Category Archives: The Junky’s Log

Puerh Junky Studies Leaves

Posted on by Yang-chu
10 Aug

Puerh Junky Studies Leaves continues an on-going discussion regarding the task of determining age of certain productions.  A recent entry compared leaves spanning 10 years in age difference but seemed may just a few.  A similar format of mainly pictures will be employed here involving a ’96 raw brick acquired spring ’22 and a ’98 7542 acquired in May of ’18  included among the Bazhong in Sampler U.

Here’s the first image taken.

Side-by-side

Don’t forget one of the nifty features of wordpress is that you can click the images for close ups.  Both have been dry-stored and you get to guess which is which.

Old productions such as these often require some type of preparation.  The ’98 received no preparation but it literally took more than five years to come into form.  All the while, I sat skeptical about the production’s actual age and drinking potential because the three other cakes from that vendor had all shown considerably more life after a year in LA. Upon tasting of the ’96, I immediately broke about half for storage in porcelain because I didn’t want to wait years before it would become enjoyable.

Side-by-side flipped

So there’s a difference in hue depending on where they are.

Side-by-side original

Something younger but more humidly stored, the ’03 Yiwu Princess. . .

Yiwu Princess 2020 foto

I immediately noticed a redder red.  Let’s look at the cups:

’96 ZC Brick

Now for the cake:

’98 Bazhong Cake

There’s a fair measure of light that factors.  Several shots in as similar a light as possible.

Revolutionary Suspect 8972

I conservatively guessed the Revolutionary Suspect to be about the late aughts, but it was pure speculation.  From among the four, it is clear that the Yiwu Princess is the darkest.  It is also the most humidly stored.  Yes, the RS 8972 certainly got something like wet storage but a year after receipt in ’14-5, it got bone dry indoor storage in clay for six years.  Given all the redness, it appears that the RS got a good deal of heat at one point. . .  or dryness?  I’m beginning to think that red indicates something other than age, maybe heat or dry heat but not age.

’09 Ox, 6FTM Guangdong storage 2022 foto

Are you getting the picture?  Determining age by looking at the leaves appears to be a challenging task.  I recall sometime back reading the comment section of a vendor in the UK.  The post alleged that the vendor was pawning young tea for old.  I immediately thought, “given the range in storage conditions how does he know that?”  Of course the accuser offered no basis for the allegation.  It’s pretty easy to get “caught up” in aspects of the puerh game that are ancillary to puerh drinking itself.  Aging variable vary widely and when it boils down to it, each production must be evaluated on its own terms.

The more I drink puerh, which is now a decade, the more I learn.  The more productions acquired in the early days age, the more I learn about how a production was conceived and crafted.  In the end, it seems that a gander at the leaves says more about how a production was stored than it does about actual leaf age.  Leaves will always be just a relative indicator, along with the specifics of storage itself.  I’m now at the stage where I doubt the years of productions less and less because I simply have no way of knowing and have witnessed some of my own long-stored items actually get lighter, at least in terms of liquor, over the years.  So, we’re back to evaluating productions on their own terms in light of years of drinking experience.

Puerh Junky Visits: Fujin Green

Posted on by Yang-chu
08 Aug

Puerh Junky Visits: Fujin Green is an update post regarding the ’09 offering from Fujin.  Puerh Junky has issued at least two missives about both this production in particular and the factory in general.   It’s hard to not roll one’s eyes when it comes to the expense of some of these boutique offerings, but so it is.  At the height of summer and humidity-plus storage, the thought occurred “why not dust off the ole PJRS for a serious evaluation.”

Fujin Green prompted a bit of thinking about the seasonality involved with natural storage.  Performance ebbs and flows in accordance with the seasons.  Right now, FG is at its best.  The aura surrounding Fujin factory becomes somewhat understandable upon opening the wrapper: strong waft of fruity and floral notes fill the nostrils.  The Henan storage gives the impression that the production is still young, five-years old at the most.  This youthfulness is evident throughout and there is a particular green note that is, putting it diplomatically, highly unusual in puerhs and certainly puerhs processed through traditional methods.  Fujin productions are processed by Xinghai factory so there’s little cause for suspicion about shiesty processing.

