2014 Laochatou Ripe Puerh Tea

almost all the nuggets had fungus on them, no crystalization, not golden flowers, white spots…fungus. I am not sure I’ll be even venturing into this tea. This is how it arrived (not due to my storage).

Nabbed this one from the first GCTTB when I had it a month or so ago…

I brewed this one up Western style to enjoy whilst having a long soak in the tub. I haven’t yet found a practical way to enjoy Gong Fu whilst having a bubble bath, but rest assured that once I do I’ll be taking advantage of those long soaks to enjoy some Gong Fu brewed Pu’erh.

I was a little surprised by this one; it had a really upfront sticky, fruity sweetness to it and a mouthfeel to match that syrupy quality. I’d say those intense fruity notes really reminded me of both raisins and plums. Apart from that, this had your typical array of earthy, brothy and mineral notes and then a richness in the foreground that I think would best be described as a fudgey, chocolate note and maybe even a little bit of caramel? The caramel was a stronger presence in the aftertaste, where it lingered on the tip of your tongue. About halfway through my mug, I noticed I was also observing a little bit of an sweet and umami quality as well in the top of the sip alongside the raisin/plum. Initial impression was tomato, but looking back on it I’m thinking a bit more of a persimmon. Persimmon is like a tomato, but sweeter/fruitier with a more honeyed taste to it.

So, a very enjoyable as well as interesting and even somewhat unique cuppa.

Thought i’d start the day out with a puerh since otherwise i won’t make time for it. This gives me a chance to take a few moments to wake up, and settle my mind before another day of tearing apart the house. These came to me from christina and were on my wishlist to try, so thank you for that!

initial steepings of this are quite nice. Smooth, a little reminiscent of “special dark” but not quite…some sweetness here as well, richness to the taste. It’ll be interesting to see how this develops.

Wow! I purchased this tea after reading a bunch of reviews here on Steepster and finding out that it was as cheap as it was. I hardly regret my purchase, and will likely add some more to my cupboard at some point. Following the reviews, I gave this tea two boiling rinses of thirty seconds each, with a firm shake of the gaiwan in between to loosen up the nuggets. The lid of the pot smelled rather savory, with notes of beef broth and dark earth. After time this loosened up and I started to smell more of the chocolate that I had been reading about, and knew I was in for a ride. The taste began dusty and like dark earth, which flowed into a rich chocolate, almost like dark chocolate brownies. There was a definite savory note, of course, but it was the savoriness of the salt you put in the cookie dough, rather than a fishy sense. After a while, the cocoa started to fade, and I was left with something more like a snickerdoodle or soft oatmeal cookies sweetened with molasses. The sweetness went on and on. After six steeps, I tipped the tea nuggets into my thermos and poured about a cup and a half of boiling water over them to let them sit for ten minutes. I’d heard about boiling this stuff, but I guess my pots are aluminum, because everything tastes metallic and awful, so I figured this would do. The broth I wound up with was earthy, bitter and sweet, with lots of molasses cookies and a tinge of mineralness that was very good.

I reviewed this tea with some pictures here: http://writing.drab-makyo.com/posts/tasting/2016/04/07/white2-laochatou/

Shou and I are not exactly on the best of terms. It’s too earthy. It’s too fishy. I hear people say they like it, that it’s so rich, but when I make it, the results just leave me….flat.

I gotta admit, when I took the tea out of the bag to measure it and start steeping, it looked… dubious. The nuggets were small, matte, dark brown, and just in general highly suggestive of some other type of substance.

I took 5.25 grams of these nuggets and made sure to give them a good, thorough rinsing before drinking: two rinses of 30 seconds each with just-boiled water.

After that, I did a first steep of 20 seconds. The resulting liquid was a deep reddish-brown, like beef broth. The flavour was light, but overall it was earthy, slightly fishy, somewhat salty and savoury. Kinda like soup broth.

The second, third and fourth steeps were all for 30 seconds, and they were pretty similar in taste to the first, if only a bit more intense in colour and flavour. The smell was savoury, brothy, and earthy, with notes of spices like cinnamon, star anise and clove. The mouthfeel here was also pretty thick, like soup broth.

