Got this tea as part of the “Guangdong-aged pu’er sampler” from Yunnan Sourcing in late 2017. 6g went into my favorite 90ml clay pot.
Delicious wet-aged sheng smells, a lot of smells of dried fruits and hints of a wet forest.
A quick rinse at 98C came out a delightly light orange, but right away the first 5s steeping gave a more rich, amber color. The smell became more intoxicating and perfume-y after the first steeping. Typical of pre-2006 Changtai productions, this manages to taste both dry and wet aged simultaneously.
Surprisingly, this tea passed the (literal) “mom” test with flying colors.
Stands up reasonably well to abusive brewing, with no bitterness that I could detect, just a “thinning” and less complexity of flavors. Short brews tend to be perfume-y, with dominates notes of dried fruit and some earthy tones while the longer brews seem to be dominated by dry woodiness alone.
The tea’s qi felt quite strong, mellowing but invigorating; although I also did not eat lunch.
I used mostly fannings at the bottom of my sample bag for this review, but the tea went for more than ten steepings with increasing long boiling steeps of up to minutes each in thick clay.
Flavors: Stonefruit, Wood