Infusion #1

At this age and given the general conditions, puerhs should have a bit of ferment to them.  This is not the case with the Fujin Green, also highly anomalous.  It fair to guess that it will go through such a stage but is still off by a year or two.  At its current stage in Aug ’22, it is the closest expression to a two-year-old puerh in the collection. . . ostensibly.  One of the features possibly distinguishing it from a young production, however, is that it drinks all the way through.  In other words, it never reaches a raw stage where it bottoms out indicating that it needs more curing time.  This happened in previous sessions.

Brewing

I decided on using 6.5g in my 150ml workhorse zisha pot.  The pot pours quickly and doesn’t clog easily.  Older and more tightly compressed cakes may take as much as eight grams, but that’s rare.  The usual amount is 7g for this pot, but judging from the smell, 7g seemed excessive.  I don’t like overleafing because it smashes the notes.  In retrospect, even 6.5g may have been too much.  Fujin Green overall pushes to the very edge of being too much.  Stunt drinkers, of which there seems no short supply, will definitely delight in drinking this.  I administered no rinse and flash infused each round.

Rating

After three rounds the total was as follows:

  • Aroma          13
  • Clarity          11
  • Sweetness   15
  • Viscosity      13
  • Astringency  14
  • Huigan         15
  • Qi                 15

Reflections on Fujin Green

Fujin Green is intense.  It lives up to the reputation of the factory.  Each infusion differs a mite.  The character is certifiably Bulang/Banzhang, with an unapologetic bitterness.  The first infusion releases a high floral aroma, which could be easily associated with Jingmai material.  The taste in the the first infusion begins with citrus at the front of the tongue, then proceeds to vanilla mid tongue before finishing with vetiver.  For those unfamiliar with vetiver, it is a dark resinous essential oil with strong baby powder notes.

Infusion #2

The second infusion is much more intense and complex with prevailing notes of grapefruit seed and vanilla.  The liquor coats the mouth leaving the huigan of citrus, then vanilla, and finally that eau de Lick-a-Stix taste.  Pronounced piercing perfume (not vetiver but much higher) and vegetal green notes make their presence known, both quite hideous by the Puerh Junky’s reckoning.  The citrus fruit sourness and a balanced sweetness, offset those figurative flaws.

Second infusion was totally murky.  Both the first and third infusions were crystal clear. By the second infusion the ferocity of the qi became an issue.  The first pot went strait to the head but the second stirred raucously in the chest.

The citrus vibe continues into the third infusion, with the dreaded dry-sheet note making its presence known in the huigan.  Throughout each session the vaunted houyun resounds.  In other words, it’s throaty.  By this round, I was ready to tap out.  The qi has a character not altogether dissimilar from the BZ Peacock, despite being in totally different classes, FG being Floral Class and BZP being Tobacco Class.

Infusion #3

I also had suspicions about FG being a gut buster, which proved to be true.  I served up infusions 4-6 to a visitor who, drenched in sweat from the power, complained of this, stating that such was her experience with tea most of the time.  It was the first among our many sessions.  Gut-busting adds to the stunt-tea appeal. <<ahem>>

Conclusions

Fujin Green is an intense raw puerh most appropriate for the stunt tea drinker seeking young expression in a puerh well over 10 years old.  The huigan and qi are exceptional, and the sweetness is perfectly balanced in the context of the overall treasure itself.  It’s an outstanding production that lives up to the reputation that the factory projects.

96/105 A

Visiting Grenouille and Aging

Posted on by Yang-chu
27 Jul

Visiting Grenouille and Aging tackles two subjects: the first is an update on the ’06 Grenouille, and the second compares Grenouille to the considerably younger ’16 Bulang Shengtai, Jindafu.  Let’s begin

Grenouille’s Developments

Grenouille hails from Wuliang Mt, in Simao.  The most famous of Simao mountains by far is Jingmai.  Wuliang Mt could well be the second most famous.  The terroir profiles of the two are distinctive. Where Jingmai are know for their florals, often described as orchid, Wuliang can be minerally or peppery.  The pepper profile is extremely common among Simaos that do not bear the appellation Jingmai.  These often hail from Jinggu.  There is also Ailao Mt possessing a pepper note.  Simao is synonymous with Lancang, cf Lincang, and Puer City.  Jingmai, Wuliang, Jinggu, and Ailao are the commonly recognized names of the productions associated with Simao.

There will be a quiz so pay attention.

