2014 Yunnan Sourcing Red Horse Gongting Ripe Puerh Tea Cake

I bought this mostly because the price was reasonable, and I’ve started kind of exploring puerh. I was interested to find that this doesn’t have the kind of fishy taste that I noticed in others. I actually don’t mind the wet/fishy taste, but this tea is pretty smooth without it. I’m not sure how to describe it, other than easy to drink, and sweet, like others already said. I kind of am tasting an undertone of a little bit of spice maybe? I might be imagining that, though. I think it’s actually my favorite puerh so far. It’s just toasty and approachable. I’m glad I bought a little cake!

A pretty simple tasting Puerh, but definitely worth it. It has a very full bodied, creamy taste that immediately hits your palate. The earth flavor that one usually finds in a puerh is barely detectable; not the overwhelming. The flavor itself ends abruptly and is not complex but I’m happy with this tea. Not all teas have to be a life story, and this one will be a nice morning puerh. I will order again.

I recently bought a tong of these mini cakes so It’s good that I liked it. It was sweet with a fair amount of fermentation flavor. The fermentation taste was the dominant note for the first four or five steeps. It definitely needs a little while longer to clear. It was think and dark in the early infusions. There may have been some notes of chocolate in there but I wasn’t really paying attention. I was too busy watching a movie while drinking. It was quite good however. There was very little bitterness to this tea.

I steeped this tea twelve times in a 150ml gaiwan with 12g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse and a 10 minute rest. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, 30 sec, 45 sec, 1 min, 1.5 min, and 2 min. I could have gotten a couple more steeps out of the tea had I wanted to.

Ru Yao dragon teapot gongfucha.

Dry leaf: musty
https://www.instagram.com/p/BEOdI8cJ45h/

Wet leaf: like wine. (New to me)
https://www.instagram.com/p/BEOdLuuJ45n/

Light steep: I taste/smell;
Little to no —→ earth, autumn leaves, fermentation taste. Medium sweetness.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BEOeAmXp47e/

Medium steep: I taste/smell;
Slight—→ earth, autumn leaves. Little to no fermentation taste. Medium sweetness.

Heavy steep: I taste/smell; light —→
Earth, fermentation, camphor, autumn leaves. Strong sweetness

All in all, this is is one of the best teas I have ever tried. I rate this tea a 100 because of the taste and aromas. Just lovely! I plan on ordering a cake or two someday! This is now my third most favourite shou! Love at first tea session.

Many thanks to R.F Hill for this amazing tea sample!

As I stated in my review on the site: “When you’re tired and in need of a full blast of energy, this is the tea to have! Need to wake up early in the morning? Red Horse Gongting. Need an afternoon pick-me-up? Red Horse Gongting. A very nice thick tea that is smooth, dark, and sweet.”

I’m fully energized and ready to go. My students are going to question as to why I’m more energized than they’ll be today; however, it may be that I’m both tea drunk and pumped up. Ha-ha. Seriously, though, this is a nice feeling. Great tea, too!

Fairly good/decent cheap little cake. Not a shou that stands out as particularly memorable, but nothing negative to say about it either. I think this is a good learning cake for someone new to shou, as it’s small and has hints of several common shou flavors without anything too overwhelming. You don’t get too many steeps out of it, but at the price that’s a fair trade off.

This is a tea. I am drinking it.

It’s pretty tasty IMO. A little too much dirt in the first couple steeps, but it’s a fairly sweet, mild puerh. It has stronger, more complex flavour than the last weirdly memorable one I tried – http://steepster.com/teas/white2tea/63681-2003-xiaguan-crane-mark-ripe . It’s also NOT salty, which is really nice.

Definitely prefer this one. That’s kind of disappointing, as I have read a lot about the Xiaguan cakes, and had high hopes for it.

Dexter, you have to try that Xiaguan one soon (ish). I look forward to seeing what you think of it!

So I brewed up about 7g in a 100ml gaiwan at about 210f. I rinsed twice. A nice looking dark liquor. The wet leaf gives the traditional ripe smells…no fishiness at all with the barnyard scent that we all love. This tea has a rosemary/sage smell on the wet leaf as well as in the taste. I feel this tea definitely needs some age as it needs to mellow out a bit more but hey its a young ripe and what you would expect. I think this is a decent ripe with gong ting grade leaves but doesn’t brew out too fast as you would think. It holds up well and gave a decent amount of steeps. I can’t really give my opinion of this tea as it is just a baby and hasn’t grown into a mature tea that can handle my criticism. But overall I would say this will be a good tea in a couple/few years. Cheap little cake thats worth a bit of the shelf in the storage space.

12/22/2015 10g/20oz/212F 2 min

infusable inshmusible… I’m on my 4th infusion of this powerful, deep, dark, delicious shou and just to prove a point I steeped my 5th on just 5 gms while writing this review.. still a sweet opaque brew. Can’t get into the flavor details since I’m recovering from sinus surgery but suffice it say that this brew is cutting right through the barriers to my tastebuds