Tag Archives: chinatea

Championship Round: Ripe Puerh

Posted on by Yang-chu
20 Jun

The Championship Round of the Ripe Puerh Challenge commenced on 14th June ’24.  Three contestants performed and that day, followed by the last two on the 15th.  Parameters for the championship round differed from the initial round in that 1) contenders sat out for about five days, 2) only two rounds drunk for each, with the second pushed considerably.  Initial round and championship round differed considerably.  In retrospect, all of the contenders reached the championship round in the first place because they performed best straight from storage.  This is to say that no production performed better than straight from storage.  This serves to reason as they all expressed stellar qualities to get them to the championship round in the first place.  This is not to say, however, that the duration for airing was too long.  For example, airing Merlot for only about 18 hrs dramatically increased its performance, while a cake (Hailanghao’s ’05 Jinseming) with an especially innovative fermentation approach on hand for 14yrs performed best it ever has after sitting out for more than two weeks.

Second, a pushed infusion doesn’t necessarily make for the most enjoyable drinking experience, though it does get to the innate character of the production.  Under ordinary circumstances, diluting or stacking of shorter infusions would have been in order.  Still, apprehending the innate character reveals more about the underlying material of the production itself.  Here, there’s no mistaking Yiwu with Menghai.

55, Zhongcha #1  Champion.

Zhongcha’s ’06 “55” commemorative continues evolving along a path of deepening sophistication.  Curiously, Baidu states that it is part of the 7581 series, which either seems wrong or raises more questions than it answers about what precisely “7581 series” constitutes.   No other 7581 is as populated with gold buds as the “55.”  One would think that “series” signals some established standard of material, fermentation, and other processing variables, but this doesn’t seem to be the case.  A previous entry discusses this.

Highlights: Bitterness, piney camphor, incense, cream, balanced sweetness, mushroom, cocoa deliciousness, big qi, cuts phlegm

Ripe Participants

  • Yiwu Commission, DQZ
    Creamy sweet, bitter finish, smooth, chocolate milk–> the second round push exhibited that Yiwu smoove, zero humid notes.
  • BZ Peacock King, LME
    Bitter!  Crazy clarity, dark chocolate then cream, piques salivation, icy-hot camphor, cotton mouth, light incense, cheeky–> would definitely have diluted second round.
  • Operation Macau, XH commission
    High camphor cream aroma, dry newspaper hint, slate, cream aftertaste, piques salivation; cream forward, camphor finish w/ mineral accent, bittersweet cacao, touch of roast, late aftertaste slight sour–> sweetest expression from first to second infusion by far.
  • Silver Peacock, XH
    Malty cream and roast, glass smooth, pecan, vanilla, bittersweet aftertaste–> even-Steven from first to second.

Ripe participants are probably listed in the order in which they placed, though personal preference increasingly trumps quality as they’re all good. Here’s a link to try for yourself.  Scroll down for “champions” selection. It consists of 16g of each participant.  The link will remain active till about 14th Jul ’24.

Sound the Zhongcha Trumpets

Posted on by Yang-chu
05 May

4 May 2024 will forever be remembered as the day to Sound the Zhongcha Trumpets!  It has to do with the 600g ripe commemorative acquired around Christmas ’14.  The pic is above.  The reason for the trumpet sounding?  This monstrosity has finally come into form!

Just last year I thought to myself, “maybe it’s really just a lame offering that’ll never amount to much.”  The difference a few months can make.  My feeling about ZC’s Purple Sky is quite similar, though by now I should know better.  There’s a prevailing perception that ripes do not require aging.  It’s imprudent to make such a sweeping generalisation, as factors vary greatly from one production and batch to the next depending upon the conception of the maker.  ZC is probably most notorious for this, realistically providing an absolute max of five recipes but executing varying permutations of material quality, processing, and fermentation to derive “new” productions.  As the saying goes, “if it ain’t broke. . . ”

The 60 has been tested religiously since its acquisition.  Less than 100g remain.  Every session till today has been “myeh”.  Some people like a dry brew, but dryness is an indication that the production hasn’t matured.  If the “55” serves as any basis for comparison, it seems even some of ZC’s raws take about 15 years before rounding into form, i.e., for the sweetness to come in and the tannins to impart richness as opposed to astringency.

A light bulb went off this morning.  The aroma is intensely roasty.  The brew itself requiring three-stacked infusions to reach the proper ratio of density to sweetness.  Such a deep vortex of roast and molasses-esque sweetness is evocative of LCGC and Boyou offerings.  Poof!  That’s where LCGC gets its “0081.”  Duh!  LCGC’s ’13 “0081” is scrumptious.  It’s their entry-level ripe that will soon be posted.  It is to such heights that this 60 has now climbed.

Not to be repetitive but 60 is a “7581,” but not all 7581s are equal.  Before delving further, it’s worth noting that 7581 is a standard-bearer among ripes.  In fact, it is considered one of the first, if not the first, “perfected” ripe recipe.  The “75” indicates the year of production.  The “8” indicates the size of the leaf forming the bulk of the recipe.  The “1” indicates the factory, Kunming Tea Factory, which since ’07 has been the principle entity holding the iconic Zhongcha (aka ChinaTea) trademark.  This recipe constitutes a conceptual tour de force, something now hard to imagine given that most ripes emulate this production style, a style epitomized by having navigated away from attempts at approximating aged puerh and tacking more toward the coffee vibe.