Grenouille typifies the Simao essence.  Where Jingmai should sing in a high register, other Simao brood.  There’s nothing pitchy.  Rather, there’s a complex melange of medium to dark notes, notes that are difficult to identify beyond Simao itself.  Think of an attar of oud, vetiver, and vanilla, the hand of a fiendish perfumer.   This is not your mother’s Menghai.  It takes some sessions to get one’s head around what the terroir communicates.  Similar offerings in the the Collection include Buddha Impressions and Auspicious Dragon, both from Jinggu and the Cherry Blossom, also from Wuliang.

Grenouille came into the Puerh Junky’s possession in early ’19.  Up to that point, it had been conservatively dry stored, perhaps a bit warm.  Such conditions can give rise to a baby powder cum old church lady perfume quality that appeals to many drinkers.  The transition has been from subtle to insufferable to settled, where it is now this Jul 2022.  There’s a touch of bitter and an even smaller bit of sour.  Quite sophisticated it is.

By “settled,” the Puerh Junky means to convey something about that layer of baby powder.  At the insufferable stage, it is the prevailing note constituting an intensely sweet attar.  This is where increased humidity of LA conditions heighten the top layer of expression.  At the settled stage, that trait percolates into the overall character of the tea.  This indicates transformation beyond the top layer where the deeper layers have also had a chance to cook.

Aging: Grenouille vs Bulang Shengtai

Grenouille is from ’06 and Bulang Shengtai is from ’16.  Ten year difference.  I’ve been storing the latter since ’17 and the former, as mentioned above, since ’19.

Grenouille 2022 Foto

Shot two:

Bulang Shengtai 2022 Foto

Here’s another:

Bulang Shengtai 2017 Foto

Let’s let the pictures speak for themselves.  It’s clear that Grenouille is darker, but the question is whether it appears ten years darker.  The answer lies in understanding the relative nature of aging.  Obvious, right?  Still, it’s good to have a side-by-side gander to determine just how difficult it is to tell the age of a production by the leaves themselves.

The darker the leaves the older the tea.  Again obvious.  The darkness of the leaves relative the production date indicates storage conditions.  The difference is apparent in clearly humid versus dry stored productions.  However, there is a good deal of gray, especially among mainland offerings, so the colour provides an additional indicator of just how dry relative what’s being tasted.  This provides some clues regarding what to expect given one’s own storage conditions and transformation prospects for the production itself.   Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like I snapped a shot of Grenouille‘s cashed leaves when first acquired.

 

 

 

Shocking Puerh Changes

Posted on by Yang-chu
17 Jul

Shocking Puerh Changes relates the on-going observations of the Puerh Junky with his pre-2016 purchases.  Specifically, it involves the dangers of classifying productions, which are wont to transform into an entirely different category.  It is also part of a saga of discovering erstwhile duds were nothing of the sort, but processed in such a way where they only have come into form after a great deal of time.  Let’s begin.

Shifting Puerh Class

The ’07 Prince of Vanilla came into the Puerh Junky’s possession in ’15.  It hails from the Longyuan TF, which produces an awful lot of tea, many with super fancy wrappers.  In the year of its incarnation, ’06, the PoV won some type of metal at some competition that was essentially ignored upon acquisition.  The wrapper captures a theme of a continued Dai/Thai tradition thus comprising a thematic “fit.”  Compression is one of the most noticeable features of the cake.  Whereas most Menghai productions from this era have been machine pressed with serious zeal, the PoV is quite moderately pressed.

Nothing impresses more than the ability of competition tasters.  Over the years, it is hard to say any thing had particularly stood out about the PoV and for copetition tasters to detect award-winning traits hot off the press boggles the mind.  In one missive, I mentioned that Prince of Vanilla made for good bowl drinking and that the qi was stout, a great firm drink in the Tobacco Class for the morning.  At one time, there was a vanilla note, which earned it its name, but after some time faded residing rather humbly in the Tobacco Class most distinguished by its wrapper.

As such, it never garnered any special storage attention and could said to have been relegated to quasi-purgatory treatment.  Special attention means more humidity and purgatory means getting whatever humidity possible, which isn’t a whole lot.  This could prove positively disastrous in the desert, but Los Angeles isn’t exactly a desert climate given the famous marine layer that adds a bit of humidity to the air for about three of the four seasons.