Over time, I also noticed grainy notes that reminded me of popcorn. However, I’m not getting the chocolate or caramel notes the description above promised. Where is my chocolate, White2Tea??

On the fourth steep, I started to notice a cool sensation creeping across my mouth and throat, like menthol or camphor. My lips also started tingling.

The fifth, sixth, and seventh steeps were 40-50 seconds long. The flavour still hadn’t developed those chocolate notes I was told to expect but when I smelled the lid of the gaiwan after the sixth steep, I noticed scents of tobacco and a sweetness that reminded me of red bean past. The second steep was a bit lighter in colour, but by that point I had pretty much used up the water in the teapot so I wasn’t interested in drinking anymore.

At least I didn’t get any caffeine rush this time.

What’s amazing is that even after seven or so steeps, these nuggets still hadn’t unfurled. They were still compact, dark, and tightly packed.

Full review at: http://booksandtea.ca/2016/02/lao-cha-tou-ripe-puerh-white2tea/

I didn’t think I’d write a review this weekend as it didn’t go so well. Anyways, I tried to escape the emotional pain via tea; in case you were wondering, it doesn’t work.
Here’s my attempt: http://postimg.org/image/648w2w0hf/
A few hundred cups within 72 hours and here I am drinking this absolutely wonderful tea that I had to come online to review it. First let me say this: There is no better deal out there that I am aware of, roughly $6 for 50g… absolutely blew my mind.
This was a sample someone provided for me and upon my first sip I had the same thoughts as I did when I first sipped Repave: There goes my paycheck.
However, the price on this is CHEAP. This tea has a thick texture that makes one think of molasses but taste of chocolate from another dimension. The smell wouldn’t tell you that and neither would keeping the liquid in your mouth, but once you drink it down there is this immediate robust flavor of a dessert that you’ve been craving all day (even if you haven’t been, you will realize it was there all along).
I’m just in shock at how amazing this tea is. I’ll be buying a decent amount of this to share with others because when you find something great, why wouldn’t you share it?

I had to pick up some of these as everyone kept raving about them. They steep up dark pretty quick, but they’re light on flavor at the beginning. It takes maybe four or more steeps to get them going, and you really gotta steep them out long….several minutes, and then they’re amazing! Sweet, rich cocoa, mmm! Reminds me of Mandala’s special dark…that kind of cocoa, but maybe sweeter! My kinda Shou! I almost feel like I shouldn’t like them though, because aren’t they like the leftovers? The scraps? So delicious though!

Yum yum yummm. This is so tasty!

So, change of pace from all the W2T shengs I’ve been trying, I decided to brew up the old tea nuggets. :) Roughly 5g of nuggets in my 100ml gaiwan, boiling(ish) water. A 30sec rinse, then I gave the nuggets in the waterless gaiwan a good shake to try to loosen them a little, then another 30sec rinse. Then 20sec steep adding 10sec each time, until I got to 100sec at which point I started adding 20sec at a time. Wheee. :) Does anybody else use www.steep.it to time their tea steeping sometimes?

Anyway, this is sweet and creamy and pretty much delicious. I got a bit of cocoa 4 or 5 steeps in, but mostly this has raisin, prune, date notes for me. At one point it reminded me of a good dark fruitcake, you know, with lots of molasses and real dried fruit? It’s not overly complex, it doesn’t have a crazy texture or surprising aftertaste, I just keep drinking it as fast as I can brew it because it’s so darn tasty! Also, I might be just exhausted because I’ve had a long day, but I had to go lie down after about 6 steeps. ;)

I’ve tried a few Laochatous and this one is my favorite so far. Ready to drink, very smooth, sweet, chocolate and fruity at the same time. Brews up deep and dark, coffee-like. Probably a good place to start for a coffee lover looking to get into Pu’er. These nuggets last a long time, and you can’t really over-steep them as far as I can tell; I’ve forgotten I had them in water a few times and the flavor was still lovely with no bitterness. This makes it a good work tea for me because I can focus on other things and still have a seemingly never-ending and delicious cup of tea that lasts the whole day.

This reminded me of Yanxin’s Reserve, with a sweet pastry type flavor to it.