10g sample weighed in at 10.9g. Used 5.5g for competetion-style brewing. Will follow up with gong fu brewing test. I usually use 7g for gong fu so with 5.4g I’ll use a bit less water & slightly longer steeps.
Dry tea looks nice, large sized balls (odd-shapen more that perfectly round) with some really big ones and just a little dust. Dry aroma is moderate sweetness.
Competetion style:
Filtered tap water at full boil, quick rinse. 6-min brew in gaiwan. Tea color darker than I expected. Very nice honey aroma. Wet leaf aroma is sweet with floral and vegetal notes.
Tea taste is very nice: pronounced honey sweetness with notes of stone fruit, mild roastiness, something vaguely familiar that I can’t quite identify, a little cinnamon, and…leather! Moderately tannic. Nice umami. Appearance is a lovely amber color, about the color of a Dongfang Meiren/Bai Hao.
Subtle hui gan still there 10 mins later.
Appearance of wet leaves is interesting. They are somewhat torn, and I suspect it was machine-harvested? Evidence of bug-bites around the edges and where present the leaves have a notable purple tinge. Some leaves are entirely purplish and those tend to be very thick and resistant to flattening. Don’t recall seeing leaves with this color or the thick leatheriness that some of them have.
Try this one — it’s fairly unusual and a very nice tea at a good price ($14.99/56g)!
Flavors: Cinnamon, Honey, Leather, Stonefruit
