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I purchased a caddy of these back in September of this year from Tea Hong. This was my first pu’erh, and by extension my first shu cha.
I decided on this tea because I wanted something that would reduce the amount of time and effort required to prepare a good cup. Because pu’erh calls for boiling water and the “doses” are pre-measured, this particular tea delivered on that easily enough.Locked securely in a caddy and individually wrapped, the tea came in good shape. Of the 27 odd squares in the tube, not a single one had any signs of real damage, and none ever fell apart before blanching or brewing.Preparation takes a little extra time because of the need to blanch the leaves, but this can be reduced to a minimum if you boil enough water to both blanche and brew back to back. The squares fit into a regularly sized tea-ball with room to spare, even when at full saturation; a fact that greatly enhances the ease of preparation.The liquor that results from the first infusion in 250 ml of (at pour) boiling water for 4 minutes is very savory. I am not good at selecting the right adjectives for tasting, but the words I would select are “hay” and “mushroom”. It reminded me of days on the farm years ago, in a very pleasant way. There’s a certain sweetness behind it all, linked to the fore-flavor of hay. The flavor fades fairly rapidly, but leaves a pleasant aftertaste; not bitter or astringent, in my experience. I found the aftereffects to be very cleansing to the pallet, even after consuming some strongly flavored foods.Recurring infusions last alright out to the third, but I wouldn’t push it further. Second infusion is at 6 minutes, with the last normally being 8. Pretty generally, I do not remove the tea-ball on the last infusion. The second and third infusions have the same general profile, but the mushroom taste disappears and the hay flavoring is more subdued, with a greater focus on the “sweet”.I have paired this tea with several kinds of food, including pizza, hoagies and fast-food hamburgers / hot dogs. Always it leaves my mouth feeling clean; I can understand Leo’s words in one of the articles on shu cha. It also works when drinking after sweet foods – tried it with a chocolate once. I’ve also enjoyed it on it’s own as a dessert.I’ve only consumed these in a few different mugs, using a tea-ball all but a few times (using a strainer on those other times). I am unsure how this would infuse in a gaiwan or pot – I believe the leaves may be a bit small / broken for that.In my experience, this is a very handy tea – relatively easy to prepare and versatile. If you are in a location where you cannot accurately control water temperature, this is a great tea to have. I kept a few at work for a while and I’ll have to say it has spoilt me away from my usual work teas. At an inexpensive $8, I’d suggest adding it to your next TeaHong order. Even if pu’erh is not the highest on your personal list, the compact and pre-dosed nature makes it very easy to hand out as a gift – I’ve even given out some at home and the office.If this is where quality pu’erh begins, I think I have a wonderful journey ahead of me.M. -
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You are most welcome! The best part of these were how handy they were. My next order, I fully intend to grab at least one tube, primarily with the intent of taking them as easy travel-tea. Gifts are also good; I plan to start doing “tea tastings” with a few locals sometime around March – these would make appropriate and inexpensive “party favors”
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@MEversbergII, I am glad you like the tea. Even though this is a basic quality for us, I myself have worked quite some efforts to make it taste the best it could. It has also improved quite a lot since we started maturing it.
Small tips here for everyone: the price will rise for this batch when we introduce the next newer one early next year.BTW, very nice writing. -
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@M, Sure, I think a photo or two would definitely illuminate the article. You know, in Europe, they used to call this highly decorative and sometimes even narrative initial letter in ancient hand-copied literature “illumination”. It lights (light was a much rarer thing before) up the page for a person to read it. 😉
I asked pancakes, didn’t I? Though I surely want everybody to write their own tea reviews! -
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