Norbu Tea

I wish I know what I did that was so distinctive, but recently I brewed up the best infusion of this tea ever. I did it a little carelessly, in bulk, for my thermos, so can’t be sure of the exact parameters. But it was floral, vegetal, and sweet, so delicately perfect that people were asking for seconds and it didn’t sit in the thermos long enough to lose that fresh-brewed perfection.

Wow.

This is a favorite green tea. There is a slightly peachy/fruity/camphor note in this tea that is distinct from the nuttier edge of a Dragon Well. Also, this is a particularly mellow tea. It is possible to find bitterness in it, but you really have to try: very hot water or very long steeps or way concentrated. And it has amazing ‘legs’ for a green tea—I just keep going for 8 or 10 infusions.

I brew this one with a wide range of conditions: the leaves are so light and loose that it’s hard to eyeball accurately, but it’s so forgiving that I’m not often motivated to measure it. Anything from 0.5-1 grams of tea per ounce/30mL water, water from 160-180 degrees, steep time 15 seconds (for high concentration/hotter water/early steeps) to more than a minute (lower concentration/cooler water/later steeps). Its a rare green tea that even holds up well with brew-in-advance hold-all-day in the thermos.

(A free sample included with my last order from Norbu)

This is a warm, dark, toasty oolong. It reminds me a lot of the Tung Ting I got from TenRen, and my longtime companion SeaDyke Ti Kuan Yin. First impression is just toasty, roasty, dark, woody. Then it starts to open up a little, fruity, sweet, complex.

I started 185 degree water, 3.5 grams of tea in one of my larger yixing pots, but not filling fully—trying to keep it to about 1 gram leaf to 1 oz water. Each new infusion, the first impression is the toastedness, then the fruity sweetness becomes apparent after a few sips, as those the toasty tastebuds are getting saturated and there is attention available to notice the sweet fruity backdrop. Later infusions more quickly drop the toasted mask, and show these flavors sooner.

I think I might prefer this with a little less roast, so that I get to the sweet/fruity sooner. I agree with Greg’s description of the very smooth rich feeling of the liquor, and the remarkably pleasant aftertaste.

A nice session with this tea this evening—sweet, mellow, a little hint of floral, just pleasant and nice: started 160 degrees, up to 180 degrees after 5-6 infusions.

Drinking it again today, right after a particularly nice set of infusions of Dragon well, and having drunk some of the Jin Xuan green tea last night, and it does have a subtly different flavor that is not particularly like those greens, or quite like a green oolong either. Can’t put a name to it yet, though.

Another very fine brewing of this tea. This time it was a gaiwan for gongfu cha, and it responded beautifully. I started with water at 170 degrees, and the first infusion sat a while because I was interrupted; by the time I was free to drink it, it was not very hot or very good. After that, I brief infusions from 10 seconds increasing gradually to one minute, water from 160-170 degrees, and the flavor has a lovely warmth that is almost oolong-ish, but still a bit of astringency and with that first messed up infusion, some distinct bitterness marking it as something closer to a green tea than an oolong. Still haven’t had the best I think it can give, but if my next infusion can take place without interruption or audience, I should get it right. I would start a little cooler, with 160, then moving warmer as I continue to infuse.

What a lovely mellow tea. I started out with what looked like a small volume of green leaves in my kamjove, which had little scent, then added water and there was a strong scent of green peas. Lovely. The leaves expanded to fill their chamber almost entirely. The first steep was a little long and ended up overconcentrated, and I did find a little bitterness in it; but when I finished up a thermos full from these leaves, it ended up as essence of summer hay, warm and mellow, just lovely.

I can see this will be a keeper. I think it will be particularly nice of an evening, to keep infusing while doing paperwork, semi-gongfu cha, but also is going to be lovely for a thermos full when I have to be away from my desk for half a day or more. But I will watch that first steep.

I was particularly pleased with this one because I recently tried some “silver needle yellow tea” from Hunan which was just unbearably bitter for me, very unlike the couple of wonderful yellow teas I’ve had from other sources.

