I finally made my way to Sunsing today, as I thought I was going to do for quite a while now.
They sell lots of cakes, at prices that are not TOO expensive, but certianly not cheap. I was looking for newer cakes (can’t afford the old ones). I tried two today, both newer cakes that are their own private label. One’s a 2003, the other 2006. The 2003 one is a little weak — mild, pleasant, but not enough strength. It’s apparently a Dadugang cake, whatever that means.
The 2006 one is overwhelmingly smokey. The smoke lingers on, but I think beneath the smoke is a tea that has a lot of decent characteristics and doesn’t make you feel nasty after drinking it. I like that. The leaves are big and fat, and look quite nice. Price tag is a little high — $20 USD a cake. I’m not sure if I want to pay that much for some new tea….
I did, however, buy something — two issues of Puerh Teapot.
You should pretend to be a mainlander and start bargaining. It just might work…
No, too many mainlanders here who buy tea are people who go back to the mainland and resell it. They’re actually often the people who bargain the least — they can flip it around for a 3x to 4x profit.
I stand corrected…
Why are tea prices higher on the mainland than in Hong Kong?
For older puerh, the supply is very small in the mainland — much of the old puerh supply comes from places like Hong Kong.