Honeysuckle Puerh

Die cold, die!

Pu’er also does amazing things for when i have anything wrong with my throat. I can chain guzzle lemon honey and green tea, but pu’er does the trick in loosening slimey throat items, stopping coughs and clearing my voice.

This was one of my first straight pu’erhs and sadly now I’ve had better ones, but this one is pretty good for its juicy and honey notes.

After this, I’m going to make some firey sujebi soup. I will burn the cold out of me!

Sipdown! I’m glad to be under 70 teas but I’m sad to see this one go. After that first pepperoni misunderstanding, I think we were starting to grow close.

Not much in cedar today, but lots of sweet buttery earth- makes me think cinnamon. I’m not sure if that last note is intended or if it’s just because it sat beside Jackie T’s winter chai in my cupboard for four plus months. Either way, the overall outcome is delicious. Thanks again for the samples, Jackie T.

Thanks Moraiwe! Oh my I completely forgot about this pu erh. I’ve had it once before and loved it. I was going to buy a larger amount but forgot D: so thanks Moraiwe for sending this sample. I love the earthy sweetness of this pu erh. It has a nice floral/earthy aroma and a honey like sweetness to it. I read Moraiwe’s review about how honey opens the flavors up a bit more so I added a touch. It kind of does! It has more of a floral/sweet flavor that lingers. This was such a lovely treat before heading off to work! Thanks again!!

It is a pu-erh kind of day today. I have PLENTY of teas right now, but not a whole lot of pu-erhs I really like, and only one serving of this one left!

I drank no tea yesterday. Truth be told until suppertime the only fluid I drank was a glass of milk first thing in the morning. I got busy and just lost track of time. I was hoping to make up lost time today but haven’t done well so far. I am following so many people there is no way I can catch up with tasting notes. I barely checked in on Steepster yesterday now I have way to many unread notes. I have got a few cups of this one in me though.

First the bad news. I cannot make the honeysuckle connection. It grows wild in the fence rows all around here. In the summertime the air is amazing in the early morning air. Slow car rides with the windows down are highly recommended.

Now the good. This is a very mellow gentle puerh. The dry leaf scent is like a fruity black tea with hints of mint. The sip is very smooth with a sweet forest floor woodsy floral aroma. My first cup was at 30 s and it was light with notes of mint. The second I went 5 minutes per The Persimmon Tree suggestion. It was a little stronger and spicier but really pretty similar to the first. I actually preferred the first. I think next time I’ll start at 2 minutes and adjust from there. This is a really nice first unflavored puerh with enough depth to grow with you for quite a while.

I’m surprised to be the first to rate this! I’m feeling the pressure!

Well, the only other puerh I really have experience with is DAVIDSteas’ Chocolate Orange. It’s pretty strongly flavored where you don’t taste the puerh-ness as much. Well, this is obviously different. As soon as I opened the sample bag, I got a strong whiff of a familiar scent. This Honeysuckle Puerh smells like crawfish. While crawfish are delicious, I DO NOT want a tea that tastes like them. So I decided to try rinsing the leaves. I ran hot water through them for probably about ten seconds. Hopefully that was enough to bring out the honeysuckle and the non-fishy side of puerh (whatever that tastes like?)

Hmm. So I’m getting some of the crawfish flavor and some earthy flavors with some notes of nut. But what I’m definitely not getting is honeysuckle. I’m not experienced enough to know if I rinsed it too much (could I have rinsed the flavor out?), not enough, or if I need to add sweetner. I’ll need to experiment with this.

Loose
Appearance: dark loose curled leaf
Aroma when Dry: honeysuckle, sweet, woody, faint floral
After water is first poured: honeysuckle syrup
At end of first steep: bright, sweet, floral
Tea liquor:
At end of first steep: leather brown
Staple?No
Preferred time of day: any, save evening
Taste:
At first?: crisp, smooth leather notes, floral honeysuckle close
As it cools?: honeysuckle notes open, tea starts to get slightly peaty, foresty, tea gets bodied
Additives used (milk, honey, sugar etc)? No
Lingers? Perfumy floral honeysuckle notes

Second Steep (3 min)
At first: lighter texture, same notes

I threw a sample of this in with my last order. I am very pleasantly surprised by this tea.

The first sip was cloyingly sweet, but after that the tea soon mellowed out and there’s only a faint sweetness cutting the earthiness of the pu’erh. If I don’t take a sip for a few minutes, it sweetens back up.

I quite like this. I’m not normally a pu’erh fan but I like this.

I really thought I was craving something earthy and dark just now, but obviously my tastebuds had something different in mind. That being the case, I definitely sweetened this one with just a little honey after the first sip. The woodsy flavor and very slight smokiness just wasn’t cutting it for me untouched and the honeysuckle finish wasn’t quite enough to make it so. But wow WOW WOOOOW that tiny touch of honey really opened some beautiful floral and sweet notes. It makes the whole sip have this really sweet afterthought that is so complementary to the puerh flavor. Yum! I’ll definitely be squeaking all the resteeps I can out of this one today.

This tea smells very interesting – nothing like I would have assumed honeysuckle puerh would smell like. The dry leaf scent is kinda like molasses. The tea brews up very dark and tastes syrupy, fighting between wet forest notes of shou with the bright floral notes. The resulting taste is thick and a little sweet. I think it would be a good first step for someone who wants to know about puerh without really diving into it.