As of the summer of ’22, the Prince of Vanilla’s Tobacco Class days are very behind it.  It is now a Fruit Class bomb.  It’s not like the Thick Zen where there are just fruit notes.  No, it is screaming blueberry, a taste which lingers and lingers long after done drinking.  It’s as though this is the material from which the mercurial Merlot was taken.  Merlot is a ripe which was originally going to be called Crunch Berries because it was so fruity but then settled into something more like Merlot before shifting back into to a voluble fruity expression. . . with more qi.  It seems sometimes that consistent dry storage will develop this fruit character, instead of strong camphor and tree roots.  The storage is certifiably dry but it isn’t in the least dry tasting.  That occurs when storage is too dry and too hot, which in any event result in different notes.  Here, nothing about the PoV is dry.  It’s super summer fun.

Jingmai Puerh Awakens

Another ’15 acquisition was a Jingmai with a stunning wrapper from a now either defunct or reorganized outfit called Mountain Top TF.  The fate of such a factory is quite telling.  To wit: the ’09 Jingmai is only now starting to show signs of promise in ’22.  A new factory faces a serious uphill batter for survival if their processing required waiting a good 15 years before coming into form.  This is a battle that Mountain Top appears to have lost, but there’s still its offerings for evaluation and enjoyment.

Perhaps most surprising about this Jingmai was its utter absence of the signature Jingmai florality.  Youth and processing notwithstanding, Jingmai are still expected to possess a floral character.  Without any particular character or floral expression, this production was nothing short of a major dud, especially given its exquisite wrapper and very careful pressing.  As such, it was set aside and essentially given the purgatory treatment: dry and given little if any fuss.

The July ’22 tasting proved surprising.  There is a hint of flowers starting to emerge amidst a very sweet broth.  It’s hard to imagine how such tastes and aromas age into a production, but this is what makes puerh aging so interesting.  Also shocking is the virtual absence of colour in such an old production.  By all accounts, I would have guessed that this was a ’20 Lincang processed for young consumption, the exact opposite of the facts.

The caste of the broth stays this colour throughout.  There may be a hint of pink in there which is supposed to a mark of the absolute best.  It could also be from the time of day the photo was taken.  I paid more attention to whether the floral note would express more strongly, how long the sugariness would continue, and whether the broth would darken up or go through a cloudy stage than the nature of the hue itself.  It never went through a cloudy stage nor did it get darker.  The richness and sugar start to fade in the 6th and 7th infusions.  Clearly its most humbling feature involves the colour, as a typical barometer of age.  Curve balls of this sore make the Puerh Junky all the more apprehensive in doubting some age claims.

The remaining cakes were resting in more humid climes for a few months, but there’s a measure of storage orchestration with which I’m currently contending, so they’re back to purgatory for at least the next week. The Jingmai will be sampled again at the end of the summer.  I’ll be particularly interested in how long it lasts and whether the floral note continues to develop, as I’m finding with the Bulang Shengtai.

 

Puerh Personality Via Drury Lane

Posted on by Yang-chu
28 Jun

Here’s a chance to chat upon Puerh Personality Via Drury Lane.  Every puerh treasure has it’s own personality requiring varying storage and preparation conditions.  When a few of your sessions don’t measure up, the last thing you want to do is conclude that your treasure has lost its way.  You first want to consider storage and preparation factors.  We can illustrate the matter of preparation by looking at a recent experience with Drury Lane.

Drury Lane is a twiggy 250g ripe brick from ’02.  It made its debut in spring of ’21.  At the time of posting, after sitting a few months to revive from its original storage, Drury Lane possessed a sparkling character, a woody sweetness with a refreshing camphor thread and an overlay of vanilla muffin.  It was the kind of ripe puerh that distinguished itself not for thickness but for a perfection of flavors that made you want to keep drinking.  The cocoa aftertaste that is in no way cloying also hits the summertime spot as far as ripes go.

A bit of an upgrade in containers occurred around Dec ’21.  It’s likely that most of the ripes spent a few months in conditions even drier than usual.  A tasting around the time of the lunar New Year ’22 nevertheless reflected the hibernation to be expected from the cold. . . by LA standards. In May moved the brick into more humid conditions and tried again about two weeks ago.  Myeh.  I tried again three days ago and the result was equally unimpressive, mottled and not particularly sweet.  I let the brick sit out over the weekend and tried on Monday morning.

