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Had a really bad weekend after finally tapering off my SSRIs (a process that’s taken me four months), so right now I’m trying to get my bearings back with tea and reading. Got this from a friend as a good comfort tea, and he was right! This stuff is delish, sweet and light and has a very strong fruity milk taste. Also the smell of this tea is incredible—I could spend a day with my nose in the bag. Plus, it’s way cheap and seems to steep like a champ. Exactly what I needed, honestly.

These buds and I have had a rocky relationship. I first got them about a month ago, after reading some rave-y reviews here on Steepster. I plopped a good amount into my gaiwan and started brewing, only to be greeted with…sourness. These things were so unbelievably sour, like someone had squeezed an unripe lemon into my tea. I tossed them after a few steeps.

Over the past couple weeks I’ve brewed them up a few times, and have learned to use less leaf and colder water. I’ve got the brewing parameters right, but still don’t love these things. They’re sort of sweet up-front, but with this lingering, drying sourness that I can’t seem to shake no matter how low the temp/how fast I steep. It’s the kind of sourness that sits at the back of your throat and coats your tongue…ugh.

As for the rest of the taste, they’re a little sweet and have a sort of malty flavor to them. I’m not getting the hay or usual white tea flavors with these—they’re their own thing.

Anyway, while they’re very much not to my taste, other people seem to like them! Just brace yourself for a mouth-puckering experience.

Got 25g of this since I loved the 2013 sample I bought so much and I wanted to see what it would be like with some age. I’m a little under the weather so take this with a grain of salt, but I just didn’t like this nearly as much as the 2013. Flavor profile was similar, with some earthiness and that deep fruity sweetness lingering. It just was way more muted and less interesting than the 2013—fewer flavor notes I could pick up and less thick and satisfying. I also felt the mouth-watering effects were far less on this cake than the 2013. Still definitely good, and it’s lasting till 8 steeps with dark brews, but as it stands now I’d choose the 2013 over the 2011.

Brewing up this tea has been sort of a comedy of errors for me. I was super excited to get some in my last YS shipment (I’d split 50g with a friend), and decided to brew up a big thermos of it for work in the morning. I did what I call “speed gong-fu,” which is essentially a normal gong fu session minus the drinking part—I just dumped everything into a thermos. I sealed the lid and looked forward to some delicious sugar-roasted tea in the morning.

I was so wrong.

So yeah, the way I brewed this tea made it unbelievably bitter, like bagged black tea that’s been in the cup all day. I could take a few sips of it here and there and got some nice sweet potato-y notes, but otherwise it was awful. I poured it on my little dorm plant, in the end.

This afternoon my friend decided to make a big mug of it western-style, which I also tried. Much less disgusting than before, but it still had an unpleasant (read: not chocolatey) bitterness on the end, and just tasted sort of…weird. Maybe because of the sugar I expected it to be super mild, but it’s got a very strong taste, with some definite sour and bitter notes. It’s also strangely salty-tasting—last night when I did my little tea session my whole room ended up smelling sort of briny…which is strange.

Anyway, not loving this at the moment, but I’m planning to do a more definitive session today or tomorrow and see how it goes!

Got this tea from a swap with the generous Matu. I have a little complex with this tea—because it’s a gift I really want to like it. But as it is…the tea’s not great. It’s just very, very watery, with none of that interesting salivation or thickness going on.

Funny to think that I see salivation as a good thing, since before getting into pu’erh the idea would’ve grossed me out. But I dunno, sampling something like the 2013 Hui Run, I’ve come to love that saliva feel. Anyway!

This tea has sort of an anemic color, which along with the bitter note of smoke makes me think it’s less fermented. Probably could use more time either way.

As far as flavor, this tea has some up-front bitterness that’ll probably fade with age. Under that is a little fruitiness, and some sweet notes. My main beef is it’s just so…watery. I might try cold brewing this and seeing where it goes.

When I first brewed up this tea, the two of us really didn’t get along. My sample was sort of broken up and powdery, so the first steep was incredibly strong and bitter, like getting slapped in the face with a bar of baker’s chocolate. Second steep was better, though I still didn’t love it. It was more like a 90% chocolate bar as opposed to 100%. Third and fourth steep have the same theme…the tea is just really really strong, like coats my tongue in this cocoa bitterness that diminishes over time. It’s not personally my sort of thing, but I can see how someone would like it, and I can see how this could get better with age.

Later steeps definitely got less strong, and a little thicker and sweeter. However, the tea also dropped off pretty sharply after steep seven or so. Pretty good, but not a favorite.

Got this as a sample with my recent berylleb order. At first I was totally mystified. The Menghai Tea Factory…makes bagged tea? And bagged ripe pu’erh?

I tore the thing open to get a look. I was doing this in the dining hall at college, and my friend looked over as I pulled it out. We both stared at the tea bag.

“Looks like rat shit,” he said.

Sad to say he’s totally right. This tea not only looks like crumbles of poop, but it just tastes…bad. Plenty of fishy ripe-ness masked by heavy, heavy flower flavoring, and a sickeningly sweet aftertaste. Just…stick to the cakes Menghai. Please?

When I opened up this cake, I was struck by the color of the leaves. They’re such a rich, blackberry-black color. I also got hit by a whiff of smoke! This tea is one of the smokiest I’ve had, almost BBQ-esque…in a good way? It’s got a bit of a sweet note too, and it’s not bitter. Not sure whether it’s really up my alley, but it’s definitely good for a change of pace!