2007 Changtai Lingbao sheng (380g)

OK. So I’m holding space here for a proper review. This is just an initial impression.

I need to let the cake properly humidify but I couldn’t resist pulling off a little chunk.

Brewed in a 90ml Zhuni pot with 4.5g of leaves with boiling spring water.

At the first smell of the leaves (after the wash) I’m transported to a camphorous, mulchy woodland in autumn with my nose over a bowl of steamy vanilla rice pudding covered in apricot jam.

If you’re familiar with a nice patisserie it’s not a million miles away from a decent ‘oranais aux abricots’. The type with custard-cream and almonds a little burned on the edges.

The spicy apricot jam smell fades to a tart but softened apple pie filling after a few steeps. It definitely has the baked goods thing going on.

I’m always struck by how softened fruit acidity can be right on the edge of camphor (or how close those scents can be).

Colour of the soup is dark brandy, but less of the viscosity.

I’d say that’s a pretty good start.

Mouthfeel isn’t thick and is quite soft with zero astringency. It’s creamy, mildly sweet and smooth. Very ‘vanilla pudding’ in taste.

One negative point is that I’m getting a little sour tart aftertaste (it was pretty dry) so I hope that’ll go away after a short stay in the pu bin. The flavour doesn’t seem to linger much. It’s also falling a bit flat… but I think this is due to the dryness and hopefully it’ll round out.

This is something that I’d recommend trying right off the bat. For the money, it seems incredibly good $/g. But I’ll update this if things don’t turn out well.

As a first impression at least, on a relatively dry cake, I’d give this a solid 8 out of 10 (for now). Hopefully, it’ll live up to itself in a few weeks.

Starting this one out with 10 grams picked off the cake and into the yixing. I hit it with hot water for about 5 seconds and let it rest another 30 seconds to open up. The aroma of the wet leaves was almost like a damp forest floor. Like you would find in the woods after hiking through it after a rain shower. The first brew was about 10 seconds as I forgot to set the timer. It brews a nice dark golden color in the glass mug. It has a slight semblance of ’smokiness" to it but only briefly. This quickly turns into a pine and honey flavor. A touch of fleeting bitter and it is back to the honey. this is one of those teas that will make the tip of your tongue slightly numb and excite and tingle the middle part of it. it give the cooling effect after drinking it.
This is a nice enjoyable sheng to those who would like the slight smokiness similar to an aged Xiaguan tea. Very solid for the first cup and afford-ably priced for a whole cake.
Second steep smoke has subsided a bit . A little more bitter turning slightly sweet and the numbing punch is still there..