Drury Lane Jun 2022

The results from the morning were as good as I knew Drury Lane to be.  It had lost none of its original pizazz.  Having the brick sit out in the open for a few days made all the difference.  Nothing with the variation in storage had affected its expression, but some changes in storage have made it necessary to modulate preparation.  Experienced drinkers will often talk about taking their treasures from storage a week or two in advance of actually drinking, sometimes also referred to as “waking” (醒茶), the same name given for the initial rinse.

In at least one previous post, your Puerhness has spoken about the importance of air in storage.  Here, the matter involves air for preparation.  Not all productions require airing before consuming.  This is where personality comes into play.  Some productions would much rather be brewed immediately upon leaving storage.  It’s not too much to assume that seasonal differences will also come into play.  Keeping a mental note or physical record of these nuances become more important the further out you get from the date of acquisition.  If you’re able to quaff down your purchases within three months, then this post isn’t going to matter much to you.

 

Raw Puerh Summer: OG Gangsta

Posted on by Yang-chu
25 Jun

Raw Puerh Summer: OG Gangsta is the unceremonious title for a blog update on the eponymously referenced object of attention: ’05 OG Gangsta.  In some regards, it appears our pirate of Puerhia is getting “sof”, as they say back in Philly.

I broke off a fleck of a little over 8.6327g, placing in my 150ml gaiwan.  The whole fleck went in, and I gave it a good two minutes to brew.  From Palookaville to Plum Village, if I had to tell ya.  No smoke, no toe-curling astringency, something you’d give to the gramma of the girl you started dating to get on her good side.

“What’s this, Joey?  Ya sayin’ da OG done gawn straight on us?”

“Hold ya hawses, Milton.  I’m just tawkin’ about the first few passes like four or somethin’.  Ah ain’t done tellin’ ya about da nex day.”

Each of those subsequent infusions were about a minute, surprisingly sweet and entirely unexpected.  The next day wouldda made the gang back in Philly proud, lemme tell ya.  By that time all the leaves had loosened up real nice, ya see.  Then, they got yer normal flash action.  The first one was a real doozy, a blast of camphor right in the kissa with some vanilla on top.  It then settles in to something more familiar, though softer, with the smoke greatly attenuated.  The sweetness and the texture are also much more developed and the huigan confidently redolent.

 

Boss Square Reprise

Posted on by Yang-chu
23 Jun

On solstice 2022, the Puerh Junky received a shipment containing an item that he’s been trying to track down since acquiring in ’17.  It’s the Boss Square.  I ended up getting it from the same vendor as before, the vendor from whom I’ve acquired most of my GPE stash.  It seemed like an interesting idea to list what I wrote about the Boss Square some five years ago.  Quite a bit has changed since then, not the least of which is having a modicum of understanding about GPE itself.

Gu Puerh started its exploits in 1999.  As often stated, the breaking of the tea monopoly known simply as Zhongcha witnessed the spawning of numerous private ventures that were previously branded under the Zhongcha label.  Often these factories were supplying to the big three, Menghai TF,  Xiaguan TF, and Kunming TF.  This factor contributes in no small part to my skepticism around the craze around Menghai/Dayi productions.  To be honest, I cannot say just how much “better” Dayi actually is.  I don’t bother drinking them with the exception of a sample or two that I’m gifted.  The Puerh Junky is not particularly inclined toward buying hype, favouring a “less well trod” path.

Aside from the dissolution of the monopoly, many of the Menghai TF braintrust were forced to break out for new pastures, setting up factories of their own, e.g., Haiwan, Xinghai, Boyou, and Pengcheng to name a few.  Some of these individuals, aside from having their own operations, are commissioned by other factories for specific productions or have a significant hand in operations of other factories, such as Ms Du Qiongzhi and Ms Wang Xia.  It is this latter who is much more highly regarded and is known for several famous productions.

The Boss Square, first introduced in 1999, was created by Wang Xia.  It won the Annual International Tea Expo hosted in Guangzhou that year.  That ’99 version, if it can be found, is a collectors’ item.  Any other version, I’ve only seen the ’07, is definitely worth snatching up.  There are many GPE raw squares on the market.  It’s often difficult to discern them from the ZC offerings and the numerous other replicas from other factories.  The GPE raw square is also crafted by Wang Xia.  Fakes for this size seem to be plentiful, but it seems to be usually for the ZC offering.

