Menghai Baohexing Tea Co Ltd. (Puerhshop)

I purchased this tea for $15.99 from puerhshop, kind of a throw-in I probably picked to get free shipping. When given a choice, I’d rather get more Tea than pay shipping.

This is a ripe “choco” brick molded into 18 breakable squares. Mathematically 125g doesn’t really divide evenly into 18 parts (repeating number). So depending upon how you break off the square you will get 5-7g per piece. This works out nicely for a brewing vessel in the range of 100-130cc.

This tea company was created by a former employee of Taetea, who supposedly is responsible for some of the ripe recipes when he worked there. I find this tea has the Dayi house flavor, so I can believe the story. It brews up dark and syrupy. The tea ranges from 2012-2015 and was pressed in 2015, and still needs time to clear fermentation flavor which may take awhile given the compression. I’ve had this for over a year and it still seems fairly heavily fermented. I got 10 steeps easy and the tea isn’t even going much off the flash brew time yet. It is definitely on the pricier side for a new ripe. The vendor thinks this will increase in value, but I don’t see the value in brick tea when it starts out at this price. It is a curiosity without a huge commitment, I can easily finish up a small amount of tea like this.

This was a nice tea and not expensive. There was a fair amount of fermentation flavor to it for the first few steeps. The brick was tightly compressed. It took until the third steep for the tea to open up. First two steeps were a little light. I would say a note of dark bittersweet chocolate developed but that is an interpretation. It was definitely bittersweet at the start. It developed into a nice sweet flavor. Not sure what to call the flavor that had developed by the twelfth steep but I suppose generally fruity might describe it, but not a heavy fruit flavor. I enjoyed this tea.

I steeped this twelve times in a 150ml gaiwan with 10g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, 30 sec, 45 sec, 1 min, 1.5 min, and 2 minutes. Judging by the color in the twelfth steep I would say there were between two and four steeps left should I wish to continue.

This was a fairly tasty shou puerh with a lot a fermentation flavor and a wet storage note in the first steep. The wet storage note was only in the first steep, the fermentation lasted about six steeps. It was initially somewhat unpleasant tasting but not fishy. Puerhshop describes this brand as premium shou and this one sells for about $35. Not a large amount to pay if you do consider the brand to be a premium brand. As I know of no other seller selling this brand I don’t know how to judge if this was a premium product. I am sure it can be found on Taobao but I have not looked. In any case I think it was good enough to justify a price of $35 a cake. It did develop a nice sweet note in the end. There may have been some notes of chocolate in there but I wasn’t really paying attention to the specifics, I was just enjoying the tea. It was tasty and I am not upset that I bought a whole cake. We will see if it improves in a couple of years or so.

I steeped this ten times in a 160ml Solid Silver Teapot with 14g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, 30 sec, 45 sec, and 1 minute.

This is a tasty ripe tea with a lot of fermentation flavor left. The fermentation taste was quite strong for the first four or five steeps and then dissipated. It was initially sweet in nature and then some bitterness intervened in the middle steeps. There were notes of cocoa or chocolate in there too. It even developed a fruity flavor in later steeps. The later steeps taste of this tea balances it out. The initial steeps were thick with fermentation flavor but sweet too. It developed a nicer flavor later. According to Puerhshop this brand is a premium brand of tea. That being said I had never heard of them before and wonder if anyone else has. This small brick is the only offering at Puerhshop from this Menghai Baohexiang Tea Co. Ltd so I don’t know about their other products. This one was pretty good in the end but really needs to age a little to lose some of that fermentation taste. It was almost fishy in nature but not quite. For the price of this I am not unhappy with my purchase. It was only $13.79.

I steeped this tea eight times in a 120ml gaiwan with 9.1g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse and a 10 minute rest. It didn’t take long at all for the leaves to open up. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, anad 30 sec. The tea color of the eighth steep was still an amber brown. This tea would certainly gone a few more steeps, maybe twelve, maybe fifteen but I was at my caffeine limit.