Incidentally, all of the ripe ZC Lunar/Zodiac series are 7581.  It’s fair to conjecture that this series provides the best opportunity to compare relatively recent 7581 vintages.  It’s certainly sufficient basis for mentioning in an ever-so-blasé manner among fellow tea tyrants, “but you know, the drought of _____ (insert year here) in Menghai really shortens the attack after the third infusion.”  Feel free to substitute “flood” for “drought.” Be creative, expositions needn’t be confined to just weather, but could also include religious, political or any other identitarian platitude of one’s choosing; the key is conviction.  Be forewarned. The jury is out on just how much puerh prominence one can possibly gain by talking 7581.  After all, it’s been crafted very much as being “the people’s” ripe.  It’s probably best to start such a conversation by noting thematic inconsistencies in the Zodiac/Lunar wrapper, finish with compression and leave it at that by circling back to talk about HK and Taiwan vendors.

In the past six months, I’ve had the opportunity to visit the ’12 7581 individually boxed brick, part of Ripe Sampler Group #1.  I picked up a slew around April ’15.  Tracking its transformation has formed the basis for a great education on the nature of ripes in general and the 7581 specifically.  Recently (since spring ’23), the brick started to take on some the berry notes often found in Hunan heicha.  There’s also a nice blend of creaminess.  After so much time, there’s a level of sweetness, roundness, and depth that just cannot be found in either a new or questionably stored brick of the same vintage. Yet satisfying as the brick may be, it is clearly comprised of more modest quality material than either the Snake or 60. . . or maybe it’s just that 2012 was an especially ordinary year.

Material quality does vary between cake, brick, and tuo, but there’s no consistent practice across factories.  ZC tends to be most recognized for their bricks, but as stated the ’12 brick doesn’t hold up to Snake nor 60. Curiously, the same year I picked up, unbeknownst to me, the first year Houde was offered.  An Instagram associate in HK recently posted some shots of his, so I gave Houde a visit after several-years’ hiatus.  Previous sessions where characterized as having a wretched cherry note and the lacking character of immaturity.  The recent session was actually quite pleasant, reminding me of that rotund gourmand extraordinaire.  Houde comes up because it’s from the same same year as the brick.  Houde is classed as an outstanding daily-drinker.  Productions from ’12-’16 are nowhere to be found in cake form but there are still some bricks around, which might indicate some batch variation.  Houde and the brick are in similar neighborhoods, with the former being slightly more durable.  Houde doesn’t approach the Snake or 60 either.  Tis time to circle back to 60 for now.

Whenever a treasure comes into form, a little fanfare is in order.  When it comes into form and is as good as the 60, then it’s positively time to sound the trumpets.  Pondering the finer points of 60 compared to 55 and Snake, both of the annual commemoratives were very tannic.  Befuddlement: recipes are highly guarded secrets.  At one time I would have said that by appearance alone that 55 was not 7581.  Filled with so many gold buds, “55” appears to be something else. . .  but for that matter every other 7581 is something else too, so it becomes extremely difficult to make any definitive calls even about what 7581 actually is.  The situation is complicated by storage variability, which is of incalculable importance.  Still, buds tend to make for a more tannic expression and for this reason alone it’s probably safe to assume that 55 is not 7581.  Another thing noticed about the 55 is that the qi seems to be getting more intense with the passing of each year, something not really noticed with the Snake, from which I’ve drunk much more parsimoniously.  After only a couple years the Snake appeared promising, in part because it wasn’t particularly tannic yet obviously already quite rich.  Frequent drinking would have only proven an indulgence at the expense of sampling productions about which there was less certainty in terms of it maturity and storage stability.  By Snake’s fifth year, through the fortune of plenty heat and humidity, a full explosion of petrichor and camphor emerged.

The 60 is victim of fairly stern compression, which in the long run may account for some of its splendor.  At 600g, size and compression mutually factor into the rate of transformation.  However, my cake has been drunk down to well less than 100g for over five years.  Interestingly, the 60 now is already much sweeter than the 55.  Blame it on 55‘s bud content. Naturally, not all recipes are crafted with the same sweetness in mind, as the delightful T8371 shows.  Conversely, 7581 should be unequivocally sweet and rich, barometers of maturity, storage, and quality.  By these measures, 60 has earned its trumpet, having not only become ready but also expressing some of the best that  7581 has to offer.

Recap

Ripes age.  The 7581 is a trailblazing ripe recipe, but not really meant to be expensive.  Nonetheless vintage, processing, storage, and age variability contributes to considerable variation in price.  Fermentation styles of ripes vary.  The maturation of 60 comes at year 14 of its evolution, which is roughly about the same amount of time required of 55.  Invariably, each offering has its charm.  The berry and cream in the ’12 brick stands in contrast to the dense petrichor and camphor of the Snake both have their place.  The 60, not for sale, is remarkably similar to the LCGC’s 0081, itself inspired by the ripe paragon, 7581.

Cheers!

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.