Chun Ya is a green tea I haven’t heard about that often, and the dearth of notes on it suggests I’m not the only one. I steeped around 3 g of leaf in an 85 ml teapot at 185F for 10, 15, 20, 30, 40, 50, 80, 120, and 240 seconds. I also steeped about 2 g of tea in 200 ml of 185F water starting at 4 minutes, adding hot water as needed.
The dry aroma is of flowers, green beans, and chestnuts. The first gongfu steep has notes of green beans, spinach, chestnuts, grass, and faint florals. The next steep has a hoppy/piny bitterness and adds brussels sprouts and watercress. The next couple steeps have notes of hops, cilantro, spinach, asparagus, and chestnuts and are getting bitter. The final few steeps are predictably earthy and bitter, with notes of brussels sprouts, spinach, and grass.
As with the other green teas, bowl steeping brings out many of the pleasant notes (chestnuts, hops, florals, asparagus, spinach) without the increasingly unpleasant bitterness. What it lacks in complexity, it makes up for in drinkability.
I have to say that to my untrained palate, these green teas are much of a muchness. This one is less savoury than the Lu Shan Yun Wu but less nutty/sweet/elegant than the Huo Shan Huang Ya and Bi Luo Chun. I think I would repurchase all of these three teas instead of this one. I already cheated on this drink-all-my-green-teas project with a Red Jade hongcha from What-Cha and an Alishan from Tillerman (no regrets!). However, I will keep forging ahead. Thanks to Teavivre for the samples!
Flavors: Asparagus, Bitter, Butter, Chestnut, Earth, Floral, Grass, Green Beans, Herbaceous, Hops, Pine, Spinach, Vegetal
