Huang Shan Mao Feng Green Tea

I am so glad I bought a lot of this! I made a 22 ounce pot to go with our Asian take out tonight, and had to resteep. Hubby was really throwing it back! Tonight we really went overboard and bought too much food, and most of it is pretty high fat and rich. We realized that we had been so busy today that neither of us had eaten all day – just had a glass of milk. No wonder we went wild when we got our take out!

As I sipped this tea with my meal, it was remarkable how it seemed to wash through the heavy food with a bright, lightly floral taste. I liken it to sunshine! There is a floral sweetness, a bright mineral flavor, and no sour or grassy taste at all. Delicious! The second pot is almost at an end!

Finally got to spend some quality time with this one. I will have review on my blog in a couple days. The first time I fixed this it was tainted by onions from our chili making. The second time I knew I liked it but wasn’t sure how it differed from other Chinese greens. Now I think I latched on to what makes this a winner. The dry leaf smells fresh and green. After steeping the leaf reminds me of stew beef – I love it when it does that. The liquor is nearly clear. The sip starts buttery and veggie then mid sip I catch moments of floral like a green oolong. I have never caught this in a green before. Awesome! Late in the sip it changes back to sweet green. There is no bitterness. I really found this to be refreshing.

I guess I am not done giving rating numbers.

Yum yum! I love how sweet and nutty this tea is. It’s amazing how different various green teas can be from one another in taste. I definitely appreciate them way more than I ever did before. Actually my appreciation of these greens makes me not as interested in some of the flavored green teas I used to like a lot… those bases just seem so boring in comparison. I do love the occasional flavored green with a really interesting base, but I don’t see them as much.

After having such a wonderful experiment with Verdants Eight Treasures Yabao I decided to redo this one gaiwan style. Now when I first tried this I got a decent amount of saltiness to it and a bit of a metallic aftertaste. Redoing this gaiwan style has made this tea so much better, and for that I am upping the rating.

First I barely detected any saltiness to it and no weird metallic aftertaste..woo! Instead what I got was a nice plum-like fruit notes in the first few steepings, fading as the steepings continued. There was also no astringency at all this time.

About the second infusion I started to get more vegetal notes, reminding me of Dragonwell without the butteriness like so many others. Towards the fourth steeping though, when the fruity notes were barely detectable, a light creaminess did appear, more in the texture than in the taste and it wasn’t buttery.

I think with having such luck in brewing teas gaiwan style and tasting the difference from western style that for now on I shall brew gaiwan syle when I get the chance. It brings out a much better quality in the tea; I am more able to taste the different nuances in a very good way.

Mmmm this tea is marvelous. The aroma of the dry leaf is sweet with fruit and hay notes. The flavor is lovely. It’s sweet and floral. It has a nice fruity sweetness along with a crisp floral note.

(Free sample provided by Teavivre. Thank you!)

Yesterday I found some scattered tea notes and one of them was Teavivre’s Huang Shan Mao Feng.

Dry leaf is very long with partially twisted first leaf. Apart from its usual green texture I noticed a few leaves with somewhat yellow and brown hue to them. With a deep sniff dryness with hint of sweetness to it is revealed, and when dropped in pre-heated teapot you get some starchiness rising to nostrils. When it comes to visual appearance his tea has hardly any broken leaf and seems to take a bit more volume than my other Mao Fengs I have in cupboard.

I steeped this tea in glass 250 ml teapot three times (and I could have gone for more if I wasn’t full) with 80 Celsius water, and 60 – 60 – 90 seconds steep.

1st

First infusion came out clear and really pale jade. During steeping barely any leaves sunk since I added them on top. Light bodied and sweet with lingering

fruity note (apricot, peach… not quite sure) that completes at tongue root after wallowing (peach). Every sip seems so thirst quenching, refreshing and amazingly good. As I empty pitcher I don’t see any kind of residue.

2nd

Second infusion is still clear like first but with more of jade tone to it. With slightly augmented peach notes comes a faint Tie Guan Yin-like note in background with just a hint of astringency. Few seeps in and I start to notice how my throat is getting a bit dry, almost sore-like, starchy…

3rd

The appearance of third infusion is identical to that of second. As I’m not intending to steep it further I removed wet leaves that filled my room with light Tie Guan Yin-like aroma. When it comes to tasting this infusion reminds me of 4th steep of Teavivre’s Tie Guan Yin (look it up in my previous notes) with grassy-vegetal body. At this point I thought that I might squeezed a bit too much out of the leaves and that I should’ve steep it just over a minute.