It’s been nearly a year since I took notes on this one. It has sat in its wrapper, in a cloth bag, in a file drawer in my air-conditioned office for the past year. I’ve dipped into this a few times since last year, and this time I’m using a piece that, when hydrated, fills the gaiwan between 1/3 and 1/2 full. I started with a flash rinse, let the tea hydrate/wet a bit, then have been enjoying a series of quick, hot infusions—the Pino is set to 205, and I’ve been infusing 10-20 seconds, and mostly drinking them down very quickly. Lots of herbaceous flavor, sweetness, anise, but little outright bitterness. It’s just delicious, and again, the biggest problem I foresee with this aging experiment may be trying to drink it sparingly enough to keep some around for a long time.

This has been a bit of a breakthrough tea for me. I first tried it as a sample and was put off by the bitterness. Then I tried it again as part of a tasting group and worked out a way to enjoy it: I prepare it like a green tea—lower water temps. The bitterness is still there around the edges but I slurp this one up, avoiding tasting right with the tip of my tongue, and get the wonderful sweet rich flavor in the back of my throat, a little smoky, a touch earthy, and go through infusion after infusion.

I bought a beeng of this one because I want to age it and follow the changes to see how the bitter flavors change with time. I am not working with selected temp & humidity conditions, nor did I buy multiple beengs—just playing with the idea of aging more than anything else.

I like to give this one a quick boiling water flash rinse, then let sit to hydrate with the water that clings to the chunk of cake, about 2-3 grams in my small gaiwan, infusing about 60-75 mL, while the water in the kettle cools to the desired 170-180 degrees. Then, a bunch of short infusions, 10" or less at first, up to 30+" by the time I’ve done a dozen or two.

I’ve even done this one as a bulk brewing for my thermos, to share with colleagues at work during the afternoon, and gotten a good response. The hard part will be keeping enough intact for some semi-meaningful aging, to watch the young sheng turn into mature puerh.

This one looked just too unique not to try!

It’s so hard to describe these buds so please look at the product pic!

Prior to infusion it has a mellow floral-candied-sweet smell. Post infusion…a sweet carrot smell is what I thought about first with a little sweet spring floral scent and almost a sweet chocolate hint or something…I know…totally random and really strange. :)

This is completely white in color but it’s very flavorful! It’s an extremely clean and sweet taste – very hydrating!

This is a tea you will have to try even if only for the experience! This will be in the “make-up” TTB! So…be on the look out!!!

Only one tasting note for this tea? I’ve nearly finished my 50g pouch of it. It continues to be a lovely, giving tea, mellow and wonderful, and I expect to keep teas like it in my regular rotation, as long as I can find them. It’s enough of an oddity that I can easily imagine it vanishing.

After a question came up about whether this was an oolong or a green tea, I decided to check by brewing again, and it was clearly behaving like a green tea, less tempermental than most, but clearly a lovely sweet delicate green tea, with just enough astringency to confirm its green nature.

Again finding this is one lovely green tea. I’ve been brewing it like an oolong, covering the bottom of my small gaiwan with the rolled leaves, and finding that they expand to intact leaves that mostly fill it. I use cooler water—160-170 degrees—because it is a green tea, and the flavor is more vegetal and less floral than the green oolongs, but it is as easy and flexible and forgiving in terms of slightly variable quantities of leaf to water, and varied steep times from 15 seconds to a minute or quite a bit more with later steepings. The steeps thus do vary in flavor and intensity but are never bitter despite that. I’ve brewed up several green teas in the past day (shincha!, korean green, dragon well) and each of those has reminded me that they need attention and respect to remain mellow and pleasant. This one just stays mellow regardless of my fumblings. Love that!

Edited: still haven’t reached the end of the flavor from these leaves, now at least 8-10 steepings in. I do like my teas somewhat diluter than many, but this is still amazing for a green tea. Very oolong-like in this too.

