33 Tasting Notes
Got a sample from Matu after he decided he didn’t love it and I’m glad I did! What an awesome tea. In his review, he states that he had to keep the water below 200F to enjoy it but I’m loving my steeps at 208 so far. Grass, root veggies, sweetness, just enough bite, everything I want a raw puer to be. I’ll be buying one soon for sure.
Preparation
First, a little rant. This is my second month of the White2Tea monthly club and it will definitely be my last. I signed up for December because they were including a 250g heicha brick and that seemed like a good deal (which is sort of was, the brick is OK). This month I open my box to find a grand total of 22.5g of tea. For $30. I wouldn’t pay that much per gram for tea I knew was going to be amazing. But whatever, maybe this tea is super valuable and rare to try and I’m just an idiot. But really, what a horrible value.
Leaf is lightly rolled and very intact, beautiful leaves. Primary nose on the wet leaf is chocolate and malted milk. Taste on the rinse is fruity and roasty. Nice so far. Fruitiness is less bright on the second steep and a little more mineraly, still keeping a nice roasty flavor. Perfect tea for this snowy morning, really.
Continues to be bright, mineral, low astringency, some oxidation flavors, really delicate and complex tea. Delicious? Yes. Worth over $1/g? Hell no.
Preparation
Started with 209F water rinse expecting to get an astringency bomb like some of the other wild arbor YS raws but this rinse water is pleasant. I’ll keep the water at this temp for a couple steeps and see if it stays tolerable. 1st steep (flash) astringency is still low, good sign. Some of the wild arbor YS samples I just haven’t been able to taste anything past the astringency. Nice mineral and root vegetable flavor, more sweetness than I usually get this early on in a raw. If it keeps tasting like this I’m in for a treat! 2nd steep (flash) is getting brighter and astringency is rising a bit. It’s a bit grassier but still has that nice root veggie umami. 3rd steep (flash) is about the same. 4th as well. 5th steep I went up to like 10-15s and it’s getting a bit too astringent. Still tastes nice, decently complex and wide. 6th+ the flavor doesn’t change too much but it’s still good.
I’ll for sure be buying a cake of this!
Preparation
Wow, okay. This tea is awesome. Sweet and smoky. I brewed it pretty haphazardly and it was very forgiving. 100% getting a full cake of this on my next YS order. Really interesting tea.
Preparation
San He Zhai from this year from them has a smoky edge as well.
Yup, it has a bit more smoke but combined with age its perfect. I think I can’t stand smoke until i has a few years to it, then it gives the puerh a soup like quality in my mind.
Almost a broth taste to them. I concur on that point on how the smoke affects them.
Got a bit nervous right away because the fishy smell was strong enough to be sitting on the dry leaf. The fishiness did not show up in the flavor at all though. Nice easy cake to break up, beautiful little nugs just sort of fall off once they get loosened. My only gripe is that the wrapper is glued shut so you need to rip the paper to get at the tea. I really wanted to keep it intact and be able to fold it back shut. Not a big deal.
Has some beautiful flavors: mushroom, rice, root veggies. Perfect level of sweetness for me. Very very light astringency. Lots of steeps (I’m on 9 now, I think, and it’s got a lot more to give).
At 6.6 cents/g this is a great value. Glad I added this brick to my order.
Update: got 12 or 13 steeps I think, wasn’t really counting. Last one was about 2 minutes and it was still nice and smooth and sweet.
Preparation
I recently put in an order of 15 samples of YS’s private pressings. This is the first I’m tucking into. I also got a cute little 60ml gaiwan so I can stop using my huge one.
Slightly musky floral smell at first, similar to jasmine but brighter. Smell becomes grassier through the steeps and less floral. First steep after the rinse was essentially flavorless so I’ll just call it a second rinse (: Very nice light yellow liquid.
Steeps 1-6 were flash steeps.
First real steep is pretty astringent. Mushroom and mineral. Second and third steeps are similar, high astringency and more mineraly. Fourth and fifth, the astringency stays about the same but more floral flavors are there. Sixth on, the astringency finally chilling out. Finally got the balls to lengthen the steep for the 7th since it doesn’t turn my mouth into the desert anymore. Tastes of citrus, flowers, and dirt. In a good way. 8th is getting really nice and I’m scared I’m towards the end! Really creamy feeling and excellent aftertaste. Qi is showing (or I’m just laughing myself short of breath on /r/youtubehaiku and mistake that for cha qi). 9th is good too. 10th has some nice cooling and still really nice flavor, although a bit light. 11th and 12th I left a little longer and they’re nicer than I expected.
Finally giving up around the 16th steep, although it’s still kinda tasty!
Any advice on getting rid of the astringency right away and getting to the flavors I got from the later steeps sooner? Do I not flash brew this but do more of a 5,10,15,20etc. style? This would be a stellar tea if not for the high astringency.
Preparation
the only way for me to lower the astringency was to lower the temp. try 200F and shorter steeps 3/5/7secs . i usually use 1g/15ml ratio
Agreed. Lower temps usually = lower astringency, but it can also mean less florals depending on the tea.
Try using good quality yixing, nixing, or chaozhou clay. I find the clay rounds out the tea’s flavor and can sometimes bring out other nicer qualities of the tea.
Really awesome scent on the wet leaves—the usual roasted oolong notes of malt and chocolate but with a little fruit in there. Similar flavor on the first steep. Beautiful light amber/deep yellow soup. Very clean tea, basically zero dust. Second steep I’m getting more fruit and a little sourness right on the rear sides of my tongue. Pretty unique sensation. Faintly reminiscent flavors of lychee ramune. I’ve never had a gui fei so maybe this is run of the mill but to me this is extremely unique and very, very delicious.
After the 3rd steep the smell of the wet leaf becomes, for lack of a better word, soapy. Not in an off way, I mean I’m getting citrus/fruit/floral notes that are not identifiable to a single plant so the mishmash of scents reminds me of a scented soap. A little astringency is starting to peek out which is nice. The fruitiness and sour notes keep getting stronger as the roasty flavors fade. Seriously tasting like a lychee ramune with the little marble, if you don’t know what I’m talking about see if your Asian market has them they’re so good.
I would’ve used a bit less leaf but the sample was 7g and 120ml is my biggest gaiwan and I wasn’t about to toss 2-3g! My pot is crowded af with this leaf though and it doesn’t even look like it’s done expanding. At $0.23/g, I’m not in a huge hurry to get more but I always have a hard time breaking past the $0.10/g barrier (which is why I don’t drink a ton of oolongs). Based on other oolongs I’ve had at a similar price, this is a good deal. It’s nice to have a roasted tea that doesn’t just taste like roastiness.
Preparation
Pretty psyched to open this one up after reading mrmopars rave review. He very kindly sent this sample to me. I had a disappointing sheng this morning so I’m excited to have something, hopefully, excellent.
Whenever I rinse a shou and go in for that big first whiff of wet leaf, I brace myself for the smells of the rotten Minneapolis riverfront in the spring when all the dead fish thaw out. I instead got a beautiful leathery, caramel smell. Not an insanely dark soup on the first steep like I usually expect from a ripe. Beautiful color though. Sweet, awesome mouthfeel. Nice body already. 2nd steep and it’s getting wider and creamier. Still very sweet and smooth. 3rd-5th steeps are all pretty similar. Still smells and tastes really nice.
(incomplete notes)
Glad I was able to pass it onto somebody who could appreciate it more! I’m not much of a Huangpian person, myself :)