Here is a short back story on my decision to purchase this tea. Last year when I was trying a bunch of black teas from Camellia Sinensis (my first year purchasing from them too), I was pretty overwhelmed by all of the options. Not knowing which teas would sell first, I didn’t prioritize buying this one. And well, as you can tell by where this story is going, it sold out! Fast forward to this year, I saw Mei Zhan Zhen was back in stock and immediately purchased it. (Now that a month or two has passed, this tea is once again unavailable.)
Onto my tasting notes:
Dry leaves have a strong sweet and floral fragrance. It also makes me think of marzipan or cinnamon rolls.
First steep: As expected, it does taste very floral, but still in an amount I can tolerate. Sipping some more, there is a very enjoyable mix of aromas: spices, floral, pastry, earthy black tea flavour. The tea body isn’t heavy, but I wouldn’t say that it is too light.
Second steep: I like how the flavours continue to build up, but none of the many flavours screams out at you. The more I sip, the more some other type of aroma comes out (reminds me of pine trees or something).
Third steep: Still maintaining a consistent flavour, not weakening yet.
Fourth steep: The liquor has become darker, and the flavour has really exploded too. Both the spices and floral aroma shine in this cup. I like how there is this fuzzy, velvety, and thick texture to the liquor has it goes down.
Fifth steep: Pretty similar to the fourth steep, maybe a touch more harsh and astringent.
Sixth steep: Tea liquor has weakened a bit, but otherwise the aroma is still powerful.
Seventh through ninth steeps: Floral, spices, and pastry flavours are still noticeable. I stopped on the ninth because I was pretty satisfied and full of too much tea. ;) If my husband were around to help with drinking it, we could probably get a few more steeps out.
I think CS does a good job of not only providing a lot of excellent black teas, but ones that different enough from each other. This is a pricey one, but I’m looking forward to at least buying another 25g next year.
Overall I found it to be a charming black tea. It shares a lot of characteristics I’ve come to seek, but also provides new and unique characteristics that make it memorable. As someone who can be turned off of floral black teas, I think this is a good balance between the very earthy black teas and overly floral ones.
100ml purion teapot, 2 tsp, 9 steeps (30s, +15s each resteep)
