more than I can pin down in a couple sessions. I’ll probably pack some of this tea into swap boxes for those who enjoy more roasted Dancongs.

Smoky and minerally yancha, heavy on the cooked fruit aspects. I personally get some plum and red/purple fruits, and the roast borders on cocoa on occasion. I’m enjoying the oz I have. More to come, and better gong fu so far.