2015 Yunnan Sourcing "Autumn Bang Dong Village"

Had a sample of this tea from the last time the Sheng TTB passed through. I was definitely impressed by the quality. It brewed up a very thick-bodied tea without being astringent or even particularly bitter. There was a sort of “airy” quality to it that I associate with autumn sheng which contributes to the lighter feeling of it. Good floral and slightly grassy aroma. Mostly floral in flavor. I didn’t find this tea to be particularly flavor focused. More about the texture in the mouth and when swallowed. A pleasant and relaxing session.

Pretty solid raw puer, as it gets to its 3rd steeping you really need to watch out for the bitterness, but then afterwards the steeps are great, and soft. It’s not the tropical fruity type of raw puer, but it has a strong minerality and grape like body to it. I’d say that plums come into play too, but when I’m listing fruits, they taste close to these notes, it’s not like a cup of fruit juice. I know that most pu-heads out there don’t even need me to tell you this, but when I haven’t tried a gong fu tea before I took the notes as is, haha. But never the less, this tea is I’d say a pretty standard raw, there’s nothing that really jumps out to me that makes me really fall in love with this tea, but a great daily drinker, for the times where you don’t want anything special and are just craving a regular cup.

The aftertaste on this is very very good though, which is something that actually did set it apart now that I think about it. The minerality really made this tea super enjoyable, it’s sweet, and for a moment I even tasted vanilla ice-cream, never had that in a raw before, ever, but a majority of the lasting taste is bitter and acidic stone fruits. I can tell that this tea was either grown near plenty of rocks or was from trees with very long roots because the minerality is great! I just wish that there was a more exciting body to it, that wasn’t so average, haha.

In the end this is a very very good daily drinker, but not something that you would save for special occasions what so ever. Just what I needed today, honestly.

Drinking up the last of my sample from Liquid Proust’s Sheng Olympiad.

The wet leaf has a pretty strong scent. I would describe it as herby, a little bit vegetal, with a kind of candy sweetness to it. I don’t smell apricot or tartness in this one.

The first steep is strong in body with a little bit of upfront bitterness. Overall flavor is fairly light, mostly floral and vegetal. In the second and third steeps, the bitterness tends to build up in a tongue-coating way. I’m essentially flash steeping but still finding quite a bit of bitterness.

Second thing I’m trying from the #shengolympiad2017. I spilled most of the first steep, which I’m quite upset about, because what I did get to have of it tasted really good. Sweet and fruity, with a floralness that develops over a couple of steeps. Smooth, thick mouthfeel that becomes more viscous and mouth-coating throughout the session. This is a good one, and only a year old, so I definitely look forward to trying the 2010.

Drinking this from Liquid Prousts Sheng Olympics. I think I own the spring version of this. This is a very tasty raw tea with very little bitterness and an overall sweet note that you would probably call apricots or stonefruits. It was good overall. It did have a bit of a sour note in there but not much.

I steeped this eight times in a 150 ml gaiwan with 8.1g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, and 30 sec.