Wang Xia seems to have the Simao region under her wing.  In at least one previous post, I noted some confusion over whether GPE and the Simao TF were one in the same.  This post is mistaken, btw.  They are the same.  This question arose in the course of purchasing two bazhong productions both associated with the Simao TF.  Only within the past six months did I learn that the bazhong A, one which I’ve written about on more than one occasion, is actually a Wang Xia production.  The thing is, Wang Xia has her own operation also bearing the name Simao in the title.  I’ve not gone so far as to discover the gory details.  Below is the copy of the original Boss Square description.

—-

Of all the ripes I have in my collection, since acquiring this this summer of ’17, I keep it most at the ready.  The conveniently renamed ’07 Boss Square Puerh comes from the Simao Tea Factory, which I believe was designated with the #5 back in the day of the state-operated system.

This is a flawlessly rich ripe puerh.  Zero tannins.  High-impact delivery of chocolately goodness.  No dank, earthy, interesting microbial musing necessary.  In the hot zisha dry it gives off none of the saltiness so common among productions.  Wet in the cup, the wafting aroma from the pitcher is evident.  Grains and malt.

The gan is evident very quickly and lasts and lasts in the mouth and from one infusion to the next.  In order to get past the tannins, many productions require over-brewing or are best when brewed for more than a minute.  After the second infusion, 10s I found to be too much for this.  The release is rich with just 5s.  And the qi is full and expansive in the chest.  The mouth is active.

This is an exceptional ripe production and for experienced drinkers.

Puerh Junky Visits Yiwu Gratitude

Posted on by Yang-chu
20 May

Puerh Junky Visits Yiwu Gratitude should be a a tidy communique about just how tasty this offering is.  It is very, very good.  It tastes very, very good.  The storage on it is spectacular, really the epitome of ideal storage.  It comes from a preferred vendor, whence many of the offerings constituting the Puerh Royals sampler hail, who has a keen sense for storage.

Storage of this sort might be characterized as juicy.  There’s plenty of humidity and heat but neither excessive, so the underlying character of the puerh is in no way tainted.  It only brings out the best that each production has to offer.  Storage of this type would understandably be classified as dry because dry storage has no humid notes.  However, the range of dry storage is wide.  Besides variations in humidity there are variations in temperature.  Cool and dry storage obviously transforms quite slowly.  Dry and hot storage transforms quickly but at the expense of aroma.  Hot and dry storage also accentuates a perfumy-dryer-sheet-type expression that would otherwise transform into wicked camphor explosiveness.

Different cakes under the same conditions may also transform quite differently depending on product compression.  There’s also air flow.  Juicy storage checks all the boxes in terms of having everything necessary to be perfect.  The second even a hint of humidity is detected, it’s no longer juicy but humid, no matter how light that humidity might be.  Humidity is clearly a matter of preference with similar gradations.  The point here is to just distinguish juicy from humid.

Yiwu Gratitude has juicy storage.  It allows for maximum appreciation of what Gratitude TF is throwing down, and what they’re throwing down is every bit as good as the cake looks.

The Yiwu Gratitude Factory opened their doors in 2004.  They primarily craft raw cakes from wild material, using traditional of sun drying and stone pressing procedures.  The Puerh Junky’s Yiwu Gratitude features a wrapper that’s a cross between two productions listed in the 2007 Pu-erh Yearbook.

This is the exact same production being offered from the following year.  Instead of the title including qiaomu  as with the PJ offering, it’s included in the the green strip to the right.  The block lettering at the bottom is identical to the YWG.  The flanking blocks, the right stating raw puerh and the left ten great tea mountains are identical with both cakes.

This ’07 Banwei includes mingqian springtips in green lettering to the far right, whereas this data is included in the green strip with the PJ listing.  The Banwei and the YWG have the same neifei, whereas the Yiwu from ’07 is more generic.

Here’s the PJ’s Yiwu Gratitude for comparison’s sake.

The use of traditional to describe their way of doing things, goes beyond just the pressing.  They wrap their tong traditionally as well.

The super traditional tong are branded with the name at the top.  They don’t go that far, as you can see:

At the bottom of this sticker, the phrase mingqian springtips is included.  As mentioned in the original listing, wispy Yiwu effect notwithstanding this is legitimately “springy.”  It’s one of the most floral Yiwu productions I’ve tasted.  There’s more “spring” to it than the Dragon, which is comparable in terms of the type of floral expression.  It could be described as having an apricot cum grapefruit nature.  It isn’t lilac, honeysuckle, jasmine or any of those other really loud perfumy florals, which at fifteen years of age aren’t that bad anyway.

