2002 Yiwu Ancient Spirit Raw Cake

wow, I just did a session with this tea using yixing pot and a lower leaf to water ratio. Its great tea!

amazing that what once appeard to be a dull, lifeless snokey tea now has zero smokey aroma, a clam, steady quality, and smooth, aged character.

Its not particualry complex , but the flavor and aroma are woody with slight camphor fruity notes.

This wonderful sonata creates an image of brown reddish leaves while a campfire is cracking in front of you and an echoing melody of the coming winter breezes around your cheeks and ears. While nature is preparing for a resting phase a deep earthy mushroom soaked by rain spiritual bouquet enlightens your experience and put your mind at ease – it’s

just you and this aged cup of tea!

Already it’s aroma of aged agarwood, sandalwood, oak moss and a thick layer of camphor plus a sweet impact of apple turnover or baked apple creates such a wonderful atmospheric image of late Autumn with a its natural changes and harbingers of the Christmas season. This silky soft bronze liquor immersing you into such a delicious adventure of those already mentioned light smokey late Autumn campfire nuances. What a delight!

There you find the earthiness and fallen leaves aspects of Autumn followed aged Chinese old wooden furniture with the dense touch of camphor to it while this whole constructs gives you a warming feel with a steaming baked apple between your hands but in a more subtle performance. There is definitely a medicinal feel to it which gives you an overall feel of standing in the middle of an old Chinese herbal TCM shop with all its old wooden furniture and scents of nearly everything the surrounding nature can offer while outside a fine wind is whistling through those earthy colored forest canopies. In fact there is so much popping up in my imagination while enjoying this precious aged Sheng – but isn’t it better to discover your own journey? Guess you need to find out! ;)

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Finally got myself a bit of this tea to try – almost every time I order from YS a sample of it ends up in my cart only to be purged before I hit checkout. Thanks to whoever put some in the TTB! I’ve heard this one is pretty dank, but I didn’t really find it to be so. Dry leaf was a little sour and woody smelling. After a rinse, I got some bigger wood notes, a bit musty, some dry leaves.

The tea started off quite thick and only got thicker as I steeped it. It was smooth and slick; mouth-coating and sweet. I didn’t get any unpleasant off-tastes like I have sometimes experienced with aged sheng. Just sweet woodiness with a little bit of a mossy flavor going on as well. Again, not particularly dank or anything. The texture became almost like melted butter by the middle of the session – very nice. Probably the highlight of this one.

This seems like it was stored very well – it’s aged without being super dank, but certainly could age further – there was still a little bit of a dryness in the corners of my cheeks and mild astringency in long steeps. I remember seeing (or hearing about) this tea being about $79 or something – at that price I think it would be very hard to resist picking up a cake. At the current price of $119, a little bit easier to resist…but I’m still considering it.

A few quick comments. There are no green scents left that I can detect in the dry leaves. The wet leaves if breathed deeply yield some subtle char/smoke, but it doesn’t come through in the liquor. There is a good amount of sweetness in the amber liquor, not much bitterness, and a good deal of chalky astringency in the finish.

very clean, no storage notes (being its humid stored), dark amber color. the aromas are wow! really great aromas, unfortunately those don’t translate into flavors. wet leaves are mostly chop with a few half-leaves mixed in.

-leathery, wet wood, gentle but boring
-no chi
-mouth drying aftertaste and gentle astringent kuwei
-gentle tannic bitter when pushed
-no huigan
-medium/thick mouthfeel, mouth coating
-slightly chalky in beginning, and again at the very end
-really good longevity, just never ended, I stopped drinking because I got bored with it. its not active enough to keep me going after 10 steeps. I pushed to about 16, then gave up.

I did get binghole’d with my sample…take it for what it is. I’ll pass on the $99/cake . its not bad, but its not exactly wow’ing either. one of those teas you really want to like but it just didn’t come through and convince me

This is smooth, minty and leathery, not particularly thick or complex. Sweetness increases after a few steeps. It actually feels like a mild ripe to me. I didn’t feel the tea bloom in my mouth or throat as I expected and I wasn’t particularly floored by the qi, as some people were.

I think my bias toward the dynamism of younger shengs colors my impression of this mellow tea. I like it but I don’t think it would be something I would drink regularly.

This tea was well regarded, but I hesitated to get overly enthused as it is one of YS’s very few wetter stored cakes. However, having been in Kunming for 5 years or so now, it hit that sweet spot for me where’s it’s clearly seen some humidity but it not so funkadelic as to offend my oh-so-delicate white man sensibilities.

Mouth coating and length of flavor are both solid, while not being world-beating. As far as the actual flavor components, it’s one of those where you’ll just have to take my word that I liked it, as no actual descriptors that come to mind will likely sound pleasant. I suspect if you went out on a sun-dappled, dewy spring morning and threw a slightly damp stick for your faithful canine companion, the taste in his mouth as he clamped down to return the projectile for another round would be similar, if more fleeting.

I’ll not lie, though, if you threw a beeng of this like a frisbee, I’d lope after it on all fours and leap my best to capture it. Just sayin’.

this tea was recommended me by James fr Teadb. its not a first try, ive had it before. yesterday it was quite powerful, i dont remember experiencing such strong qi from this tea. it was very nice, sweet, menthol cool, with quick powerful huigan. But… i think it had so much effect on me that i acted like 3yrs old and hurt my friend’s feelings. Im sorry. it must be a weather too. i have to blame it on something. it wasnt me, its them

https://instagram.com/p/BGrrOnUBwrG/

Finished a sample of this today. I don’t have a lot to add to what I said before: this is some good tea with real endurance and significantly matured taste, with no defective or even humid storage characteristics. It’s probably too long-winded to drink every day but I’d like to be drinking something like this more often. I just keep hoping I can find something at less than $90/bing.

I purchased this bing about two years ago at what I thought was a reasonable price at the time. The bing has beautiful leaves with a colour tone that is consistent with the year of production claimed. The wet leaves produce a wonderful woody aroma with subtle hints of ripe fruits in the background – definitely a pleasant nose on this one. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about the liquor itself. There is a pleasant sweetness that brings wet wood to mind. However, this sweetness fades away quite rapidly. There is a nice slight cooling effect with this tea, however, I’d have to say that, in general, its quite dull. In my opinion, despite its age, its a decent tea, one that I would not pay its current asking price for.

Parameters : 7 g to ~ 100 ml