2015 Menghai V93

Interesting ripe, but overall left me unimpressed i owe this to my lack of knowledge on how to brew ripes and to its younger age, i have a 2014 aging but i lost one to mold recently.

Weakish but later steeps brought forth a smoother but perky flavor of something between strong mineral water and a herbal tea, had a hint of something i would now assume smells of Chinese medicine?

The finish was pleasant, nothing really strange in the wet leaf smell, smelled earthy like a young ripe, dry leaves did smell a little of fish mostly cause of age i would assume.

Interesting to note that there was a strong cha qi showing up in the 4th steep, this took me by surprise a little but the flavor by this point was very weak and tasted of sweetwater which was off putting.

I would try this again but i’m too obsessed with shengs nowadays.

So I threw one of these into my last YS order as I’ve heard people talk about them fondly as a daily drinker. Tried it today and I’m a little confused as to whether I liked it. Mind you, given the price I wasn’t expecting a lot either.

Used 8g in a 130ml gaiwan, and washed it for about 20 seconds. Then started steeping at 10 seconds. Slightly bitter, with some cocoa notes. Gets sweeter on subsequent infusions but the slight bitterness never entirely goes away. Overall it just felt a bit.. flat, light and mono-dimensional. I wouldn’t say its a bad tea, its decent, but I can’t see myself ever craving it.

Later in the day I brewed this once more, this time western style. 3g in 300ml of water just off boiling for 5 minutes. Finally a bit thicker and definitely better, but still not remarkable. I could drink this at my desk while working etc, when I can’t pay full attention to my tea.

I wonder if an older v93 would be significantly different?