pu-erh of the day. Sheng or Shou

2009? Yiwu Golden Unicorn from Bana Tea. Nice complex aroma. Thick and – sticky? My Gaiwan’s conspiring to have me pour slowly today, so some bitterness too, which I think would normally be negligible. Mellow huigan. Some mintiness. Better than my last memory of drinking it. Really feeling the qi today, chesty.

1990 Quarter Brick from puerh.sk. Aroma is mild poopy birdcage, very light. Liquor is thin to medium, mild humid storage note, no bitterness. This is a very worn down tea with no off flavours. I prefer something with more bite to it.

Heh, mild poopy birdcage. Why do we drink this sh*t again? :P. I agree though, need that “Goldilocks” amount of bite.

2018 Wu Liang Qiao Mu from Yunnan Craft. Shi Dun brand.
Looks like it’s now called 2018 Wuliang Shan – Arbor.

V A P I D

I’ll be doing a very lazy storage experiment on the rest of the sample.

Got some Dayi “Song of the Lotus” shu, a cake bought blind from YS US. Made in a 3-part Chinese infuser mug @ 4g/250ml.

I’ve been drinking gongting or small-leaf blends for months, and it feels kind of weak by comparison.

Edit: curiously, I can’t find this cake at all on taobao. It seems to be pretty obscure.

No it came from YSUS https://yunnansourcing.us/products/2016-menghai-song-of-the-lotus-flower-ripe-pu-erh-tea-cake

Looks like that thing you linked is something different. I looked for other sellers with this cake and don’t think I found any, even on taobao. Maybe Scott’s translation of the name doesn’t match anybody else’s. Google Xlate says “Lotus Song” is 莲花歌, or maybe just 莲歌, and while the first character is good (“lotus”) it’s really a stretch to distort the 2nd into something that looks like what’s on the wrapper.

Edit: YS mothership still has it https://yunnansourcing.com/products/2016-menghai-song-of-the-lotus-flower-ripe-pu-erh-tea-cake

Edit edit: how did you get that link? HTML, markdown, bbcode… ?

2004 Dehong raw brick from Chawangshop. Golden liquor, medium thickness, active, good aged earthy with that refined shoe polish note.

2000 Kai yuan Green Stamp from Essence of Tea. Aroma is a very nice smokey wood, liquor is brown, medium thick, excellent smokey wood flavour when brewed right.

2018 Snoozefest from White2Tea via a swap with Togo.

Still early into it. I can’t smell anything right now, so no idea about aroma. Full sweet flavor and body, oily, cooling in throat, brassy metallic, plenty of green bitterness, some astringency and huigan, Not picking up an aftertaste. It reminds me of the 2018 Flapjacks raw mixed with a drop of strawberry preserves.

I’ve never tried to purchase this cake since I don’t really hop on hype sales. From what I know, this goes for a low price and it’s probably worth it.

Last of the 2017 YS Suan Zao Shu sample. Cake on the way from the US site.