Kunlu Sheng Pu-erh from Ancient Tea Tree 2010 Spring

captain’s backlog teadate 27-may-2020

via ashmanra. much thanks :)

A mellowing, very natural feeling tea. Aroma of bitter white florals that are very perfume-like and incense along the line of myrrh transfer into the mouth and meet with hay-dry grass and floral-incensey bitterness, hints of leather. Smooth and savory. As steeps progress, buttery caramel begins to appear in taste and mouthfeel. Light oats and unripe apricot also come out. Slight tangy and mineral finish with some mouthwatering precedes a short unripe apricot aftertaste. Huigan arrives late but isn’t shy, followed by menthol and camphor. I’m digging this one. I never felt like this tea fell off quickly and it changed ever so slightly with each infusion.

Another lovely sample from Wymm Tea. :) 6g in the 4oz gaiwan, 2 rinses with boiling water then steeping at 90deg, quick steeps (5-15sec). I really love the scent of the wet leaves of these past couple of shengs. I can’t really describe what it smells like, but I keep sticking my nose into my gaiwan after pouring to get another whiff of it. Clear light golden liquor, not much aroma to it. Wow, the mouthfeel of this tea is amazingly thick, almost syrupy. Intial steeps were very sweet, like honey-soaked apricots. Then later I started getting a sweet grassy flavour, like fresh hay. You can tell there’s a little bit of age on this, since the flavours are rounder and smoother, less of that bright zippy bitterness you see in the fresher shengs. Just a hint of that leather/old book note, and in later steeps a mineral flavour is really coming out. Nice aftertaste, with a lingering sweetness in the mouth and throat, and a slight drying sensation. I really like this one, the complexity of the flavour is quite lovely.

Of the three sheng in the sampler I ordered, this was my favorite. The other two were a bit too light for my tastes. This one was full of flavor, like a juicy, well-rounded apricot from the beginning of the session and lasting throughout. It had a bit more thickness to it also. The only thing that was disappointing for me was that it didn’t change much throughout the session. I think it would have been more interesting if it had started differently and then developed into this juicy apricot flavor after a few steeps.

This was my early morning gongfu session. I was very excited to try this tea, for I have heard multiple good tings about it. The packaging from this company still gets me. I am a sucker for aesthetic qualities. The dry leaf is composed of loosely compressed dark green and platinum dusted maocha. These long tendrils twist and ravel together to form a sweet stone-fruit scented cake. I placed a chunk inside my yixing and gave it a shake. This tea had a very sweet and succulent odor. I could hint at a mix between peaches and apricots with a grassy undertone. I began my morning brewing ritual. The steeped leaves gave off a smoky green aroma. The flavor was fantastic. I got the memory of old fashioned oatmeal that’s been doused in brown sugar. The huigan from my first sip was amazing. My entire taste buds were consumed with an encompassing sweetness. Also, There was an underlying grassy note that followed each delectable sip. I could hint at a slight smoky wisp in the background. Sadly, this flavor faded rather quickly. I had lost the powerful sweetness by about the fourth steeping. This brew was still quite good, though it had lacked the hook that grabbed me at the beginning. This drink becomes dry and slightly bitter, like that of kale, at around the seventh steeping. I was able to get nine before I decided to call it quits. This was a wonderful morning gongfu session, and it was quite a treat of Sheng for me. The qi was partially non existent. It got me going and awoken my inner self, but it wasn’t something prominent. I still enjoyed this morning’s brewing ritual.

https://instagram.com/p/5kCqt-zGdH/?taken-by=haveteawilltravel

I had it awhile ago and was pretty sure I left a review. Sorry.
I remember I had a very nice session with this tea. It’s smooth , fruity sweet and touch bitter which is really ties all the flavors together.
Many thanks to Wymmtea for giving me a chance to try their wonderful teas

https://instagram.com/p/24UCPxhwl9/

https://instagram.com/p/24WIDTBwpk/

Nice, super thick sheng with citrus, stone fruit, straw and steamed vegetal notes. The texture is my fav part of feeling fluffy and thick. I got 12 infusions via gaiwan. It does get pretty dry in the later infusions, so if I were to have this again I’d probably not carry it as long.

Big leaf too!

Full review and pictures on Oolong Owl http://oolongowl.com/2010-kunlu-spring-sheng-puer-from-wymm-tea-tea-review/

I found a treasure today! In the parking lot at the shopping center by my house, there are dividers that are filled in with gravel, specifically large river rock style gravel. Large broken chunks of cryptocrystalline quartz stained with iron oxides. I glance at the piles of rock each time I pass, but have yet to find anything really spectacular, until a glimmer of sparkle caught my eye today. Looking down I see a dark grey and blue rock with many pockets of crystalline quartz drusy, like little geodes, where most likely water was present when the rock was forming, leaving these beautiful pockets of crystal. Usually in rock piles the most I find is a slightly botryoidal agate or an especially shiny piece of chert, so this epic shiny is the best treasure I have found in a non-specific rock hunting location.

Today is a good day to talk about some Pu, specifically Wymm Tea’s Kunlu Sheng Pu-erh From Ancient Tea Tree 2010 Spring! As you can see from the name, this is a Sheng hailing from the Kunlu Mountain, a mountain which sits at the end of the Wuliang range. Over 200 years ago Kunlu Mountain was the imperial tea garden for the (obviously, what with it being imperial) Qing Emperor, quite illustrious history. As fun as history and all that is, what really makes a tea is its sensory qualities, history is just an added topping, if you will. The leaves are dark, with a delicate patch of fuzzy pekoe (Trichomes!) decorating a few of the leaves, they are big, but not too big to fit into my tiny shui ping. The aroma is gentle, but complex, offering many layers of notes. Starting off with wet hay and freshly broken sweet hay, then moving on to old wood and cedar with a burst of camphor. The finish is old leather, like a much loved book, with a little bit of that musty old book smell.

