tl;dr: Unoffensive, easy to drink, brews out quite a bit and forgivingly. Mostly a cardboard/pencil shavings taste in a soy-sauce colored liquid, mellows out into something sweeter. Not my favorite flavor profile to start, but if you’re into it this would make an excellent cake at the price, and the ending was worth it. 3.9/5.
6g leaf, 75ml porcelain gaiwan
98C, 10s rinse: Gentle smell of caramelized sweetness over earth.
98C, 5s: flat, watery, unremarkable.
98C, 20s: Can’t really get much smell off of it. Pensil shavings, cardboard/carton-y, flat mouth feel. Very unoffensive. Immediate qi (or maybe I just haven’t eaten yet xD). Basically soy sauce colored.
98C, 45s: gentle ripe notes finally appearing. mouth feel less flat, leaves totally opened up. Super easy to drink at this point, basically chug-able.
98C, 60s: mouthfeel really rounding out. some faintest fruity smells, currant?
98C, 90s: these leaves become more fun to smell the longer they’re brewed. cardboardy tastes are gone, simply a clean, unoffensive shou taste.
98C, 90s: sweeter smell, creamier texture/flavor.
98C, inf s: sweet….cardboard….? those are real flavor words….
98C, inf s: really loving these last few steepings. it’s still super dark, if no longer soy sauce level.
98C, inf s: third dead man steep, flavor starting to thin but I’m still enjoying it.
98C, inf s: probably done.
Flavors: Cardboard, Sweet