But wait!  There’s more.  That more is the hallowed root beer, which to be honest is much more cream soda here, as there’s no spice to emerge just yet.  This type of offering usually doesn’t go the spice route.  That’s fine.  The creaminess and richness is good enough.

Yiwu Gratitude is sweet and durable.  All of the attributes that are evident from the outset last throughout the life of the tea session.  That includes the sweetness.

Lifting the Lid on Tinned Puerh

Posted on by Yang-chu
09 May

Lifting the Lid on Tinned Puerh marks an episode in the puerh storage saga of the Puerh Junky.  About a year ago, I took a few productions and placed them in various vessels, some tins, some glazed caddys, and others in porcelain.  Seals on the vessels varied in tightness and material.  The main reason for this experiment had to do with a desire to hasten transformation and adjust for what I noticed to be a bit of drop off in the pizazz primarily of the Fohai.  Altogether, I placed about five different productions in five different vessels and then proceeded to compare the performance of the vessel-stored productions against the cakes.  The caddies are stored mostly in the door of the dead refrigerator, which seems close to ideal.

 

Findings: May 2022

After better than a month with the lit removed, the Fohai was back to its original sparkle.  Notable for the Cherry Blossom was greater sweetness and a stronger fruit nose.  All of the items improved from removal of the lid with the actual vessel being of no discernible significance.  The exception being the items stored in porcelain.  None of the porcelain-stored treasures had their lids removed because they did not exhibit the same undesired tendencies.  If anything they got better.

It’s difficult to say that any of the the tinned have aged appreciably more than their respective cakes.  What can be said, however, is that their performance is noticeably better than the cakes.  Whether lid-free tinning produces appreciably better effects than setting the cake out for a few days before drinking probably depends on the production itself and the conditions in which the tea sets out.  It’s my suspicion that the Fohai probably fares better in the tin than if it were just set out, but this is merely a hunch.

Puerh Perplexity

Posted on by Yang-chu
06 Mar

Can you help a Puerh Junky out?  The Puerh Junky finds himself twisted in knots over what it means when one says “They don’t care for factory productions.”  Does that mean they don’t like recipes?  Maybe it means they like young productions.  Perhaps it means they only go for small factory productions.

As you’ve already discerned, the Puerh Junky is clueless.  He’s read of famous puerh vendors who’ve bought tea here and there, only to take it to be processed at reputable factories.  What does it mean to not be a fan of factory teas?

Factories often have so many selections, styles, and grades.  Even if it means not caring for a particular house style, this still confounds.  House styles vary, so it’s impossible to speak of factory productions as a monolith, unless there is some elusive trait that they all share.  It is true that among the factories emerging on the scene since the late 90s that they overwhelmingly descend from the Menghai TF.  Still, these meistras and masters bring their own touch to productions and are frequently commissioned to oversee special offerings by vendors.  What on earth is “the factory style”?

Maybe it’s the pressing and aesthetics, but pretty much all productions since ’14 have gone the way of Yiwu in making their teas look pretty. . . except for recipes.  This leads back less to factory productions per se than to production styles of a particular era.  Even so, there are plenty of old Yiwu offerings hailing from the factories that are gorgeous.

Maybe it’s the quality, but this is a very tricky matter, especially if one is tasting a five-year old recipe and expecting it to taste like a similarly aged production from some Lincang village.  “Factories” have been offering more and more of these type of selections, and the question begs to what degree these bear the classical factory traits.  As the market has evolved, offerings and production styles have evolved.  Surely, these factors enter into the calculus of one who doesn’t like “factory productions.”

The best bet is that “factory” is shorthand for “recipe.”  Certainly, “8582” doesn’t have the curb appeal of say, Cosmic Bitch Slap or Orgasmic Shortcake both with histories reaching as far back as 2016.  Are these even puerh, really?  And how is it possible to have any reasonable clue about a five-year old recipe?

Now before casting the Puerh Junky as an inveterate curmudgeon, understand that he likes a young production as well.  However, it seems that age is the crux of puerh.  Only factories have productions old enough to determine the spirit of an offering.  Factory productions come from a lineage that is true to either the region or school or both.  What you end up getting then is a factory’s rendering, not dissimilar to the differences in pianists playing Schubert.  Such renderings make it nigh impossible to be categorically dismissive without sounding a smidge inexperienced.