When the leaves get their odd spa treatment (imagine going to a spa, being rinsed with hot water then being soaked for a few seconds, it would be odd, but for a Pu-erh, it is same old, same old) they really become aromatic. There are notes of leafy greens (like spinach mostly, a touch of chard as well) a tiny bit of hops, and a bit of wet hay and wet wood kinda like a barn. The finish has the aroma of old book and a touch of distant fruity sweetness. The liquid is pretty mild, a blend of delicate apricot sweetness and camphor, with a tiny bit of hay and cedar at the finish.

The first steep starts with a smooth mouthfeel, bordering on silky with its smoothness. The taste is delicate, starting out with minerals and wet slate, it then moves on to gentle smokiness and a definite cedar wood finish. It leaves a cooling feeling in the back of the throat and into the stomach, the mark of a good sheng (at least in my book.)

Second steeping time! The aroma this time is quite sweet, with dried apricots and honey, cedar and wet hay, and a finish of smoke and distant wildflowers. The taste starts out sour and a touch bitter, like hops, and then almost immediately switches over to sweet. The sweetness is represented by delicate apricots and honey and a surprising note of orange blossom. The finish is cedar wood and cooling camphor that lingers for a while.

Third steeping, hello aroma of apricots and honey, that is pretty much all I pick up on the third steep, not too complex, but very sweet on the nose. The taste has the same switching almost immediately from bitter hops to sweet apricots. The taste then fades to orange blossoms and wet hay, with a cedar cooling finish.

I went for a few more steeps, like I do, and the flavor starts to fade pretty quickly, going from fruity to just woody and cooling, by the sixth steep. While the taste lasted I enjoyed it, but it was a short lived tea.

For blog and photos: http://ramblingbutterflythoughts.blogspot.com/2015/06/wymm-tea-kunlu-sheng-pu-erh-from.html

Thank you Wymm tea for the sample of this tea! I was interested in this one not only because i missed out on Crimson Lotus’s Kunlu offering but because of a couple reviews on this one recently. Mrmopar had this one yesterday so i used it as an excuse to remember to pull this one out today. I have three others i need to look at but I’m waiting for more time to be able to sit and focus on the teas.

Love the way this one smells when the water and leaves come in to contact with one another. I’m more of a shu girl, but this had a great aroma to it. The steepings i had of this one were sweet with an initial very slight bitterness to them. Nothing overly so, but enough to remind me that i was drinking a sheng. This isn’t a super heavy puerh – mostly just a lighter, refreshing, fruity, sweet, brew. I didn’t get much in the way of apricots as other have but the sweetness leans towards that sort of plum/stonefruit taste. No smokiness here and a really enjoyable puerh from today. I spent the better part of the day with this over multiple infusions in between drinking other things.

Thanks again for the great offering Wymm tea!

I got this as a sample provided by Wymm tea. I hate to be so late getting to it but family matters weighed heavy on me the last week.
I got this sample out and weighed it , 7 grams so I got out the gaiwan for it. I gave a quick rinse and let it set for about 15 mins.
Upon opening the gaiwan the aroma was really good. It had the aroma of wet grass and honey mixed. I gave a quick 5 second steep and started away to drink. It gave a nice light yellow color in the cup. I picked through the leaves letting it cool a bit. The leaf in this is really nice .Whole leaves with a couple on a stem with 2 leaves attached.
I got into the cup and the aroma was still hanging around. I sipped it and just an instant of tobacco bitter and then it went sweet really fast. No astringency or biting notes just soft, sweet and nice. No hints smoke or anything. Just a nice one. The sweet lasts a while on this and I can see why others noted apricots , they are in there with some nutty notes as well.
Nice well done.

I’m always happy when I get samples from WYMM Tea. Their teas have a really unique and pure quality to them. I feel an impression of closeness to the source.

The leaves in a warm gaiwan smell like dried fruit with a little hint of fennel. After a 20 second rinse infusion, they smell much more like dark dried fruits, fig or plum, and a hint of perfume. I’m reminded of high quality artisan incense from Japan crafted with rare resins (like those you might find from the 300 year old Shoyeido company).

With raw Puer, I often taste the rinse infusion to see how it is and if it’s good, I’ll drink it. With higher quality ones, I find that the rinse tastes just great. This one is no exception. The rinse infusion tastes like dried fruit, similar to golden raisins. It has a really juicy, wet mouthfeel, no drying astringency or bitterness at all.

By the second infusion, the flavor is more robust and the texture more juicy and mouth-filling. The taste is still of dried fruit. This is a really gentle and easy tea to drink, despite its depth of flavor.

The third infusion seems to exhibit a hint of bitterness, though it’s subtle. The flavor is less intense overall, so I will let it infuse a bit longer on the next.

On the fourth infusion I’ve let it steep a bit longer, and while the flavor is more full, overall it is less sweet and fruity than the first two infusions. It has a hint of bitterness that lingers, but it’s still really subtle.

The fifth infusion is a bit more fruity sweet but still with some lingering bitterness, a bit stronger now. I could see these flavors registering as “apricot” and “smoky” to many Puer drinkers. I see these descriptors used a lot for raw Puer. Sixth infusion is similar. The seventh is even a little more bitter and the taste has a bit of a tropical fruit note to it. From here forward the flavor tends to wane and if you try to push more out of it, it gets somewhat bitter.

Overall, this tea tasted best early on. I enjoyed the first few steepings so much. After that its flavors diminished a bit, but it was still enjoyable.