xingyang 2008 golden buds shu

I am still new to tea tasting; that’s my disclaimer for the following. I was really looking forward to this tea due to the Verdant description of “pound cake” and “whipped cream” as main flavors. But what I tasted was hands down medicinal. Something in this tastes how an acupuncturist treatment room smells. A kind of acrid and bitter underside to the tea, is it like moxa? Is that camphor? Menthol or wintergreen? It has a coolness about it and engages the nose a lot, as if there were volatiles being released. Chinese medicinal roots. Like chewing on a licorice root. This stood out in the aroma of the steeped leaves as well. Maybe, maybe in steep I tasted some whipped cream, but I also was wanting to taste that from the start, so maybe I was imagining. The texture is smooth and rich with some creaminess.

I have tasted less than 10 shu pu’er so far, and this one was different from all the others, so it was a good experience in showing me new possibilities. However, the upfront medicinal taste (and aftertaste) disqualifies this tea for me in terms of daily drinking. This is a tea I would recommend to taste with friends for a session comparing and contrasting different shu pu’er.

I will be curious to see what other reviews say.

The leaves are small, dark, and compact, with some broken leaves and dust from its excision from a larger cake. (I unfortunately do not have an entire cake, although I do love this tea.) The layers are visible from the side of the chunk and are separated without much difficulty using a pu’er pick. The scent is mostly vanilla to me, with a sweetness that could potentially be the cake flavor the description reads.

First I did a 8 sec rinse, then the first steep was about 15 sec. The color of the brew is a medium red-toned chestnut; it smells much the leaves did. The taste starts off sweet and ends with a thickening (best I can describe it) of the taste, with vanilla throughout. The aftertaste is a pleasant fading of the vanilla, leaving a heavy feel on the back of my tongue.

Second steep of ~30 sec. The taste was much the same, although the heaviness was more apparent. The leaves have now fully broken apart from the clump I first put in the gaiwan.

Third steep of ~60 sec. The taste is more subtle now, and the heaviness lighter. The color of the brew is unchanged however.