The notes from Norbu identify this tea as a varietal “usually processed into a mildly fragrant oolong tea”, but what this one reminded me of was an Alishan oolong, but without the oolong—if that makes sense. There is a strongly floral undertone here that reminds me of the Alishan teas, more than a typical mainland green tea. And, like the Alishan teas, this one steeped and steeped—my first brewing was informal (i.e., did not weigh the leaves, sorry), and with enough balls of leaf to lightly cover the bottom of the gaiwan, water 160-170 degrees, my friend and I were able to enjoy probably 8 infusions before we were done, with the first one maybe 15 second and later infusions up to a minute. Sweet, vegetal, occasional hints of astringency, but no bitterness, and that floral/haylike undertone that was so nice, over and over.

The best TGY from this past year I tried. Diamond, indeed.

A nice traditional roast Wuyi Yancha from Norbu, the spring 2009 harvest.

Brewed this one up several times, water 185-195 degrees, 1-2 grams of leaf per 1 ounce/30mL, infusions at 30-60 seconds apiece, in a small gaiwan. I can infuse it 8-10 times and still enjoy all of them.

It starts spicy/sweet, moves on to more earthy/fruity, and is delightful all the way.

I have too many good oolongs in the cupboard to have room for one more right now, but I’ll keep this in mind for the future. It’s not as strongly spiced as the one Rou Gui I’ve had, but the flavor goes longer than the Rou Gui too.

First brewing in a long time of this favorite, in a tiny yixing pot, drinking from a new gorgeous little tea cup, and the jewel-like glaze on the cup matched the delicate floral/camphor loveliness of the tea perfectly. Mmmmm…. Flash rinse after flash rinse, and lots more left in the leaves to enjoy this evening.

This lovely tea continues to make friends and influence people. Today Lisa said, “this is the first time I haven’t added anything—no honey or lemon or sugar—to my tea!”

And this was a cup from an admittedly inferior brewing—fit in around some crazy fast-paced work that went right through lunch—a 30 minute first infusion (not a typo, yes, 30 MINUTES!), several more almost as insane infusions, mixed in the thermos, and the end result was not only drinkable, but charmed someone new to my teas. Good job, dear puerh!

coming back to a dear friend, after romancing a lot of sweet young things…..or rather, somewhat bitter young things…..

So, after having drunk some 2010 white buds* that are basically the same tea, uncompressed, the parallels are so clear, and the tea is so nice, that I am, naturally, falling in love all over again with this tea, as I do every few months. I’m drinking it very dilute, as this is the end of the day and I don’t want to be buzzed all night, which may amplify the similarities with the uncompressed young tea.

A moment of overconfidence and overlong brewing was a clear reminder that this is PUERH, and not to be taken for granted, yet it gave only momentary pause, not oops-dump-and-start-next-infusion-over response. Even when it’s bad it’s good.

*http://www.norbutea.com/2010_Spring_YongDeBaiYa

I have just finished off my second thermos full of the 2007 White Bud Sheng Puerh from Norbu (a private production cake which is now sold out). This was a typical thermos brewing—working with the kamjove ‘gongfu art’ brewing thingie, flash rinse, starting brewing with water even before it quite hit boiling, having to stop and start several times over an hour and half as other work kept pulling me out of the office, and finally ending up with a brilliant thermos of tea, subtly smoky, sweet, with a warm background of caramel. Just soothing and calming and oh so good. And as is usual for this tea, a little went a long way—maybe 5 grams-8 grams for a 1 quart thermos full, then resteeped for a second full batch. Fortunately, I have several more beengs of this in reserve. Heh.

I love this one: smoky, sweet, earthy, and if I keep my infusions short enough, not bitter.

1 gram of leaf per ounce water just off the boil, in gaiwan or small yixing, flash rinse, then short steeps, 10", 10", 15", 15", 20", 20", and so forth. I have continued to enjoy 20+ infusions from this tea. It also does nicely bulk brewed: a good wedge of tea, toss it into the kamjove, flash rinse, then steep a minute or so, pour several more volumes of water through it quickly, and add all to the thermos for a long afternoon’s work or meeting or drive.

Another one I love so much that I have one beeng at work, one at the new satellite office, and gave one to a good tea buddy who also loves it, and now I need to bring another chunk home because I have run out here, and that is not a good thing!