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While I’m still in the mood to write and have a little time before I have to get back to work, here is another review from my backlog. This is another tea I finished earlier in the year. It was also a totally new experience for me, as I had never tried or even heard of Po Tou Xiang Dan Cong prior to this one. Did it make a good first impression on me? Yeah, for the most part, it did, but it also did not wow me so much that I will be frequently making much of an effort to track down more Po Tou Xiang.

I prepared this tea gongfu style. After a 10 second rinse, I steeped 6 grams of loose tea leaves in 4 ounces of 203 F water for 7 seconds. This infusion was followed by 16 additional infusions. Steep times for these infusions were as follows: 9 seconds, 12 seconds, 16 seconds, 20 seconds, 25 seconds, 30 seconds, 40 seconds, 50 seconds, 1 minute, 1 minute 15 seconds, 1 minute 30 seconds, 2 minutes, 3 minutes, 5 minutes, 7 minutes, and 10 minutes.

Prior to the rinse, the dry tea leaves produced aromas of cinnamon, smoke, char, and cherry. After the rinse, I detected new aromas of cream, butter, roasted almond, orchid, and cannabis. The first infusion brought out subtle aromas of blackberry and roasted peanut. In the mouth, the tea liquor presented notes of cream, grass, roasted almond, cherry, and butter that were balanced by hints of cannabis, cinnamon, earth, orchid, smoke, blackberry, and roasted peanut. The bulk of the subsequent infusions introduced aromas of vanilla, blueberry, mulberry, baked bread, minerals, orange zest, and rock candy. At times, I also picked up on a subtle violet scent. Stronger and more immediately notable impressions of orchid, blackberry, and earth appeared in the mouth alongside mineral, sugarcane, orange zest, blueberry, mulberry, and violet notes. I also consistently detected subtler impressions of char, vanilla, baked bread, toasted rice, pear, rock candy, and white grape, as well as an interesting and unexpected hint of green apple after each swallow. As the tea settled and faded, the liquor began to emphasize mineral, baked bread, orange zest, grass, sugarcane, violet, butter, mulberry, and blackberry notes that were balanced by lingering hints of orchid, roasted almond, cherry, rock candy, charcoal, white grape, toasted rice, green apple, and blueberry.

This was an incredibly odd and challenging Dan Cong oolong with highly unique aroma and flavor profiles. It also produced a tea liquor that was constantly shifting in terms of weight and texture in the mouth. There were times where I expected it to hit me hard, and it never did, but then there were other times where I expected it to calm down and thin out, and it instead presented as being strong and heavy. Honestly, I am still not entirely certain what to make of it. I can say that I most certainly enjoyed this tea, but I also found it to be a bit much. I think I’ll primarily stick with my preferred Dan Cong oolongs for now, but should I ever get the opportunity to try another Pou Tou Xiang, I doubt I will pass on it.