Question? Does your mood affect your tea experience?
Generally I wake up in the morning in a good mood, I am grateful for a new day and looking forward for what the day will bring. Today, however, I was feeling a little off – I didn’t want to speak and I just wanted to be left alone – don’t talk to me husband, don’t purr at me cat, stop following me around the house dog, ugh. I was feeling pretty damn grumpy. So grumpy that I actually sat staring at the wall and contemplated for quite some time about having a tea session. I finally decided on having some tea and decided to try one of the newer teas I recently purchased.
A couple of weeks ago I purchased an 11 year old puerh — which is the oldest tea in my collection – 2006 Yi Pin Tang “Menghai Lao Shu” Ripe Puerh Tea Cake – I am really trying to explore the world of ripe puerh and have been starting out with ripe puerhs older than 5 years. My thought in purchasing this tea and others was also to explore not only the age but to figure out if these price points were truly worth the investment for my tea drinking overall? Does price truly matter? (A topic I plan to explore later down the line.)
But back to this Menghai Lao Shu cake, I have to say that this first session was very uneventful. And I truly believe from the bottom of my heart that it was my mood. Not to say there aren’t bad teas or that my taste buds just ain’t feeling this particular batch – but I am telling you at this time it was the worst tea I had ever had. I was not impressed and I found it hard to touch on any flavor profile or aroma.
The flavor took quite some time for me to pull together – all I could think was it tastes like “storage” – like it has sat in a cardboard box in the back of a closet for years?!?! Which it probably has. Then eventually, after 4 steeps I got hints of wet wood — Still not something I was feeling at all. The aroma was of cardboard – dry leaf to wet leaf…I was not getting anything more than cardboard.
So again I wonder was this my experience due to my mood at the time. Will this change the next time I have a session with this tea? My hope is that it will, but I am definitely taking notes of this first session with this tea and will make sure the next time I sit with this I am in a better mood, and see what differences may come of it…..
Fingers crossed for a better experience next time around. To Be Continued…..
Flavors: Wet wood