Although I can’t recall much of the experience with this particular tea I can, however, tell that this is the best Mao Feng I’ve had so far. I guess I should write more in-detail impression just after finishing my cup in future.

Tea of the late morning……

I have my last round of samples from TeaVivre. This time I requested things I am considering buying, and they were very accommodating. I am very grateful for this tasting opportunity, and I am so looking forward to purchasing the next season of teas, as I am sure I have a backlog of greens from them at home to drink before they expire. This was my chance to really explore some Chinese green teas, and I am finding that all of my preconceived notions about green tea were so wrong. I don’t know why I assumed it would be otherwise, as my thoughts on tea in general have been completely rewritten, and lean nearly in the complete opposite direction as they did before I tried loose leaf. I think the green teas I had tried in the past were low quality and poorly prepared. Now, I am surrounded by high quality green tea, and I have learned a thing or two about preparation. These things have made a huge difference!

This tea is very nice. The leaves are very long and thin. They are a deeper green than the Premium Dragonwell, but still in the green range rather than leaning brown. It is hard to measure the right amount of tea, because the leaves are so long! My first mug was a little light on the leaf, but still enjoyable. For the second infusion, I added a little more leaf, and now I have something very good. The liquor is a light yellow-green. There are very light floral notes as well as light notes of asparagus (kind of like the long jing), but there is not the buttery-ness from the long jing. I guess you could call this an addition of floral notes, but minus the buttery notes in comparison to long jing. It is still not as floral as a Tie Gwan Yin, but lovely and light. Not even a hint of bitterness, and oh so smooth. I can see why it is one of China’s top teas. Definitely on the shopping list.

Mug method at 180, roughly two tsp of leaf (I may need the scale next time!). No additions.

Thanks go out to Angel and Teavivre for providing many samples of their tea for sampling. This came with my first order, at my request, as I wanted to order Dragon Well in my 2nd order (2012 version), along with one or two other greens. This won out as my 2nd favorite green.

Huang Shan Mao Feng is a mild, slightly vegetal, slightly floral green. I can see how some have compared it to a TGY in that respect, but this is not as bold and much milder. It has no bitterness as all, but perhaps a bit of astringency while hot (goes away when cooler). While cooling, it does move into a slight grassy phase, but goes down so smooth.

What I really liked is that I only have to (yes, I know I don’t “have” to) add a minimal amount of honey to make it enjoyable (under a tsp, therefore under 20 calories, lol.) It is good without any sweetness (but much better with a little). My whole point of trying to switch to tea is to reduce calories (and a healthier alternative) :)

2012 version
Quick rinse, 2 tsp., 2 minutes at 175.
Thanks again Angel !!!!

A lovely two-glass tetsubin of Teavivre Huang Shan Mao Feng was the perfect follow-up to today’s lunch of a third of a Ciabatta split lengthwise, toasted and slathered with a lobster-seafood cream spread before piling baby arugula high and then smashing the two sides together into a sandwich.

Same pale greenish-yellow, slightly vegetal but very smooth liquor as before—only even better after this meal!

Many, many thanks to Angel and Teavivre. I’ve really enjoyed everything I’ve sampled so far, and this is no exception.

The dry leaf smells very sweet and nutty. Like honey, fresh hay, and a little walnut.

Once steeped the aroma from the leaves, well, I feel like if green had a smell this would be that smell. The liquor itself is light jade and smells spinach vegetal with hints of fresh hay.

The mouthfeel is buttery and smooth, and there is no bitterness or astringency in my cup. It’s a buttered spinach/asparagus green taste that isn’t overly veggie tasting with very subtle hints of floral. There’s a definite nuttiness here as well, and that lingers in my mouth long after the sip has ended.

Even brewing Western style, I was able to get three decent steepings out of this, with both being more floral in flavor and reminding me a lot of a (not too floral) Ti Guan Yin with a thinner body.

This is a really lovely green tea and headed straight to my shopping list.